When we look back on 2015, we will most certainly remember it as the year of weddings.

We were invited to a grand total of — wait for it — 11 weddings this calendar year and have made it to 10 of them (including one via Facetime)! We thought our 9 in 2009 was a lot, but nothing could prepare us for the epic-ness that has been the wedding season of our late-20s.

I think it’s because there is something innately special about these later-in-life nuptials. They are either the product of long, leisurely courtships or short, quick engagements after meeting the one they never thought would come. No matter the journey, it has been an absolute treasure witnessing each couple grow in their love and set out on their own path, on their own schedule and in their own personal way.

But we’ll be honest, when we tell most people about our 2015 wedding count, they mostly look at us overwhelmingly and make disparaging comments about the time, money, and travel it must be taking away from our lives.

These are totally valid points, but that’s not the case at all.

We LOVE weddings! [Don’t listen to Jason’s grumbles. He loves them too.] Maybe it’s because we had so much fun at our own, but we see each one as yet another opportunity to eat good food, bawl our [my] eyes out, rendezvous with old friends, and dance like the silly people we truly are inside:

Yep, that’s most likely our attempt at Thriller

All of these amazing places and lovely people deserve their own post, but instead of inundating the webs with descriptions of our favorite menus, settings, playlists, dance moves, table conversations, flower girl breakdowns, and open bar selections, we will instead present a retrospective collage documenting each occasion.

Cue photo reel:

Megan Greaves and Patrick Geherin | January 31, 2015 | Denver, CO

Megan Dingwall and Reid Wilson | Wichita, KS | April 25, 2015

Nat Halvorson and Anna Drake | Portland, OR | May 23, 2015

Katie Kanady and Andrew Stanger | Oklahoma City, OK | June 13, 2015

Laura Mallory Lane and Matt Cahill | New York City, NY | September 5, 2015

Rebecca Frels and Bo Weinbaum | Beaumont, TX | September 6, 2015
[Yep, that’s us attending via Facetime.]

Lindsey Shoemate and Matt Meyer | Vail, CO | September 18, 2015

Lyndsay Ball and Nate Bradley | Golden, CO | September 27, 2015

Elizabeth Johnson and Jack Aldridge | Pittsburgh, PA | October 17, 2015

And then there was #10 — the final one of this wedding season. And boy, did we save a special one for last.

This one was for Sabine, who has been one of my nearest and dearest friends since the third grade. This girl has seen me through it all: all of the musicals, all of the awkward middle school growing pains, all of the heartbreaks, all of the family drama, all of the birthdays around my kitchen table, and all of the milestones. It’s impossible to vocalize what she means to me and the role she continues to play in our lives.

When Jason and I first started dating, we somehow found ourselves in Sabine’s company frequently. As a trio, we embarked on multiple wedding tours, reunions, and escapades and eventually founded a partnership that we now refer to as Team Tripod.

Team Tripod at our friend Rachel’s wedding in 2013

Her wedding was–to say the least–something we had been looking forward to for a long time. And it didn’t disappoint.

Because this wasn’t just a union between Sabine and her handsome groom Carson, it was also a collision of friends and family. Taking place in my home turf of Wichita, KS, this wedding was one of those rare opportunities that allowed us to reunite with our oldest friends in the world and spend quality time with our immediate and extended family.

It was also an excuse to eat EVERYTHING.

Public at the Brickyard

Hurts Donuts

Not pictured: lunches at SpringRo and Tanya’s Soup Kitchen, bachelorette drinks at Siena Tuscan Steakhouse in the Ambassador Hotel, a rehearsal dinner at B&C BBQ, and a post-ceremony, pre-reception happy hour at Firebirds. We know how to eat, okay?

But for all of the meals and company, the cornerstone of the weekend was undoubtedly Carson and Sabine’s wedding ceremony, which took place at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in downtown Wichita. Much like our wedding venue, it was one of those beautiful settings that didn’t need a single flower. All it needed was two doting people, an effervescent priest, and gorgeous music to fill it from floor to spire.

And, of course, given that it was a full Catholic Mass ceremony, it gave me more than ample time to cry. It came on first during the opening Gloria when the cantors harmonized like angels; it came again when the organ and string quartet heralded an instrumental arrangement of “You Are Mine” [we still get chills thinking about it]; it wouldn’t stop when the priest spoke about how  the world needed more marriages like theirs and how the Heavens had parted during the Gloria so the angels could come and celebrate with them [took the words right out of my mouth]; and it made its final appearance during Carson and Sabine’s vows. Because when the bride chokes on her vows, I’m a goner.

But nothing could compare to the waterworks that were to come during the reception, when Sabine’s father, Bob, began his long-awaited toast. I’ve known Sabine’s parents since I was in elementary school, and there is simply nothing sweeter or more endearing than hearing a man you have respected since you were 8 years old talk about his daughter, your dear friend. Let’s just say I had to call on a few nonjudgmental people to snap me out of it, because it was getting out of hand.

But I can’t help it. I will always cry at weddings, and most especially ones like these. There is just something so beautiful about watching one of your best friends marry the man of her dreams. A man that is just as ridiculous as he is sincere — whose love for life is infectious and whose love for Sabine is undeniable. Carson was truly the most excited-to-get-married groom we had ever met.

We couldn’t be happier that these two lovebirds found one another and that our Team Tripod is now officially Team Quadpod.

Thus, the tenth and final wedding of 2015 has come to an end. But while it might be time to close the books on the 2015 wedding season, it will be absolutely impossible to forget the lingering joy in our systems from all of the love and laughter that has saturated our lives over the past 12 months.

Plus, we came home to our first Save the Date of 2016. So there’s that…