The bridal party for Leonardo and McKensi Rodriguez’s wedding is pictured above, from left to right, front row: Jasmin Rilea, Sara Dusing, Leonardo Rodriguez, McKenzi Rodriguez, Ceirra Thompson, Aaliyah Worden. Back row, left to right: Carson Hernandez, Zach Benson, Eli Paz, David Pool, Ivan Vela, Connor Minor.

Leonardo and McKensi Rodriguez recently celebrated their wedding – very recently, in fact. The happy couple was wed on Saturday, Sept. 19, and their story starts the way that many couples’ stories do: in high school.

“We both grew up here in Blue Earth, and technically we’ve known each other since high school,” McKensi recalls. “Leo was a year older than me, and my best friend is actually his godsister. We saw each other around, but didn’t really talk much. We didn’t properly reconnect until we met again at a friend’s birthday party in 2022.”

“I definitely fell for her first,” Leonardo laughs. “I knew on Day 1 that she was the right person for me.”

While the pair hit it off immediately, McKensi admits she had some doubts about formalizing their relationship, as Leo already had a daughter, Alison, from a past relationship.

“I was only 19 at the time, so I wasn’t sure that I would be able to handle the responsibility of raising a kid,” McKensi shares. “As it turns out, I really didn’t have anything to worry about. Alison absolutely loves me, and we get along really well. She was the flower girl at our wedding.”

The couple went on to date for a year, with Leo proposing to McKensi on their one-year anniversary as a couple. They would be engaged for three years before finally tying the knot.

“McKensi’s first engagement ring was actually my mother’s, which she gave to me to use,” Leo explains. “I was very lucky that it fit! I did eventually end up buying McKensi a proper engagement ring later, which I gave to her on Valentine’s Day.”

When it came to planning their wedding, McKensi knew that she wanted the full wedding experience. However, a limited budget meant that the couple had to get creative with sourcing supplies for their wedding.

“We had a lot of help from our family and friends in getting the supplies we needed, but we also bought a lot of our stuff on Amazon,” McKensi admits. “My mom joked once that our wedding might as well have been sponsored by Amazon. One of my best friends who got married last year lent us a bunch of her decorations, and I also borrowed my veil from her.”

“I was actually the DJ at that wedding, so we got to reuse all of those supplies for our own wedding, which made getting our music set up a lot easier,” Leo adds.

Despite their limited budget, the couple still managed to add their own personal touches to the wedding. Rather than a traditional diamond, their wedding rings featured opals instead; and instead of fancy dress shoes, the couple opted for a more casual dress code and ordered custom Converse sneakers.

“Opal is McKensi’s favorite gemstone,” Leo explains. “My mom gave us the money to buy the rings, and I let McKensi pick out the style she wanted. It’s a lot more colorful than just a normal diamond, and it’s a little non-traditional, but that just makes them even more special.”

“I was looking at options for how to personalize our wedding online, and I discovered that Converse makes custom shoes for weddings,” McKensi shares. “I had custom pairs made for both myself and Leo, and part of our dress code was that you either had to wear Converse, or a knockoff brand that looked like Converse, so that everyone matched.”

McKensi also had plans for the color scheme of her wedding, with all of the groomsmen in matching white shirts with red vests, while all of her bridesmaids would be in purple dresses. Her own dress would be white with purple floral accents, while Leo would dress to match the groomsmen.

“For the wedding color palette, I wanted the bridesmaids in purple and the groomsmen to wear red, but I wasn’t sure how it was all going to look together,” McKensi notes. “After I saw the dresses that my bridesmaids picked out, though, I was really happy with how it all came together. The different shades of purple they picked out made a gradient, and really blended everything together.”

For a venue, the pair decided to keep it local, holding their wedding ceremony at Steinberg Nature Park just outside of Blue Earth. Their reception was held at the fairgrounds, in the Veteran’s Memorial Building.

“For food, we decided to have a couple of different options,” McKensi explains. “We had walking tacos, and then we also did catering with the P-Pod, which was cheesy chicken sandwiches. My mom’s friend did our wedding cake and the cupcakes for us; we originally wanted a strawberry-chocolate swirl cake, but since that would have been too difficult for her to make, we opted for vanilla instead.”

Both Leo and McKensi opted to select their closest friends and family members as bridesmaids and groomsmen, with Leo’s little brother Eli serving as his best man, and McKensi’s childhood friend Sara Dusing serving as her maid of honor. But they also had one more family member who needed to participate: their four-month old daughter, Chloe.

“One of our close family friends, Tim Lincoln, custom-made a little white carriage for Chloe to ride in during the ceremony,” McKensi shares. “She was pulled down the aisle in the carriage first, then our ring-bearers Carson Hernandez and Connor Minor came down, and then Alison as our flower girl. It was incredibly cute, and we’re very thankful to Tim for making that for us.”

Even a perfect wedding has one small snafu that happens, and for the Rodriguez wedding, that issue was the weather. Cloudy skies and a light drizzle were present all day long, but as McKensi tells it, rain on your wedding day might not be such a bad thing after all.

“Nothing really went wrong during our wedding, which was a relief, since both of us were worried we might have forgotten something,” McKensi explains. “Sure, it was wet and rainy, but I expected that to happen. In fact, I actually think it’s lucky for it to rain during your wedding day: a wet knot is harder to untie, so if you get married in the rain, it’s said that your marriage will last longer.”

The couple is extremely happy to be married, and while it’s still early for them to be planning their honeymoon, they do have a destination in mind: Hawaii. However, as they both explained, it’s going to be a while before they’ll get to take that trip together.

“Leo and I found out about a program where you can rent an RV and tour all around Hawaii, and we definitely want to do that for our honeymoon,” McKensi shares. “Staying in a resort just isn’t our style.”

“We’re going to need to save up for that trip first, though,” Leo adds. “But we couldn’t be happier to finally be married, and I can’t wait to see what other adventures await us.”