Zach Bryan Sends Message to His Late Mom Annette About His Wife Samantha

Zach Bryan is paying tribute to his late mother in a new Instagram post about his December 2025 wedding to wife Samantha Leonard.

“I reckon you’d of loved this and her,” Bryan, 29, began the caption of the post, which included a series of new candids of intimate moments captured on the “Something in the Orange” singer’s wedding day.

“We all took an aeroplane to Spain last week and you’d of eaten it up. You’d of ordered everything twice and made sure we got your dress perfect. Everyone I love, you woulda too. There was a lot of champagne and Mac looked beautiful,” Bryan, who released his single “Aeroplane” on Jan. 8, continued.

The singer went on to note of his wife that her “family is kind and they don’t try and fix me.”

“Dad was doing the splits while smoking a cigar on the dance floor. Rocky Lane was our ring bearer and I know you’d like that since you named me after Lane Frost so many years ago,” Bryan wrote, connecting moments from his wedding day to things he connects to his mother. (Lane Frost was a bull rider who died during an event in 1989; Bryan’s middle name is Lane.)

“If you coulda’ seen all the cheek tearing teeth smiling under the spanish moon late into the morning on New Year’s Day. Belly laughing and just eye-balling Samantha in her dress,” Bryan recounted in the caption.

“I think of all the moments you’ve missed often but Sam reminds me that you’re half of me of anyways. She is something special and precious. A thing you gotta’ keep once she touches your life.
Makes me feel light. Makes me feel like my hearts beating easy and the days aren’t as hard as they once were,” Bryan wrote to his late mother, Annette, who died in 2016 at 49.

He added that he wished she “could have seen us smiling like kids when we met on that Spanish beach,” before adding that his wife “loves a man only a mother could.”

“Maybe you’re in that Spanish moon. I’ll see you soon enough, til’ then I’ll tell her you love her,” Bryan concluded the caption, including a nod to his New Year’s Eve wedding to Leonard held at Basílica de Santa María del Coro, a baroque Roman Catholic church in San Sebastián, Spain.

Leonard also paid homage to Annette at the couple’s wedding. Bryan shared on Jan. 5 that Leonard “went out of her way” to incorporate some of the lace from his late mother’s wedding dress into her own gown.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. 

“Samantha went out of her way to put my mom’s wedding dress lace on her dress and I cried for a good bit,” Bryan wrote in a post to his Instagram Stories. “Meant so much sweetheart, thank you.”