Lia Pallivathucal is one of Riana’s three Maids of Honor. Quite frankly without Lia, and Briana (but to get to know more about her, see her profile), there would be no wedding at all - they are the ones that nudged Ri into trying Coffee Meets Bagel and went as far as to help Ri set up her profile.
Before that, Lia and Ri have known each other since they were twelve, also playing soccer together, even having a carpool for a while. After college, when they both got into their respective grad schools, Lia was the first one to say that she would be visiting Ri in Scotland, and thus rounded up their other soccer friends to make a trip across the pond.
While there, they all got to celebrate Lia’s birthday with a very special tea (at a castle!) where this photo was taken.
Michaela Gill is one of Ri’s three Maids of Honor. She and Ri met Ri’s senior year at Smith (according to Michaela, Ri was intimidating or something) on the crew team. The many 5 AM practices really bond people together, especially on the dark, freezing cold Connecticut River. And while most college students dream of spring break, Ri and Michaela spent it doing two-a-days and getting rained on it Georgia, trying to make sure their blistered hands didn’t get infected.
Basically, it was true love.
Since then, they have traveled the world together, spending time together in their home states of Massachusetts and California, but also abroad during Michaela’s year abroad at Smith and then again during her Fulbright and Ri’s Master’s program, all in all, traveling to Germany (twice), Poland, and Scotland together.
Here, they are in Hamburg together, after enjoying the German tradition of “kaffee und kuchen” or “coffee and cake.”
Lillian Barker is one of Ri’s three Maids of Honor, or in her case, Matron. Lily and Ri have known each other since seventh grade but really became close in eighth grade. Lily asked if she could hang out with Ri at lunchtime, Ri liked her and invited her to come over for a sleepover, and that, my friends, is how easy it is to make friends back in the day.
They have both grown up a little bit since then though.
This picture may need a little context: Lily came back to California with her then-boyfriend, who reached out to Ri to see if he could get Ri’s help to coordinate a proposal, since he was from out of town, and well, with Lily all the time. So Ri also roped in her then-boyfriend at the time (hi, John) to help take photos of the moment as it happened and do a short engagement shoot after.
But yeah, this is Ri and Lily in a nutshell.
Briana Hollabaugh is one of Ri’s Bridesmaids. She and Ri have known each other since fourth grade, so if you are looking for someone with the most embarrassing stories and photos, it may very well be Bri.
Besides continuously getting teachers confused with similar names and the same last initial, Ri and Bri also played soccer together as well as volunteered in the same assistance league all the way from middle school into the last year of high school, Assisteens. They even attempted an ill-fated lemonade stand one time, but again, one of those embarrassing stories…
Alyssa Hull, more affectionally known to Ri as Lys, is one of Ri’s bridesmaids. It was a real struggle to find a good current picture of Lys and Ri, since Lys is fifteen and grows like a weed. This lovely photo was in fact, taken very recently, at Christmas 2018 and featuring their dad.
When Ri was first told that she would be getting a sibling, she was the only one who believed it was going to be a girl and, lo and behold, she indeed got a sister. While Lys in her early years was called Ri 2.0, it became very clear to Ri that Lys would forge her own path and Ri cannot wait to see where Lys’s potential takes her.
As Lys is by far the better of the two sisters at social media, she has been dubbed the Social Media Coordinator for the wedding…which is puzzling because she seems to be rather found of deleting all of her pictures regularly. Kids these days, am I right?
Elyssa Olson is one of Ri’s bridesmaids. They hit it off immediately - with their love to write, their Ravenclaw-ness (and thus, deep understanding of Harry Potter), and mutual fondness for John (most of the time). It was a relationship that would grow naturally as Ri and Elyssa got to spend time together when Ri and John would visit NorCal and Elyssa would come down to visit Newport Beach and LA.
Here they are at the proposal - John planned to have his family arrive to be there to celebrate under the assumption that Ri would accept (spoiler: she did) and all the family members then went out to dinner together.
Grant Audet is my Best Man and next door neighbor of 18 years. Growing up together meant hopping the fence between our yards regularly, water/hose fights across said fence, many days spent with playmobile, Civilization, playing basketball on the trampoline, watching the t.v. show 24, sailing (and flipping over) at Shoreline Lake, countless bike rides, and me making Grant late for school when he had a car and I had none…. Grant is simply an incredible guy, one of the smartest and most talented people I know, who I have, and continue to count on as one of my best friends.
Anthony Valera and I had the pleasure of living together for about a year while we were both in Irvine. His girlfriend (Lia Pallivathucal, one of Ri’s Maid’s of Honor) and Ri stealthily coordinated the end of our leases and how convenient it would be if we lived together. Happily – they were more than right. Anthony has been an incredible friend through it all, helping make sure I didn’t go too crazy while Ri was in Scotland, exposing me to the world of CrossFit, mechanized robots, and the party game Time’s Up (for which my stellar win/loss record stands at about 2-347). Countless game nights and a couple trips up the coast have been a blast together.
Roger (Rog) Hull, Ri’s younger brother, is an awesome and defining part of the family. Roger’s keen observational ability and sense of humor make for some incredible comedy as he quickly and cleverly shows how well he knows us all and how ridiculous we can sometimes be. But beyond helping us laugh at ourselves, Rog is fearless, caring, and intensely smart. The love he has for his family is profound and I feel lucky to soon get to call him my brother.
Tara Sooreechine and I met on our study abroad summer from UC San Diego to Peking University in Beijing China. Neither of us were particularly gifted at Chinese, but we were both particularly gifted at eating all the Chinese food! These two traits bonded us over the summer and our fondness for all food continues to be a prime source of our friendship. Beyond our time at UCSD, with Tara’s career as an Actuary, she has had many exams to study for. And, as I geared up for my Business School application, I needed to study for the GMAT test – as a result Tara and I would study for significant periods crammed in a Starbucks in Torrance, CA until we were starved and would head out to a local restaurant to catch up and fill up.
Matthew (Matt) Rose is another great mutual friend of Ri and mine. Though Ri has first dibs, having grown up with him and all, I have had the pleasure of getting to know Matt especially well over the past few years. As an extremely caring and smart friend with a huge heart, I can always count on Matt – he has the unique ability to always see through to fundamental truths about the world around us and an epic sense of humor that helps me to not take myself too too seriously.
Anthony Hoopes, Ri’s older brother and one of the two Anthony’s of this wedding party, is yet another tremendous guy I am so excited to have among my grooms-people. Now living in Seattle, Ri and I got to visit him and his girlfriend and we had an absolute blast staying with them and exploring the city. Spending time with him then and at various family gatherings it is clear that Anthony has the ability to brighten any room with his presence and his love. For Anthony as well as Rog, I so look forward to getting to call him my brother.
