Wedding hits major snag when officiant breaks her ankle during rehearsal.
On the night before their wedding, during a rehearsal for the outdoor ceremony, the officiant hired by Kelsey and Andy Schneck slipped on a gravel drive and broke her ankle.
"I was pretty much in a state of panic," Kelsey told InsideEdition.com Monday. Her mindset went like this: "Oh my gosh, I've planning my wedding for an entire year and we're not going to be able to do it because we have no one who can legally perform weddings."
At that moment, the caterer pulled up, bringing a carload of food from City Barbecue. Kelsey asked if the driver could hold on for a moment because it looked like the officiant, whose ankle was swelling and turning horrific shades of purple, was headed for the disabled list.
Behind the wheel, catering manager Manny Morales said, "I'm an officiant."
"I thought he was kidding," Kelsey said. Morales most definitely was not. "Are you free tomorrow?" she asked him. "He said, 'Yes.'''
And so, on the next day, Kelsey and Andy were wed.
Morales actually wasn't free that day. He's an events coordinator and manager at the popular barbecue chain based in Ohio. "I'm trying to figure out in my head how to do this," he told InsideEdition. "I didn't want to disappoint these people."
He told his bosses, "I have to do this and they said, 'Yes, absolutely.'''
Luckily, the original officiant, who ended up undergoing surgery to insert pins into her shattered ankle, had written everything down.
The night before the nuptials, Morales stood in front of the mirror, practicing over and over. "I made a joke at the beginning, and then I just read what she wrote," he said.
Morales went online last year, filled out an application and sent a fee to the state to become a wedding officiant. He did so because a dear friend was getting married and Morales had been asked to do the honors. Then a cousin asked. The Schnecks are his third wedding.
"He did such a good job," Kelsey said. But a broken ankle was not the only mishap of the wedding held earlier this month at a breathtaking outdoor venue.
It rained — a torrential, soaking downpour.
The wedding party and guests hurried under a building that a roof, but no sides. The wind and rain actually made things seem romantic, Kelsey said. "My veil kept blowing in the wind," she said. "It was really pretty."
She added: "We had quite the double whammy. But it all worked out."
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