Downtown Tinley Park Shines In Local Couple's Wedding Day
TINLEY PARK, IL — In the corners of Melissa McLeod’s mind, memories of a lifetime in Tinley Park are neatly tucked away.
Elementary school at St. George, middle school at Grissom. Teen years at Victor J. Andrew High School. Summer strolls along Oak Park Avenue, capped with dripping ice cream cones at Whitey’s Dairy Palace. It’s all crystal clear in her mind.
It only made sense to McLeod, then, that she share her wedding spotlight with the town that long ago grabbed hold of her heart, just as her now-husband Steven did years prior.
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“I absolutely adore Tinley,” McLeod said. “I have a lot of great childhood memories there. It’s a lot of very awesome feelings for me.”
As McLeod and Steve Stepien planned their big day, they decided to focus much of it—well, almost all of it—in Tinley Park’s downtown. Each element tied in a bit of Tinley, from Classy Flowers for boutonnieres and wristlets, to a heart-shaped pizza baked specially for them at Village Pizza, capped with a sweet treat at Whitey’s Dairy Palace. Her dress came from Bella Sposa in Tinley Park. Alterations to wedding apparel were by Sara’s Tailoring and Alterations, also on Oak Park Avenue. The rehearsal dinner was held at Ed & Joe’s. Even the ceremony site was as local could be, and special to them.
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Tucked behind a new-ish condo building, sits The Tinley Park Historical Society Landmark Chapel.
“Steve and I were walking down Oak Park Avenue, and every first Sunday of the month, the chapel is open,” McLeod told Patch before the wedding. “They asked if we wanted to ring the bell—every couple who gets married there rings the bell.”
They were not yet engaged at the time they stopped in, McLeod said, but that changed in November 2023. The chapel seemed like a natural fit for their ceremony venue.
“It just reminds me of old school Tinley,” she said, before their wedding. “They haven’t had a wedding there in over a year. The condo building blocks it, so people forget it’s there.”
From there, the pieces for their Sept. 14 wedding just seemed to fall into place.
A longtime dental hygienist at Dr. Gattone’s office, McLeod continued plotting how she’d spotlight the town where she’d grown up, that she’d grown to love and where she chooses to stay. Along with their photographers from TWA Photographic Artists, they planned a visual trip along Oak Park Avenue to follow their ceremony.
Melissa had initially hoped to hold her reception at Banging Gavel Brews at the historic Vogt House, but opted instead to make it a focal point for photos afterward. Photographers followed the newlyweds along Oak Park Avenue, capturing images of essential Tinley scenes including the Vogt Visual Art Center’s gazebo, the clock tower at the Oak Park Avenue Metra station, Village Pizza, Banging Gavel Brews and Whitey’s Dairy Palace, as well as Zabrocki Plaza and the chapel.
“Our Tinley Park wedding went amazing!” McLeod told Patch afterward.
The celebration kicked off with a sweet, cool treat—and a heart-shaped pizza.
“We had Kevin from Dairy Palace drive the Good Humor truck to the chapel,” McLeod said. “It was a big hit on such a hot day! We stopped by Dairy Palace and got pictures with Kevin’s Dad, Whitey, earlier in the day. A patron at the ice cream shop even offered us his ice cream!”
As an extra-personal touch, McLeod changed dresses for the reception at Tuscany Falls, coming out in her mother’s wedding dress—alterations by Sara’s Tailoring.
“I’m so thrilled that I did it!” she told Patch. “My mom was extremely surprised! The Bill Withers song ‘Lovely Day’ played as I came out wearing it. I pulled my mom on the dance floor. She was beaming. I will never forget that moment.”
It was a wedding Tinley tailor-made, and one that turned the page in a love story with roots in their childhoods.
McLeod, now 43, met Oak Forest native Stepien decades earlier. McLeod first spotted him at a concert at the Markham Park District.
“…It’s kind of the cliché thing people say, I saw him from across the room, I thought he was a really cute guy,” she recalled. “One of the girls I went to school with was talking to him, and I was jealous.”
They didn’t meet that night, but eventually chatted at another concert later. But it took some time for their stars to align.
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“Timing was just never right,” McLeod said. “We never dated, but we always had a crush on one another when we were younger. I was married once before, but Steve was just a very good friend, I loved him dearly.”
It became clear over time that they had feelings for one another, but they never entertained them. McLeod dated and eventually married someone else.
Years later, Stepien was chatting with a friend about affairs of the heart, when Melissa’s name surfaced.
“She was the one who got away,” he said.
He sent her a text to reconnect, but she was newly engaged at the time and told him as much (though she admits now his message gave her butterflies).
Their paths diverged. Six or seven years later, they reconnected at a mutual friend’s party. Shortly afterward, McLeod and her husband separated and eventually divorced. Stepien had never married.
“I think timing was never right until then,” she said.
Stepien can still remember their first “real” date of their adulthood courtship: June 26, 2021.
“We’ve been together ever since,” he said.
Though he had grown up in Oak Forest and attended Oak Forest High School, he was happy to indulge Melissa’s vision of a Tinley-centric celebration. He jokingly calls her “The Queen of Tinley.”
“I know she’s so super-Tinley,” he said, laughing. “She loves Tinley Park.”
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