When she was 22, Viv needed some “big strong men,” to help her move one hot day in July. When her boyfriend at the time declined to help, her friends asked neighbor Neriah to join in. “He agreed as long as they provided beer,” she recalls. Although he had gone to high school with her brother and cousins, the two had never crossed paths. With the encouragement of her family, Viv  soon dropped the unhelpful boyfriend and started a relationship with Neriah. “We had more in common than I could have ever imagined, and we share a love neither of us ever dreamed of having,” she says. “I knew I wanted to marry him the very first week we dated.” Their engagement would come in 2015 on a snowboarding trip to Nevada.

According to the bride, Neriah only cared about one thing: not wearing a tux in 100-degree weather. “He got his wish,” she says. “I always knew I was lucky, but if I’d known all it would take to end the drought in California was for me to plan a wedding, I’d have done it much sooner. Our wedding gift was an atmospheric river! I think it poured for 10 days straight.”

They chose to contrast a barn setting at Delta Diamond Farm with glam apparel, serving Texas Roadhouse fare in sequins and black tie. “The food was outrageous, and my guests raved about it for weeks,” she says.

Viv shares she was overwhelmed at first about the planning, but with two years to prepare and the help of a wedding planning binder, she paced herself and dug in. “Before Neriah, I never planned to get married, so I hadn’t been thinking about it my whole life, which I think caused me to be a little more realistic about my expectations,” she says. “I was always impressed by even the smallest things that everyone else seemed to just expect.”

She notes Neriah was also very easygoing about it all. “I tried to channel his attitude most of the time and ended up telling most of my vendors, ‘Do whatever you think is best, I trust you.’ That turned out great in most cases, and the lack of stress that came with that method was worth it in every case,” she says.

The bride’s favorite part of the day was just after the two were married, in the courtyard right before they took pictures. “We had a couple of quiet minutes right before the madness began,” she remembers. “There was a sense of calm, because the most important part was over, the nerves were gone, we were now husband and wife, and anything that came after would be easier to bear. He told me how pretty I was and helped me with the mirror while I removed my veil. He got to tell me a little bit about how his day had gone, and we took a few sips of Jack Daniels. We were surrounded by our closest friends and family, and about to head into the biggest and best party we’d ever thrown—and boy was it a good party.” 

— Darren Elms