Sometimes It Takes A Second Chance To Find The Perfect Love

Have you ever been so moved that you can actually feel it in your gut? Felt so sure about something that you couldn’t ignore or push aside? That’s how Sue Jean and Kenneth felt when they reunited for a casual dinner one early evening after having broken up for two years. It was pure chemistry.

“I was leaving to New York City for my fellowship and really wanted to catch up with her before I left,” Kenneth said of their fateful meeting (again).

“I was dating someone else at the time and wanted to keep this dinner as platonic as possible, so I picked a Vietnamese pho restaurant at four in the afternoon,” Sue Jean said, “but… I could not ignore how hard my heart was pounding and how much I had missed him.”

Their casual dinner lasted for over 5 hours with nonstop talking and when the two parted, it was clear that they still had real feelings for each other. Sue Jean stopped dating the other guy, and Kenny moved to New York City shortly thereafter and the two of them embarked on a year-long, long-distance relationship. "It wasn’t the most ideal situation, but it was truly a matter of absence that made the heart grow fonder… and time that made us more mature." “We both really appreciate what we have now and feel so lucky to have each other back in our lives again.”

When Kenneth finished his fellowship in NYC, he moved back to Southern California. During the holiday season, they took a trip back to NYC where Kenneth proposed to Sue Jean in their hotel room. The two of them had gotten a puppy (Lily) together in California and Kenneth had Sue Jean’s sister secretly wrap a picture of Lily posing in front of the ring sent up to the room.

We began the wedding planning process in early January. Our engagement lasted 10 months. Sue Jean’s favorite hotel is the Langham Huntington Hotel in Pasadena and upon visiting the site together, we decided it was the perfect fit for us. It is such a beautiful, elegant, and historic hotel. It was the only venue we visited.

Kenny and I wanted to do something different during the ceremony, so when the Langham approved our plans, we were more than ecstatic to plant an apple tree on their property to signify our unity. Apple to represent The Big Apple where we got engaged.

Sue Jean’s something old and borrowed were her grandmother’s rings which her aunt brought over from Maryland, her something blue was a ribbon sewn into her dress, and something new was the dress itself.

The ceremony almost got moved indoors as it began to rain in the morning and throughout the day. Rain was never in the forecast. Rain hadn’t been in the forecast for so long that we were in a statewide drought crisis for some time! As a matter of fact, the day before the wedding, during the rehearsals, it was a blazing 87 degrees! However, a mere 15 minutes before the ceremony, the skies cleared and we had the most gorgeous weather for our ceremony… including a rainbow!!

The next morning, after our hosted brunch (for all the family members and out of town friends), Sue Jean’s dad called us to let us know that her Grandpa had passed away peacefully in his sleep the morning of our wedding. He didn't tell anyone until after the wedding because he didn’t want to dampen our spirits. He said he kept praying and asking Grandpa to keep the rain away for our wedding… I want to believe Grandpa didn’t miss our wedding and came as the rainbow.