We are halfway through 2021! We are so thankful that all of our family and friends have had the opportunity to get the vaccine and return the world to a sense of normalcy. So - I don't know about you, but I'm feeling 2022! TRANSPORTATION If you are staying at the Grand Beach Resort, we will be providing transportation to and from the hotel to Paradise Cove for the Wedding Day on Sunday. The Boat Shuttle will begin an hour prior to the ceremony (3:30pm-4:30pm) for a continuous loop. The Van Shuttle service will begin an hour prior to the event ending and continue to run through the breakdown (10:00pm – 12:00am). DISNEY RESERVATIONS Disney is utilizing a reservation system to manage park entry. We do not know how long this system will be in place or how long reservations need to be made in advance. We recommend making your reservations as soon as possible to ensure the park you wish to visit is available. Park Hopper tickets at this time allow you to visit one park first and then other parks after 2pm. We have kept Saturday, January 22, 2022 free of any wedding events so all of our guests and bridal party can visit the theme park of their choosing. Matt and I will be in Epcot then Magic Kingdom on Saturday and welcome all those who wish to join us. Both parks are connected via a monorail and are easily traversed. SCAVENGER HUNT We are so excited to keep the wedding weekend fully interactive with all of our guests, so we have partnered with Eventzee in creating a scavenger hunt using your mobile device during Saturday's open day at the Disney Parks. There will be a prize at the reception for the individual or couple that receives the most points Bring your phone power packs and thinking caps!

We have great news! We have officially booked our NEW date at a NEW venue! Matthew and Catalina will be getting married on **Sunday, January 23, 2022** at Paradise Cove Orlando. We are SO excited to officially get this party started! We want to thank you all again for your patience as we navigate post-covid wedding planning.  Little did we know back in March that this would last into 2021, with no true end in sight. Our number one priority is that everyone feels comfortable and safe enough to gather, celebrate, and that our family and friends can dance together without any worries. We truly feel that by January 2022, this will be possible. Unfortunately, Disney's wedding department was affected with the massive company layoff, and they are working with extremely limited staff and a huge backlog of postponed weddings while also managing  new inquiries daily. It's difficult to get in touch with anyone or get answers. While we understand they are understaffed and backlogged, it's frustrating that we can't reach out to plan our wedding until 3 months out because immediate brides continuously take precedence and we feel like a burden to the team. For this reason, we've decided that it's finally time to stop waiting for Disney. We do plan to incorporate the parks and resorts in our pre and post wedding activities! Our new wedding date is Sunday, January 23, 2022. Unfortunately due to all the postponements, the  2021/2022 wedding season has been busier than ever and all Saturdays in January - March were booked. The venue has a noise ordinance and the event must end by 11pm, which we hope is early enough for locals to return to work the next day, and our out of town guests to catch an early flight on Monday. We can't wait to celebrate with you all!

We hope that you have been staying safe and healthy during this crazy time. We wanted to provide you all with an update regarding our upcoming wedding at Walt Disney World in Florida. The continued uncertainty of the virus has made it difficult for us to get any specific information from Disney regarding our event in January. All we know is that their guidelines are very strict due to their scrutiny in the media, so they will continue to be extremely cautious from now until the foreseeable future. Those guidelines include a maximum of 50 guests, maximum 4-5 guests per table, no fireworks, no characters, no park-hopping, multiple resort closures within our room block, and face coverings for everyone including the bride and groom with no exceptions for photos during the ceremony or reception. Unfortunately for these reasons, holding our ceremony and reception at Walt Disney World will no longer be possible at this time as we want to have all our friends and family celebrate with us safely, while still enjoying the full magical experience we all know and love from Disney. We spoke with our wedding planner yesterday, and in order to provide all our guests with ample time to adjust their travel plans - we have decided to postpone our wedding until January 2022. We want to thank you all for your patience since our engagement in April of 2018. We have always had our heart set on Disney as our venue, and we never imagined it would be this difficult to secure a date, even before throwing a global pandemic in the mix. We will be working with our vendors (and the farmers' almanac) to determine our new date, and will continue to provide updates as soon as we have more information. Disney will not allow us to officially confirm a new date until exactly 12 months from the new date, so we will be sending out "Change the Dates" this upcoming January once we have the date secured with Disney.

"Another Floridian crazy enough to move to Chicago." That line was all it took. After spotting a UCF shirt in the North side of Chicago, Matthew and Catalina quickly hit it off after chatting about their overlapping time in Orlando, FL where Matthew attended the University of Central Florida. Their first date was at a hole in the wall featured on "Diners, Drive In's, and Dives" called Bop n` Grill, located steps away from Catalina's college Loyola University Chicago. Luckily, Matthew lived closer to Loyola than the graduate school he was attending, Illinois Institute of Technology, tucked away in Chicago's south side. Lunch at Bop n` Grill went so well, that Matthew (accompanied by his then roommate and now groomsman Phillip) met Catalina again that night at a popular Loyola hangout Bar 63. Two dates in one day turned into a year of becoming inseparable, creating countless memories and making the most out of every second they had together. From Midwestern cities, to the ski slopes of Wisconsin, the cliffs of Michigan, through the open roads of Kentucky and Tennessee, down to the beaches of Florida, Matthew and Catalina went everywhere together, and couldn't be more grateful for making the life changing decision they made to move to Chicago.

After years of hearing about the beauty of Catalina Island, located off the coast of California, Catalina constantly relayed those stories to Matthew. Now that the two were living in San Diego, CA, Matthew knew that this was the perfect opportunity to make this dream a reality for Catalina. Matthew planned a weekend trip to the island that began with the ferry over, accommodations at the gorgeous Hotel Metropole, and a plan to tie in their Chicago roots with an unforgettable hike up to the Wrigley Botanical Gardens. Little did Matthew know, this destination was a two mile hike, but that just built the excitement and anticipation as they both reached the top early in the morning. Matthew and Catalina stood in the Wrigley Memorial built in 1933, with commanding views of Avalon Bay and the entire island below, when Matthew proposed. There was not a soul in sight, and it felt as though they had the entire island to themselves in that perfect moment.