How did the two of you meet?
We were matched up by EHarmony at the beginning of January 2016. We spent a brief time talking online and over the phone. A few months later, we met in person when Kuben came to visit the US. Since then, we’ve been traveling back and forth between the US and South Africa every few months, spending about 3 weeks at a time together.
Give us the proposal details! When? Where? How?
Kuben proposed while I was visiting him in Johannesburg, South Africa. It was my first trip abroad! He made arrangements for us to stay at a resort called Forum Homini, which is located in an area known as the ‘cradle of civilization’ because some of the oldest known human fossils were found nearby. The rooms of the resort are recessed into the ground, creating the impression of being inside a cave. Kuben proposed privately on the patio of our room with a ring he had worked on with a local jeweler to design. He wanted the ring to include 2 diamonds his father had gifted to his mother many years before. After the proposal, we spent the day on the grounds of the resort and had dinner at their restaurant, Roots. The whole experience exceeded anything I could have dreamed of!
What has been your favorite experience planning the wedding?
Because of delays in our immigration processing, our wedding date had to be moved back by a few months (not my favorite part!). This rescheduling chaos created the opportunity to fulfill one of my late uncle’s wishes, that I get married at Disney World! As it happened, we had already booked our honeymoon (family included) at Disney for the first week of December. After we realized the date would have to be moved back, we thought it through and decided to hold our ceremony while on the trip, then host a large reception after we return. Although changing our wedding date was a less than pleasant experience, having the opportunity to plan a Disney wedding with my uncle’s memory in mind has been a really meaningful experience.
How do you stay sane under the pressures of wedding planning?
Honestly, the wedding planning has been a minor stress point compared to the K-1 Visa immigration process. My mother has been the main force in pulling everything together, and she has kept us all grounded and focused on the goal of getting Kuben into the US and to the altar!
What is your favorite part of using Joy for your wedding?
The ease of updating and the aesthetic of the final site.
What piece of advice would you give couples to ensure that they use Joy to its fullest potential?
I am a communications coordinator, myself. I handle all website content and development for projects I work on. The site is super user-friendly and looks fantastic as a finished product. If I had one piece of advice for those using Joy’s services, it would be to spend time at the front end of working on their website figuring out how Joy’s tools can best tell their story. Explore the design options, customize to make their site blend with their wedding aesthetic. Take time to determine how they can best integrate their site into their wedding experience…We’re only just sending out our save the dates, so we’re still adding content. But we’ve used ours to add our immigration timeline, we plan to use it for event photos. There’s so much there that couples can use to really incorporate their site into their guests’ experience. Take time and maximize it all!
At Joy we believe that even though a wedding lasts a day, joy lasts forever. What does that mean to you?
The road to our wedding date has been bumpy at times. It’s been important to keep finding and reminding ourselves of joy and happiness along the way. Life doesn’t always unfold the way we plan, joy keeps us anchored to our purpose, our ‘why’. That’s a lesson that we plan to take with us past our wedding day, and on into our marriage for many years to come.
