'Give Me 20 Minutes to Change My Dress' (Exclusive): Couple Shocks Engagement Party Guests with Surprise Wedding

One couple pulled off an amazing surprise at their engagement party, and completely shocked guests who thought they were celebrating the pair's upcoming nuptials.

Julie and Kevin Polley invited over 100 family members and friends to their engagement party at a beautiful restaurant. What the couple didn't tell anyone was that the celebration was actually their wedding.

The pair first met in early 2010, working part-time jobs at the same McDonald's. They hit it off and fell in love and nearly a decade later, Kevin was ready to make things official.

"In 2023, we went on a trip to Italy and that's where Kevin proposed. We were coming up on 10 years of dating," Julie tells PEOPLE.

After sharing their engagement news, the couple "took a little bit of time to just enjoy that we were engaged." Once it came time for planning, the two realized the traditional wedding wasn't quite what they were looking for.

"Once I realized how much planning everything would take, I had an idea. In general, we're very much people who like to host. We like to spend time with our friends and family, but neither of us had ever really dreamed of having this huge wedding, by any means. We really wanted to have a good party, so that's kind of where we started," she shares.

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"We wanted to figure out how to have a good party without putting too much pressure on ourselves. I feel the wedding industry creates a lot of that right now. We thought we could do an engagement party and then we were like, 'What if we were got married at the engagement party?'"

Pulling off a surprise of that magnitude wasn't easy. After getting her groom on board, the two approached their families.

"We just wanted to make sure that it wasn't going to be anything that was going to make them upset. We had our immediate family in the loop," she says. "Just our parents and siblings knew, which was really great for us because we got to do family photos and whatnot before, the morning of. But we had over 110 people that had absolutely no idea that they were showing up to what would be our wedding."

On April 27, 2024, it was time for the celebration and the big reveal. Julie recalls "shaking" as she and Kevin went through the speech they'd spent days before rehearsing.

"We practiced just to get the nerves out, but when you're staring at everyone like we were, it was still a little nerve-wracking," Julie shares. "At the same time, we knew every person there was there because they love us and because they wanted to help us celebrate, so it ended up being like the most fun surprise ever."

During her speech Julie told the crowd, "We've actually had a few people mention to us that if we're spending all this time and effort getting all of you guys together in such a beautiful restaurant that we might as well just get the deed done tonight, but unfortunately, we don't have the ability to make that h -

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appen right now," she said trailing off.

"But if you give me 20 minutes to change my dress —," she continued as the room realized what was happening and everyone began chatting and cheering at once.

"I felt like a famous person giving a speech for second. The support we got from every single person there was insane and it was so fun," Julie says. "Everyone who we wanted there made it, and we were really lucky."

The couple is happy to have video that showed "the look on everyone's faces" to remember the epic night forever.

"A couple of friends and family members faces are hysterical. Some are just in full-blown shock, so completely caught off-guard. Some of them look like they're 5 ft. in the air because they're jumping so high with excitement. It was very surreal because I'll probably never be able to do something like that again in my life, to surprise so many people with such cool news."

Julie changed and her sisters who were her bridesmaids, did the same. During the ceremony, only 30 or so guests were seated while the rest of the guests crowded around, creating an intimate moment.

"Everyone was standing and cheering and it was really cool. After we took all the chairs away, that ended up being a dance floor, and so it was just crazy. Everyone was on the dance floor, the whole night. It really was the best party ever," the bride says.

"We didn't do the parent dances or other speeches. Our speech was the only one that made it extra special; we were the only ones who spoke to everyone, and it ended up being really cool. But the dance floor was probably the best part of the night."

Neither Julie nor Kevin expected that the footage from their wedding would go viral.

"It's feels cliche to say, 'I had no clue that this was going to happen,' but I didn't. People told me to post it after the fact," Julie says.

"There were a lot of people who were like, 'Oh I want to see.' So I posted it more with that in mind, but it was really cool to see people who I didn't know saying, 'This is the best idea ever.'"

Seeing the reaction was exciting for the pair, who have since seen other couple's throw similar surprise weddings.

"That was really cool because it wasn't something I really saw much of previously. Commenters were so nice too. I find the internet is often the worst kind of place, but it's like an overwhelming amount of people that are complete strangers were really happy for us. I think it's cool to see something go viral for no reason other than love and happiness and people being happy for strangers."

Julie and Kevin hope to see other couples embrace the idea, if it's what feels right to them.

"In my opinion, 100% do it, if you think it sounds cool. It's obviously not for everyone. Some people do want to have all of the regular traditions, and I think that those are so amazing. I just knew that that wasn't really for Kevin and me," she says.

"It's a fun and interesting way to surprise people. We had the time of our lives."

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