Wedding Party

Danielle Vokal

Bride

Colin Nichols

Groom

Melissa Myers

Matron of Honor

Mel and I met and became friends at age 16 when I saw her reading Harry Potter in the break room at T.J.Maxx. We've stayed close friends for fifteen years, from high school to college to Mel joining the Navy and her getting married and having a baby. We drove MI to CA with stops at the Grand Canyon and some sketchy but awesome alien stores in the desert, wandering the casinos in Las Vegas and kayaking the ocean in San Diego. Our second cross country road trip was CA to VA with stops in San Antonio for the river walk, NOLA for the absolute BEST food, and Atlanta to the aquarium. We have had so much fun traveling the country or shopping, watching tv or playing board games. These days, she is a mom to Luke (who we love) and a wife to Nick (who we tolerate... just kidding, we love him too!).

Brian Anderegg

Best Man

I first met Brian at one of Nicholas' birthday parties and was instantly jealous of a Pokémon hat that he had. We became friends fairly quickly in middle school and retained a pretty strong friendship since. Brian loves to argue (have discussions? Argue?) almost as much as I do! He's also almost solely responsible for getting me into computer gaming, so we can all blame him for that. We share a love for music, games, science, and space and are constantly texting each other cool little factoids about any related topic. Usually this is followed by a significant 'deep dive' into that topic... We've gamed for probably hundreds of hours together, attended concerts together, and I know I can count on him whenever I need anything (even a graphics card!).

Ashley Denney (Bean)

Matron of Honor

Ashley and I met at birth, since our moms were close friends we were thrown together. Good thing we really liked each other and have been friends ever since! She moved to Indiana when we were kids but she would come up with her family to MI at least once a year and her parents knew to just drop her at my house for the week. We grew up loving all things witchy, with a deep love for the show Charmed where we spent so many hours pretending to me the Halliwell sisters. Or nights where we were home alone and would hear things in the woods and prepare for the inevitable home alone situation where we would have to protect the house from strangers. Colin and Zac have also become close and we all have a love for animals, antiquing, and of course food.

Nic Jorgenson

Best Man

Nic and I have been friends since Kindergarten. While we (slightly) went our separate ways in highschool and college, we had a sort of "re-connecting" after I starting dating Danielle. We've since grown closer than ever. We've had a lot of adventures together - making home movies (I specifically remember a Zelda one!), acting out entire movies while jumping on a trampoline, coming up with all kinds of intricate stories (books, movies, games, anything!) and even trying to start a few heavy rock bands together. We share a love of storytelling and music and we text everyday (even if it's just memes!). We both like to make each other laugh and are often the source of terrible dad-jokes, which will probably only worsen with time (or age like a fine wine!).

Kaitlynn Risi

Bridesmaid

Kaitlynn and I met on the bus in middle school when I was 11 and she was 10. We would walk through sketchy neighborhoods to each other's houses to rent scary movies at blockbuster, scrounge for enough change to buy double cheeseburgers and french fries off the dollar menu at McDonald's and taking shots of Sunkist that we spilled all over the carpet. We spent many nights wandering the neighborhood and got in trouble for it regularly. She came to all my family vacations to the cottage where we got in Just as much trouble. After high school she moved to NC and we text constantly in between visits. Kaitlynn is married now to her husband Joe and they have two beautiful daughters Elena, and Brenlee! After 20 years of friendship I know we'll be friends forever.

Andrew Nichols

Groomsman

Andrew is my only brother and we've been friends (and enemies! You know, siblings...) since birth. He's never one to live for a dull moment and has a tendency to liven up the room at any gathering or party. Some of my fondest memories with Andrew are the summer we spent on Grand Haven pier, salmon fishing every day. I would meet him there after work and sometimes I swear we'd spend ten hours on the pier, catching dozens of fish - sometimes we'd even amass a crowd of people watching! He has a great love and respect for the outdoors; part of my love for animals and nature definitely comes from our adventures together - whether it be salmon fishing, bow or spear fishing, camping, or trapping. He's also an excellent cook, even if he does eat it all while he's cooking!

Nicole Reeths

Bridesmaid

Nicole is like a sister to me. Her and her two siblings, Jenny and Jonathon and I spent most of our time together as kids. She was the one I always looked up to and copied her music style and her clothing style and I wanted all of the cool things her and her friends had. Thankfully she always had great taste so I lucked out following her path and her friends have always been very accepting of me as her shadow. We have grown up together and her and Kyle took me in and let me stay with them more than once when I was young and needed somewhere to go. As we get older I still look up to her as a big sister and am still close with her and her siblings. Colin and I have been having game nights with Nicole and her husband Kyle, for more than 5 years now with their kids Isla, Wyatt and Evie.

Zac Denney

Groomsman

I met Zac through Danielle's friend, Ashley. I remember Danielle being somewhat nervous (or maybe that was just me), hoping that we would get along well. We hit it off pretty instantly and became really good friends. Zac is one of those people that is always learning and researching something new, and we definitely share a love for learning. He has a deep love for cooking and makes some excellent food, as well as a love for the outdoors and for nature. Being the husband of a zookeeper, we also bonded over our interest in animals. Zac and I have had many adventures together - whether it be gaming together for twelve hours straight (hey, Danielle was on a road trip! What else was I supposed to do?) or running around in the mud at a much too-crowded Airsoft game. I look forward to many more!

Elainna Jorgenson

Bridesmaid

I met Elainna through Colin and his friend Nic, who is her husband. For years, I never knew her but as soon as we met, having a similar sarcastic and dark sense of humor and love for all things Disney, Harry Potter, witchy, and board games I knew we’d be friends. We have travelled multiple times together to Nashville and to Disney. I don’t know that I would have survived my excitement of Disney and Harry Potter park the first time we went with them if she hadn’t helped plan it all and guide me through it. We communicate mostly through sending funny memes to each other and spend a lot of time playing phasmophobia late at night. If possible we try to spend at least one night a week, if schedules allow, playing board games in someone's basement with Elainna and Nic.

Jon Reek

Groomsman

I met Jon through Danielle and we became friends pretty quickly! Jon has a huge heart and would do anything for his friends and family. I'm often jealous of his Lego collection and we share an interest in that as well as playing guitar and computer gaming. When he asked me to help him build his first gaming computer, I was ecstatic! I've since helped him upgrade it, although I'm sure he could wipe the floor with me on any of the games he plays.

Talia Luke

Bridesmaid

Talia and I literally grew up together. I met her when she was my neighbor at 10 years old (going on 20) and I was actually 20. She would come over and borrow books from me, do her homework - or we would trick Colin into helping her with math - or just hang out with us and watch tv , filling us in on her life and school. We would frequent barnes and noble or go school clothes shopping or I would let her raid my closet. I would remember myself at her age and tell her she wasn't allowed to date until she was 20. She didn’t listen. I lovingly nagged at her to get good grades and not do dumb things like I did. She mostly listened to that part. She will always be like a little sister to me, even though she will be 21 by the time the wedding rolls around (and not so little anymore).

Cameron McCormick

Groomsman

Cameron and I have been friends since highschool. We briefly attended college together before we both ended up dropping out - I moved to go to film school - and he found his way as an actor (and acted in every one of my film school movies!). Now, we work together at a movie theater and we've both gotten each other gigs in the film industry. He's very talented and the most easy-going person I've ever met. Aside from spending 12-14 hours a day on set with me (and being happy to do so!), he also dropped everything to pick up Danielle at the airport at 12am because my car died on the way there. Nothing is more important to him than friends and family.