On Wednesday March 15th at approximately 9 p.m., I got a random text message from Erika asking me guess what? Honestly, it could have been anything...it's Erika. Minutes go by and I was wondering if she was actually going to answer me. A message pops up, Zac just asked me to marry him. I was like, seriously? I asked because they like to be weird and tell us strange stuff sometimes. She says, yes, really. I added, oh, how did it go down? She said, they were just hanging out and he just randomly asked her. She told me she said yes. I told her I would keep it to myself because it's not my news to tell everyone. She said okay and told me that she would tell everyone else the next day.
The next few events escalated quickly.
She told Mom the next day thought a text message because the news was so late in the evening that she was already in bed, so she received it when she got up to go to work. Then Erika wrote the big news in a family text thread that Friday, so everyone was able to find out the big news.
Throughout the next couple weeks, Mom and I, talked to Erika about a small family wedding possibly for the end of July. She actually agreed to it but she and Zac drug their feet about making decisions and getting stuff done. The first scenario was having it down at Zac's mom's house in Vancouver. So that's what we planned for.
The end of May and into June, Erika talked about getting out of their rental house because they were tired of dealing with the neighbors, the neighbor's dogs and the landlord, and considered looking into getting their own place. The main reason was that we couldn't have the wedding at his mom's house anymore because his dad wanted to come to the wedding. That changed the first scenario and back to the drawing board. For a while, there weren't any good housing possibilities but ended up getting a relator to do some of the work for them.
They got immersed in some of the paperwork and because Erika had access to her GI Bill from being in the military, it would be easier for them to purchase a house if they were married. So, they decided on a courthouse wedding on June 10th and paid the fees and had all the appropriate paperwork ready to go. I thought that was hilarious because that was the only available day at the venue, we wanted our wedding to be at in Chehalis. I thought it was too soon and it would probably rain. Guess what? I was right. It did rain.
She called me the Monday before and asked if Ben and I wanted to be the witnesses. I said sure, we can do that. She said not to tell anyone because they didn't want to make it a big deal and they didn't want a lot of people there. I told her we would keep it to ourselves. She gave us a few more pieces of information like, where it was, what time, etc. We wrote it on the calendar and planned to be there with our nice clothes on.
The day of, Ben and I got up, got ready and jumped into his Edge around 10:20 so we could be in Olympia by 10:45. When we got there, we circled the parking lot a few times because I had no idea where building three was. I've only been to the courthouse once and that was back in 2017 when we took Suzanne to court for being a deadbeat roommate and trying to kill my cat, Calvin. We all got out and found building three.
We stood there chatting and Erika showed us her homemade bouquet she made from Dollar Tree items. As it got closer to 11, two more couples came and one of those couples were military and invited their entire family to bear witness. That included about 30 people that flew in from various places of the US to be there.
Around noon, I got cold and had Ben go get my sweatshirt and Zac got his hat since we had been standing outside of the building for over an hour without any updates on the situation. I can't believe no one was there to let us in knowing they had several appointments that day. We tried calling all the phone numbers on their website, people tried coming up with "clever ideas" to get the cops to come to the courthouse, it was getting daunting and hopeless. I really didn't want to spend my entire Sunday standing at the courthouse without any direction.
Erika took initiative and called the non-emergency 911 number to find out if anyone could get a hold of someone who works at the courthouse or to find out why we were not being helped. The one couple left because they were tired of waiting but the military couple and all of their guests stayed. They talked to us a couple times throughout the wait. Erika did get a hold of the sheriff's office and explained the situation. They knew who to call and told Erika to wait for their phone call after they talked to a few people. They called her back after about 15 minutes and told us they got a hold of a judge, who spoke to the other judges to find out who was supposed to be there. He told us someone would be in at 12:30. She thanked them for helping us out.
It approached 12:30 and a guy in plain clothes let us all in through the front door. He apologized profusely for his tardiness. He gathered all of us into the lobby, with the appropriate paperwork in his hands, and explained what was going to happen. Erika and Zac were called up first. We went into the room and the judge frantically got his stuff organized while explaining to us what had happened.
His son recently had surgery and while his son was recovering something went wrong and he had to go up to Harborview in Seattle and got back really late. He forgot his was supposed to fill in for another judge and it totally slipped his mind. We told him it was okay. He had Erika and Zac sit at the table while he explained the paperwork, he had them sign in the appropriate places and Ben and I were the witnesses and had to sign a couple places.
He got his robe on and had everyone stand up and started his ceremony. He had Erika and Zac hold hands while he read through his script. The rings were exchanged, promises were made and repeated and he then pronounced them man and wife and they sealed it with a smooch. I got a few pictures of the newly wedded couple. We left the room and the military couple's family cheered for Erika and Zac. We left the building and decided we were going to follow Erika and Zac to go find some food to thank us for being witnesses to the wedding and waiting a long time.
We agreed to go to the Outback Steakhouse. We were actually seated right away, we ordered a bloomin' onion, Erika and I had drinks, I decided to try the lavender drink, we ate bread, ordered food and hung out a bit. Erika got the shrimp and rice, I had the chicken, broccoli and fries, Ben had the steak and shrimp pasta, and Zac got the bloomin' burger. We ate our food, sent weird text messages to Doug, paid and Erika and Zac thanked us again for helping out.
Ben said since we were over on the westside, he wanted to take care of a few errands. We went to the disc golf store, TJ Maxx, Bed, Bath and Beyond and World Market. I found a few things at World Market for my cooking endeavors. We got home, changed our clothes, did a few things around the house and then took a two-hour nap because all the sanding and waiting around made me tired. Ben played his game and then I worked on putting together addresses for invites to our wedding.
Next Adventure: Kitsap and Olympic Peninsula Shop Hop and Geocaching
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