The Pavilion at Holiday Inn & Suites Lake Elmo

Wedding Ceremony

Guardian Angels Catholic Church (Peter O'Neill Hall)

Reception Feast

Summer

This is a child-free event. If this means you can't attend and need to stay home with your kiddo(s), we 100% understand. They're important, after all!

Our Wedding

If you ask Patricia: In 2018, my old college gaming group lost a member of our Pathfinder campaign and needed a replacement. Our GM suggested a friend known to everyone but me, so he threw a little pizza party to see if all of us would vibe together. Caleb showed up and we all had a fun hangout, but we were both seeing other people at the time, so we were just friends for many years. Fast forward to May 2021-- the pandemic was in full swing and Caleb suddenly needed a new place to live. He reached out to me for assistance. As luck would have it, I was moving out of a 2-bedroom apartment and my roommate wanted to stay in the unit, but couldn't without someone else to help pay rent. I got them to meet each other a couple times before Caleb moved in. After that, Caleb and I hung out a lot more often, including being in more tabletop games together. We would get together for food or just to talk about the stressors in our lives. We grew closer bit by bit, though neither of us noticed as it happened. Then in December of the same year, we both got COVID. Caleb still had a roommate, so I offered for him to come live on my futon in the livingroom to keep to keep roomie from getting sick, and so that we could be miserable in quarantine with company. Though there was a lot of tissues, cough syrup doses, and mid-day fatigue naps, we also binge watched a bunch of things on streaming services and downloaded the early access version of Baldur's Gate 3 (and conversations about BG3 events had us in stitches well into the crack of dawn). It wasn't until we both tested negative and Caleb packed up to leave that both of us realized we didn't want the adventure to end. &lt;3 -------------------------------------------- If you ask Caleb: The funny thing about memory is that it can sometimes fail us, especially when many years are involved! Sometime in 2016, was invited by a good friend at UWRF to hang out, play some games, and get to meet some of the local college folk. I wasn't informed of the scale though! Out of the 15+ people I met there, many would become long standing friends. One person in particular was a lady named Patricia. She swears up and down that we didn't meet there, but I suppose that's what this section is for. :P Fast forward a few years and we once again found ourselves playing table top games together at our friends' cramped dining room table. Over many months of rolling dice, eating terrible food, and telling even worse jokes, we formed a solid friendship that only grew for the next four years (much like she said in her blurb up above). Enter COVID-19! During a bout of the plague that we both contracted, we decided to try and keep the germs from getting to other folks by holing up together. I gotta tell you, you learn a good amount about somebody and how you feel about them when you're stuck together for a week! We understood that there might be something beyond simple friendship when it came time to leave... and now we're getting married!

Long term side effects of COVID-19 may include marriage.

The Princess & her Prince

Neither of us actually remember -meeting-, just that at some point we did and we've been hard to separate ever since. (No, literally-- we adopted each other's speech patterns and mannerisms for YEARS. Thanks, neurodivergence!) It was either an anime picnic or an Eagle Anime event that brought us into each other's orbit initially, but the deal was sealed in 2008 when she signed on to cosplay Marluxia from the Kingdom Hearts franchise for the group hrtznaoplz, which I managed and cosplayed Vexen for. We have been through so many life lessons and growing pains together, and I am infinitely grateful both that she is a constant presence in my life and that she's agreed to be my maid of honor. She's also an English major, so if you DON'T cry at her reception speech, we're putting you in jail. ;p

~ Autumn Jerlstrom, maid of honor ~

One day in Mrs. Frickey's PM kindergarten class, a quiet girl with brown hair and glasses was minding her own business and playing with some 3D shape blocks. A blonde girl who also had glasses saw this and thought the other girl looked lonely, so she planned the best social interaction her little autistic brain could come up with... She grabbed an egg-shaped oval block, sat on it, and yelled "BAWK BAWK, I'M A CHICKEN!" The quiet girl laughed. She's been laughing for 28 years. Emily has been my best friend since we were five years old. I will never understand how she didn't just write me off as a weirdo, but I cannot be more thankful that she chose friendship instead. She was my only real friend through elementary school, and even when her family moved away, we called each other all the time and got together for sleepovers. Honestly, we still get together for sleepovers to this day. Everyone needs a friend that they can be their absolute weirdest self with and she's always been there for me, no matter what.

~ Emily Anderson, bridesmaid ~

I'm gonna admit that my first feeling toward Emilie was "intimidated." She was one of the professional-level cosplayers that I had seen at Anime Detour and other cons for a couple years, winning awards and looking like she literally popped out of the anime her character was from. I was still a teenager and looked up to her, but we only really knew each other in passing. When I posted on the message boards of our local cons to start forming a cosplay group, I was floored when she responded that she'd like to join as Saïx. I couldn't believe that someone of her talent was interested in hanging out with us. We made a lot of good memories while cosplaying Kingdom Hearts, but in later years, we also went on to do characters together from Hetalia and My Little Pony. I learned so much from her along the way! Life's had a lot of ups and downs since those early days, but I'm deeply thankful that we came out of them together.

~ Emilie Bailey, bridesmaid ~

Some 20-odd years ago, I met this nifty guy in 5th grade. His hair was cut so short that he almost looked bald, and he often carried around Dungeons &amp; Dragons books. After realizing we had a shared interest in fantasy and small interlinking plastic blocks (Lego League!), Matt and I became fast friends. I don't think it's ever a cognizant realization of that gradual shift from childhood friend to lifelong friend, but over the many years our bond has only deepened. Our shared life experiences, be they rough housing and hurting each other when we were young, actually going to the gym regularly as we got older, or the intensely introspective conversations along the way, we've truly built something special in regards to friendship. Years have passed, his hair is now longer, but we are, at our core, the same nerds that met all those years ago. I am honored to have the world's nicest man by my side to call friend.

~ Matthew Brisbin, best man ~

I've been good friends with Mack ever since we met at the University of River Falls some 8 years ago. We initially bonded over 24-hour Lord of the Rings marathons and tabletop RPGs, but quickly found that the Venn diagram of our interests was basically one solid circle. What started as simply sharing interests and passions, quickly turned into meeting up 3-4 times a week to not only game, but to have long conversations about any part of life you can imagine. A few road trips to Indianapolis for conventions certainly gave us time for that, too! In rough times, Mack proved to be one of the handful of folks willing to stand up for me, and for that, I'm forever grateful. I'm very honored to have him by my side on our wedding day.

~ Mack Wilda, groomsman ~

Robert, Bob, Jarred, or Herman, no matter what you call him, he's been my brother for the better part of twenty-eight full years, and I wouldn't have it any other way. There's no real good way to summarize the relationship with a sibling, but here's an attempt: When I was born he immediately claimed me as his own, trotting me along like his new favorite pet. Then I entered the Terrible Twos and shrieked all the time, disabusing him of that particular trait. When I was 5, I decided that I needed to be his shadow; I took the job so seriously that he accidentally fell on me, practically dislocating my shoulder! I, of course, learned nothing from that experience and kept trying to do everything he did. I think I probably annoyed the snot out of him... I must have, because he shut me in the toy chest and sat on it once! It wasn't until I started to actually form into a full human being that could rationalize that he circled back, seeing me as someone he could teach French to. I never did learn. We talk the same, we laugh the same, we argue the same, and we both possess the same level of pedantry. I love him dearly, but never let it be said that we are similar!!

~ Jarred Overman, groomsman ~

The Royal Adventuring Party

Photos

Q + A

This is the hotel with our room block! It will be held open for you until June 7th, 2024, but you might still be able to reserve a room after that.

Holiday Inn & Suites St. Paul NE - Lake Elmo, an IHG Hotel

Lodging

The official theme of this wedding is Dungeons &amp; Dragons! The recent D&amp;D movie (characters pictured above) might be a good reference to watch if this is all totally new to you. If you're already familiar with D&amp;D, feel free to do basically whatever you want. No real weapons with your outfit though, not even peace bound. If you are NOT familiar with D&amp;D, it includes concepts seen in medieval fantasy like The Lord of the Rings-- elves, wizards, knights, that sort of thing. Costumes and outfits that give that vibe would fit right in. We are aware that we've invited "normal" friends and family to our special day as well. ;p Our first suggestion as an alternative to D&amp;D would be anything you might wear or dress as to a renaissance festival. Bards, fairies, vikings, you name it. It might be a good idea to check your local ren fest's website for their vendor list so you can do online shopping that way. Otherwise there are plenty of folks on Etsy who make attire that fits this theme. Our second backup suggestion is clothes that lean toward bohemian; flowy and floral can work. And of course, if all else fails, we'd rather have you THERE dressed like you're at a normal wedding than not have you at all, so please do that if it's most comfortable to you!

Patricia & Caleb

Patricia & Caleb

Registry