Disappointing news - About 6 months ago, my partner's cousin offered to do the photography for our wedding. She approached us about it and offered to do it - at that point we had not even thought about photography yet! She is someone we have both always been very close to. Well, my partner emailed her last week to confirm that she could still do it and that her daughter could still be one of our flower girls. She backed out. Apparently she has been going through a rough place in her own marriage and decided it would be best to get more involved in church again. She says that she learned a lot about relationships in the process. She renewed her relationship with G-d, and says that she can't participate in our wedding because she wants to respect what G-d intended for relationships... and by participating she would be "condoning it." However, she indicated to my partner that she would still come to the wedding. I don't want anyone to misunderstand and think that I have a problem with her religious beliefs, because I don't. I just feel kind of hurt that someone who has been so supportive of us all along has suddenly decided to change her mind. My dad decided to elope this weekend and I don't think I can go. He called me last night at 10:00 and told me this. I could fly into the nearest hub city and rent a car, but my sister (she's 16) would not be able to come because of the cost. I am still considering going depending on flight times, but it would be a ton of travel time and the logistics last minute are hard based on where he is getting married. Usually I'm pretty good at the travel planning because I travel a ton for work (last year my travel was over 90%). We talked about it and he understood. I think he is a little bit upset about it, but he seems to understand. I told him that maybe my sister and I could plan a weekend trip later in the year and we could go out to dinner and do some other things as a family to celebrate that they got married. I think the only person who IS going is my dad's fiancee's daughter because she lives very close to where they are getting married. Good news - My dad has had a history of pretending like my partner didn't exist. I would talk about her, and he would not respond. He did not respond favorably when I told him we were getting married. If he did ask about Lisa, he would not use her name. She said good morning to him once when we were visiting and he didn't respond. He has started to come around!!! Last week he asked about the wedding. He invited BOTH of us to Thanksgiving!