Heather & Wes - A Love Story

I photographed a very unique wedding in January for Heather and Wes Grinnell. I asked Heather for some background information and received the beautiful love story that follows. Please read -

We met in the summer of 1995 while planning a going away party for a mutual friend leaving for college. We had such a wonderful time together, that Wes asked me out to dinner. We were together all through my High School years and were still together when my sister, Suzy, was born. We did everything together. We dated for the next few years and were completely inseparable and totally in love.....it was that head over heels, home run out of the ball park kind of stuff...and everyone knew it!

In 2003, we started seeing each other again and realized that we didn’t want to spend another minute apart from one another and that nothing in life mattered more than spending the rest of it with each other.

Wes has been everything to me and been there through everything with me.
We have been through births and deaths together and stood strong, holding hands, through it all. He was there with me and my family when both my father and my Uncle Bill passed away and has been my best friend, my foundation, my rock and my love through it all.
Our service was lovingly dedicated to the memory of my father, John Dabney, who, I have no doubt, sent Wes to care for me for the rest of my life.

Wes works at LRMC as a Surgical Technologist & I work at the Lake County Judicial Center as a Judicial Assistant.

Well, Wes proposed while we were on the horse and carriage in Mt. Dora. It was on Valentine’s day, which was extra special because it was also the 3 year anniversary of my father’s death. Wes knew my dad very well and while he was still on his knee, he said that he proposed on this day because he knew that my dad would have wanted us to celebrate a day all about love, and not morn his loss. He was right! We LOVE Mt. Dora and knew we wanted to get married there. We also knew that we wanted to get married when it was cold outside (or as cool as it gets in FL); and per Wes’ request, he wanted to get married at the same time it was when he proposed, 7:30p.m. So, we began the hunt. I have a very dear friend who is an attorney in the area and she told us that Donnelly Park left their Christmas lights up the entire month of January. We immediately fell in love with the idea and checked into it right away! We have since been informed, that we were the first couple to ever get married under the lights of Donnelly Park!

Then began the hunt for the photographer!!! Most of the ones we met with were not experienced enough with photographing at night...and particularly not a wedding with tons of little white lights. Then we met Dan. We fell in love with Dan right away and he felt confident that he could capture the lights just as I had hoped! As we worked with Dan for our Engagement pictures and then again with my formal sitting, I became more and more impressed with his work!

Thank you Dan, for capturing our very special day and taking such amazing photographs for us to look back on for a lifetime!