'Easy Date to Remember:' Thousands Wed on 11-12-13

For some people, a successful marriage depends on how the stars align. For others, it’s all about how the numbers line up.

And, on Tuesday it was the numbers 11-12-13 that led thousands of couples across the country to lock into a time and place to say: “I do.”

It was that special date that brought Kayla Charles, 23, of Allentown, to District Judge Donna J. Butler’s office in Emmaus at 11:30 a.m. to pledge her marriage vows to fiancé Shawn Mackes, 22, of Bath.

Kayla was so taken with the idea of being married on 11-12-13 that she agreed to be wed in Emmaus—her second choice location—in order to secure the date.

While the Pennsylvania marriage license she applied for allowed her to be married anywhere in the state, Kayla explained shortly before her ceremony, the Emmaus district judge’s office was the only one in the area available Tuesday when she tried to book her wedding.

Shawn had perhaps the more practical and more stereotypically male comment about the date: “It’s an easy date to remember,” he said before heading into the judge’s chambers to marry Kayla.

He and Kayla met online four years ago, Shawn said, “like everyone else does these days.” Specifically, he said, they connected through a Facebook App called "Are you interested?” which existed, he quips, “back before there were Facebook Apps.”

Shawn’s mom, Deb Mackes, who attended the ceremony along with about a dozen other members of the couple’s family and friends, called her new daughter-in-law’s desire to get married on 11-12-13 “a cute idea.”

Butler demonstrated why she is such a popular wedding officiant during Kayla and Shawn's ceremony, putting the couple immediately at ease by telling them it was their day and they could stand wherever they liked. She also told attendees who wanted to take photos that they were free to move about the room as long as "they didn't leave footprints on the ceiling."

Butler surprised the happy couple and elicited joyous laughter from those assembled when she concluded the ceremony by playing the traditional wedding march from an audio device hidden behind her desk. 

Shawn is an assistant in his family’s automotive shop, Mackes Automotive, in Bath. Kayla, who studied art therapy at Cedar Crest College, is a recreational therapy aide at Cedarbrook nursing homes in South Whitehall and Fountain Hill.

Following the ceremony, Kayla said she and Shawn would be posing for some photos by the railroad tracks behind Butler’s office and then the couple and their wedding guests would be heading out to lunch.

Tuesday evening she’ll be worrying about a different number combination—those on a punch clock—since she has to head to work.

Kayla and Shawn’s wedding was one of three scheduled in Butler’s office for Tuesday. According to the staff in Butler’s office, the first couple, who had tied the knot at 10:15 a.m., told the judge that they are “all about numbers” and they purposefully chose 11-12-13 as their wedding date.

That couple’s only regret? They told Butler that they were disappointed that that they had not managed to book their nuptials at 2 p.m., setting their wedding for 11-12-13 at 14:00 hours.