A Gazebo wedding

[weddingneedさん]

A courtship that started and progressed for months via Facebook and phone
calls resulted in a wedding last Friday in the public gazebo on Lafayette
Street. The wedding of Danny Keith VanDusen and Kimberly Ann Leach, now
VanDusen, was held on the anniversary of the first time the two ever
communicated.

A mutual friend who had lived in Ohio, where Leach lived, had moved to
Marianna and got to know VanDusen, who lives here in the Southside Apartments
complex. Thinking they’d like each other, she helped them connect on April 15,
2015.

Beginning with their first phone call shortly after that first Facebook
exchange, the two talked every night, usually from 8 p.m. until 3 a.m. the next
morning.

They told each other their histories, their current circumstances, their
likes and dislikes. They learned they had some things in common -- both favor
Italian food and they like the same kind of music, for instance.

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And there was another party to those calls, Danny’s 11-year-old son Hunter.
He often talked to the woman he now calls “Mama Kim,” and put his seal of
approval on the union months ago.

His dad and his new step-mom met face-to-face for the first time on his dad’s
birthday. Danny had sent Kim a Greyhound bus ticket and she persevered through
some travel complications on that trip to finish the 23-hour journey across more
than 700 miles.

“She seemed like an angel stepping off that bus,” VanDusen said. “We both
knew without saying a word that we were meant to be together.”

She came back to Marianna on Christmas morning, 2015, arriving around 5 a.m.
to celebrate the holiday with VanDusen and son. The groom-to-be went back to
Ohio with Leach in order to meet her family as the New Year rolled around. She
came back with him to Marianna and has been here ever since.

VanDusen has met her daughter, Ashley Erbaugh, and will meet her son Jeffery
Kerr in days to come. He’s been approved by her mom, a widow, and she’s been
approved by his mom and dad.

With those well-wishes in hand, the two moved quickly to set up their April
wedding.

With the bride set on getting married in a gazebo, they chose the one in
downtown Marianna since their wedding would be a small affair.

VanDusen’s best man was Patrick Davis, his friend and the maintenance man at
his apartment complex. Son Hunter served as the ring-bearer. The flower girl was
the daughter of another buddy, who took some pictures at the ceremony.

Kim’s maid of honor was Ashley Gabrielle, the girlfriend of the best man.
Gabrielle provided the bride’s traditional “borrowed” item, too, lending her a
colorful bracelet to wear during the ceremony.

Notary Wanda Drake performed the ceremony and the couple wrote some vows to
accompany her traditional text.

Louise Holland, a neighbor in the local apartment complex, made their wedding
cake. They served Kool-aid with it, pouring it from a large jug that Hunter won
in a drawing.

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The couple lit union candles to symbolize the joining of their families.

Kim and her best friend in Ohio, Karen Loy, had picked out her veil and
flowers for the wedding at a Goodwill store in Ohio. Kim stitched in the glitter
band on her veil by hand and arranged the flowers with a little help from the
best man in getting them attached to the gazebo.

Despite a mostly-rainy wedding day, a few friends braved the weather to
witness their marriage.

The bride and groom are going to Panama City for a weekend honeymoon on his
birthday.