wine country inn

Happy New Year from The Wedding Pink

Happy New Year and thank you to all who have supported us.

It has been an exciting year and here are some of the highlights.

Our 3rd annual Wedding Pink was held in May at the Wine Country Inn in Palisade, Colorado. Erin and Ben had a beautiful wedding and celebrated with their family and friends.

breast-cancer-wedding-giveawayErin and Ben

Erika and Michael were selected as the recipients of the 4th annual Wedding Pink which will take place this coming May at Crooked Willow Farms in Larkspur, Colorado.

wedding-pink-2014Erika and Michael

A couple of Erika's friends surprised her at Anna Be Bridal Salon when she was trying on wedding dresses. This is one of my favorite videos of all times. Thank you to All Digital Photo and Video for producing it for us.

The Wedding Pink Dress Surprise from Cheryl Ungar on Vimeo.

Our lovely bride Erika is dress shopping at Anna Bé Bridal Boutique, who graciously donated a dress, and little does she know that her fiancé, Mike, has arranged for her two best friends to fly into town to surprise her.

The Wedding Pink is an annual wedding giveaway package presented to a couple whose lives have recently been touched by breast cancer. For more information please visit our site, www.theweddingpink.com

Huge thank you to Nicole at All Digital Photo and Video for producing this video.
http://www.alldigitalphotoandvideo.com/

 

 

Melissa and Jeff, the recipients of the first annual Wedding Pink, brought our first pink baby, Fenn, into the world.

breast-cancer-survivorMelissa, Jeff and Fenn

We would also like to announce our new advisory board members, Erin & Ben and Ann Marlin of Cloud 9 Weddings. 

Stay tuned for some exciting announcements coming in January!

 

 

 

 

Ben's Wedding Pink Adventure

The following was written by Ben, the groom of The Wedding Pink 2013. Since Erin recently shared her journey with us we felt it was appropriate for Ben to tell us his experience.


It was a beautiful fall day in early October when I received the call, a call that would alter everything.  Erin had cancer.  The most important person in the world to me had a potentially serious illness.  I remember sitting in my office, listening to her on the phone,  stunned by the news, my mind going numb as she spoke.   It was as if she were talking to me from the other side of a long, steel tube:   the words were there, but it was as if they had an echo to them that made them impossible to decipher.  My thoughts raced.  Erin was only 27.  How did this happen? How could it? Where did the cancer come from? Was it something in the water we drank, or something in the air in our apartment?  How would this change our relationship?   I knew that I couldn't stay at work at a time like this, and I raced home to be with Erin.  But what I saw in her eyes when I arrived home was not hopelessness or despair, but was instead a fiery resolve to defeat this illness, and from that moment on I was with her 100% of the way.  We were going to beat this.

For the next six months, my life became about helping to make her well again.  I organized her medication and made dosage charts to track when she was to take each of her pills.  We stayed in most nights and watched movies.  I cooked whatever sounded good to her at the time. I became a semi-professional nurse, and for six months we took the fight to her cancer.  And with every doctor’s appointment, and every chemotherapy infusion, I fell more in love with Erin, and admired her courage and her resiliency through it all.  I was better and stronger just being around her, and I gained a perspective that few men have at my age.  

A year and a half after her last Chemotherapy infusion, Erin came to me with an idea. She had heard about a non-profit in Colorado called the Wedding Pink,  which awarded a wedding each year to a couple impacted by breast cancer.  She was thrilled about the prospect, and though we were not even engaged at the time, I could see how much she wanted this.   I remember reluctantly agreeing to it at the time.  After all, there was no way that we were actually going to be the one’s selected for the wedding, I thought.  It was out in Colorado, we were here in Virginia.  I was sure our story was not as unique or interesting as many of the others that were applying.  But the more I looked into the venue and thought about the possibilities, the more excited I became.  I was still not confident that we would be selected, until we received a phone call from Cheryl asking us if we wanted to get married in Colorado in May.   We said yes, and the wedding planning was on. 

With the announcement, we began calling our family and friends, who almost couldn’t believe the news. This was understandable, seeing as how we could hardly believe it ourselves.   It didn’t really begin to sink in for me until we were driving from Denver to Palisade to meet Cheryl and our vendors.  Neither of us had ever been to Colorado, and the drive was spectacular, unlike anything we had ever seen before.  At times it was hard to focus on driving the car because around every turn in the road there was a vista more magnificent than the one before.  By the time we arrived in Palisade, we knew that this was going to be the perfect wedding.  The venue was fantastic, all of our vendors were very welcoming, and the setting couldn’t be more beautiful.  We couldn’t wait for all of our friends and family to get out to Western Colorado to enjoy it with us.

When the date of our wedding actually arrived, everything turned out better than we could have ever possibly imagined.   The team at the Wine Country Inn and our wedding planners bent over backwards to take care of our every need.  The setup, the decor and the food were all amazing, and we are so thankful for all of our generous vendors who donated their time and services to make sure that our special day was perfect.  Everyone loved the assorted candy, the cookies, the horse-drawn carriage rides, the music, the flowers and the photo booth!  As one of our dear friends and guests to our wedding put it:  “This is the best trip I have ever been on, and I have been to Tibet.”   We cannot thank enough everyone who worked so hard to make this event one to remember!

And to Cheryl Ungar, whose vision and initiative created The Wedding Pink,  a very special thank you for providing this unparallelled gift to us.  We can never truly thank you enough for what you have done for us, and we hope to help you expand and shape your vision for this worthwhile project in the future. 


Ben, groom of The Wedding Pink 2013

 

 

Erin's Wedding Pink Journey

The following was written by Erin, the bride of The Wedding Pink 2013. I have had the pleasure of getting to know Erin over the last 10 months and she is a true inspiration to all of us!

 

When I was first diagnosed with breast cancer at age 27 I made a vow to myself: I was not going to let cancer take anything away from me, I was going to take everything I could from it.


At that time, all I could think about was how I would deal with the impending treatments.  What would chemo be like? What would I look with a bald head? How would it feel to have surgery? Would I ever feel normal again? Could I ever be happy and carefree again? Would Ben decide that I was too much trouble and walk away? All of a sudden, my life turned upside-down and I was faced with questions and dilemmas that I never planned for.   For the next 6 months my whole world revolved around breast cancer treatment and once it was completed, I’m happy to report that I emerged, revitalized.  I had braved something harrowing.  I had survived.  Armed with my renewed sense of purpose, I set out to fulfill my vow: take everything I could from cancer.  This would not be a wasted opportunity.


Even given my mission, I could never have dreamed what the next 2 years would hold.  From the incredible friendships I would form to the amazing opportunities and organizations that I connected with, I truly felt like I was reaping the benefits of the time I put in during those initial 6 months.  And when I came across a forwarded email from a friend advertising The Wedding Pink, I looked at it with great interest.  Ben and I had been talking about getting married “one day” for a while, but after everything that we had been through, it didn’t seem as important as it once did.  We’d been together for 7 years and had weathered some pretty significant life events, so a wedding wasn’t something we needed to spend money on, especially when there were medical bills to pay off.  Needless to say, when I heard about The Wedding Pink, it all just seemed to make sense. 

Everything about the proposed wedding looked perfect.  It was in Colorado: we’d never been there, but love traveling to new places.  It was at The Wine Country Inn: we love wine!  It included a wedding planner: I was sold.  So (after I cleared it with Ben), I applied, and as I’m sure you can guess by now, we were selected! 

As I look back on the last 11 months, it all seems like a blur.  I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that we are actually married and that we had the most incredible wedding I could have imagined.  We went from shock of being selected, to joy of getting engaged (yes, we did things a little backwards), to excitement of planning a dream wedding to the bliss of getting married in just 9 months.  And have now spent the last two settling back into normal life. 


We were truly blessed to be connected to all of the wonderful and amazing people that worked to make our wedding happen.  Not only did they donate their time,  talents and services, but each and every one of them went above and beyond in every way possible.  Instead of feeling like we were getting a “free” wedding, we were treated like royalty.  Our experience with everyone connected to The Wedding Pink 2013 was truly remarkable.  We thank each and everyone one of our vendors that made our day so special and gave our guests (and us) so much joy.  We will never forget their generosity and are truly grateful for everything we’ve been given. 

And to Cheryl Ungar, there are no words that can adequately express our gratitude for everything you did to give us our dream wedding.  The words, “thank you” don’t seem to be enough, but Ben and I will be saying “thank you” for years to come.

 

breast-cancer-wedding-pinkErin, bride of The Wedding Pink 2013

 

The Wedding Pink 2013 Less Than 6 Weeks Away

Lovely Article in the Daily Sentinel, Grand Junction, CO

Reprinted with permission.

 

The Wedding Pink bride plans ‘soft-romantic’ May nuptials

By Richie Ann Ashcraft, The Daily Sentinel, Grand Junction, CO

Saturday, March 9, 2013

 

Six empty glasses sat in front of Erin Price as she swirled a lightly-oaked chardonnay at The Wine Country Inn on Thursday.

“Many of our younger guests will appreciate the wine selection,” she told her mother, Linda Price, as she dutifully sipped the possibilities that could be served at her upcoming wedding.

Erin and Linda, both from Virginia, were in Palisade for a three-day whirlwind wedding planning trip.

“I think I’ll just take them all,” Erin said with a light-hearted laugh.

Erin, 30, is the recipient of 2013 The Wedding Pink, an annual wedding giveaway created by 21-year breast cancer survivor and professional photographer Cheryl Ungar of Denver.

Each year, Ungar’s nonprofit organization chooses a young breast cancer survivor to receive a destination wedding in Colorado.

Erin was 27 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She lost her hair while receiving neoadjuvant chemotherapy, and she battled depression. Her cancer treatment was followed by a mastectomy with implant reconstruction.

“My two-year ‘cancer-versary’ is on St. Patrick’s Day this year, and it’s also the day of my wedding shower,” Erin said as she and an entourage of wedding coordinators moved from the Tapestry Lounge to the Vineyard Ballroom to discuss décor.

“I like soft-romantic, vintage and rustic,” she told Sheryl and Rachel Fisher, the mother and daughter-in-law owners of Shimmer, a Grand Junction event design and coordination company.

Using her iPad, Erin showed the Fishers pictures of her favorite shabby chic wedding ideas that she had saved on Pinterest.

April Nichols, director of sales at Wine Country Inn, spread an ivory lace overlay on the table. “Like this?” she asked.

“I love that,” said Linda, as she watched her daughter plan her dream wedding.

“That phone call — that she had cancer — just came out of left field,” Linda said. “We were so worried that she wouldn’t make it. This (wedding) means so much.”

She added that having a celebration to this scale would not have been possible without Ungar’s help.

Between 75 and 100 guests, most from the East Coast, will attend the wedding in Palisade in May.

“Getting married in a place like this is always going to have significance for them,” Linda said of the bride and groom, noting that she finds the beauty of Colorado, especially Glenwood Canyon, startling.

Erin and her fiancé, Ben Schabert, will be married by officiant TJ Dickerson in the outdoor gazebo area at the inn.

The wedding party will wear pale gray, but hints of pink will be found throughout the décor.

Dinner will be a choice of steak, salmon or butternut squash gnocchi prepared by the inn’s Le Cordon Bleu trained chefs.

At the cake testing, Erin and Linda selected devil’s food chocolate and lemon cakes donated by Sweet Treats by Danielle. There also will be a cookie and candy bar.

Most of the wedding, estimated at $30,000, has been donated to the couple by local businesses such as the CandyTime Shoppe, DJ Ryan Griz Entertainment, JR’s Carriage Service, and 3 Leaf Floral Design.

“I’m all for simple and pretty. I just want it to look good,” Erin said.

“We’ll make all that happen,” Nichols assured her.

 

wedding-pink-bride-cake-tastingPhoto by Dean Humphrey. Erin Price, center, and her mom Linda listen to a presentation by Danielle Versluis of Sweat Treats by Danielle about wedding cake.

Erin + Ben's Engagement Gallery

Once again, we must admit that we are so excited to be working with Erin and Ben and look forward to giving them their dream wedding this Spring.

An expanded gallery of engagement photos are now on our website and you may view them here.

A huge thank you to Fifth Gear Portrait Designs for helping with the photo shoot!

 

erin-ben-wedding-pink-2013-engagement-photo

 

Submissions for The Wedding Pink Open One More Week!

Just a reminder that our submission period for next year's Wedding Pink is open for one more week. If you or someone you know has been affected by breast cancer and is engaged, we encourage you to submit your story. One deserving couple will be awarded a dream wedding valued at over $30,000.

Next year's wedding will take place May 5 on the western slope at the Wine Country Inn in Palisade, Colorado.

All of the details as well as the submission form can be found on our website, www.TheWeddingPink.com.

Wine Country Inn, Palisade, Colorado 

 

Next Year's Wedding Pink

As most of you know we just wrapped up this year's Wedding Pink and we are happy to report that it was a huge success. We've barely had time to breathe as we are working around the clock bringing together another great team of vendors for next year's wedding on the western slope.

In case you have missed it here are a "few" of the great things that we are putting together for next year.

The wedding will take place on Sunday, May 5 at the Wine Country Inn in Palisade, Colorado and will be coordinated by Chelsea of Chelsea Allie Wedding Planning and Design. High Country Orchards and Vineyards will be hosting a welcome cocktail reception on Saturday, May 4. JR's Carriage Service will be providing horse carriage rides for family and friends through the vineyards. Sweet Treats by Danielle will be making a beautiful wedding cake while 3 Leaf Floral Design will put together some amazing floral arrangements. Wedding guests will also enjoy dancing with entertainment by DJ Ryan Griz and will have a blast with the 970 Photo Booth Company. All of these great memories will be captured by Fifth Gear Portrait Designs and Cheryl Ungar Wedding Photography.

Please don't forget that our submission period is open this summer, August 1 - 18. We encourage anyone to submit their story as long as they meet our submission criteria.