There’s something about a hot summer night that has a timeless romantic quality to it - it’s how your skin can flush warm with the memory of loved ones near you, or how your feet remember the happy tiredness of dancing the night away and then the cool relief of dipping your heels into a lake under a starry sky. Summer nights are full of the last bit of golden sunlight lingering on the water or the fresh froth of beer spilling from a newly cracked can. It’s a feeling you can come back to at the simplest reminder - a warm breeze whispering in your ear, the smell of fresh grass, or maybe just the sight of a llama.

Julia and Luca said “I do” at St. Pius X in Loudonville surrounded by friends and family, and they celebrated the occasion at Old Daley on Crooked Lake. Old Daley is a beautiful historic venue with a hand-laid stone fireplace and fieldstone walls and a 1940s ballroom. This is where Julia’s grandparents were married, and it’s a place that will be forever special to the next generation: at one point Julia danced with her son Jude to The Beatles’ “Hey Jude” and then Luca joined the dance. And as the DJ cranked up the tunes for a happy crowd the newlyweds cracked open fresh cans of craft beer - Heady Topper, of course, for those who are in the know.

But even summer nights can’t last forever; eventually the llamas left and the dance crowd thinned. Even so, the heat of the day clung to the twilight while the newlyweds slipped away from the party to wade into the cool lake and have one final kiss under the starry sky. And this, I know, is how friends and family will remember this day: the love of the couple, the nearness of family and friends, the llamas, the craft beer, and the long summer day giving way to stars twinkling over the lakeshore.

Congratulations, Julia and Luca!