I am not a die-hard Giant’s fan, I’m actually a die-hard Redskins fan (don’t laugh). But when I saw this engagement session I had to share it with the Garden! Plus it’s a timely post, since the Giant’s are playing in the Super Bowl this weekend. Whether you a football lover or not, this e-session is sexy, romantic, and oh-so-sweet! I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!
Where are you, or did you, have your e-session photos? Was it themed around a hobby you both enjoy? Share them with us!
The venue that Morning Glory Bear (MGB as I will put him for short) and I picked to have our ceremony and reception is a nice waterfront venue tucked back in a neighborhood. It actually used to be a crappy little restaurant/bar and the catering company bought it and completely gutted and remodeled the place. I love the view and it will make for some great photo ops, but I’m worried about the lack of variety and creativity available for pictures after the ceremony. Since 75% of the venue is physically on the water (see below for picture) it’s literally just the docks for pictures. There’s no beach or really anywhere to go on-site to make for different pictures.
Copyright Cesar Chavez Photography
So, basically MGB and I talked about going offsite after the ceremony to take our bridal party/family pictures. Luckily, there is a nice park about 5 minutes away with a beach, pavilion and another dock to take pictures at. I was worried about finding somewhere that was close enough to not take time away from the reception time and was pretty enough to allow the photographer some creative leeway. In my nervousness to make sure everything goes according to plan, I don’t want this to end up being chaotic! I still want to do pictures at the venue on the docks, especially something like this at the end of the night.
I had to share this with all of you because this bridal shoot it truly inspiring. This bride is so gorgeous and wanted everyone to know her personality. What I take from this is to always, always, be yourself, and don’t worry about the trends or what you think you should look like in your photos. This girl is your inspiration:
I recently looked at some photos from my friend’s wedding, I was in it. The stress of the wedding could not have been shown any better than in my face, on almost every photograph. I feel awful about this but at the same time, I cannot put all of the blame on myself.
This made me think about my own upcoming wedding. The last thing I and Mr. Pom would want is unhappy people. Yes I know, you can’t please everyone. However, I want everyone to have a great time and not be stressed about silly things such as their dresses, how they look and whether sashes are tied correctly. I have already thanked my bridesmaids, yes we finally settled on two people each, and told them that the bridal shower will be the only stressful and time consuming thing they’ll have to do.
Because Mr.Pom and I are very concious of the amount of money that can be spent on a wedding we are trying to keep all of our costs to a minimum. We are the kind of people who do not want to spend our life savings on one day and then have nothing to live off of. We are also not the type of people who are willing to have their parents spend ten’s of thousands of dollars on one day either. So we find ourselves in a very lucky situation with the friends and family that we have. I say this because here are the things we are cutting out of our spending budget.
Photography-my mother and brother are excelent photographers and honestly I’ve been to weddings where people have spent thousands of dollars on photography and somehow my pictures turn out very similar and just as good as the professional. I’m not at all tooting my own horn, but rather saying that you don’t get what you pay for. We are also going to put together a way for people to take their own photos in a feauxto booth
Cake-my mom is also an excellent baker so as of right now she has decided that she would like to bake a cake for everyone to enjoy!
DJ - Mr. Pom’s brother in law and cousin have been and are DJ’s so between one of them mixing our tunes and the other brining some fantastic sound system with him we are good to go!
So we had our engagement pictures taken (finally) last week. First of all- let me just say that is was an absolute blast!!! Our photographers are amazing! But one of the most stressful things I had to do was decide what in the world Apricot Dude and I were going to wear! Let me share what we decided to go with, then provide some tips on how to pick and show you how they turned out!
I knew I wanted two different types of pictures. First, I wanted to do some more traditional, formal pictures that I know my Grandma would love. Secondly, I simply wanted some that were us. In jeans and comfy shirts, flip flops….just being ourselves! I was fortunate to find a dress for our more formal pictures that I LOVED. So I had one outfit down. Now onto number two- and I had no idea. I seriously think I bought 5 or 6 different shirts. I knew I wanted something solid, light colored and that sort of matched our wedding colors (peachy/corals/greens). Finally, I made a decision. Well, I thought I had. The day of our pictures, I had a few minutes to kill before my hair appointment so I ran into Banana Republic. Just browsing, I came across this fabulous shirt that I knew I wanted to wear for our pictures. It was like it was just calling for me! So I bought it and it turned out to be perfect!
Now for Apricot Dude….he was pretty open to basically whatever I thought would look nice. We settled on his favorite yellow button down shirt and khakis for our more formal pictures and jeans and polo for the others. It did take us quite a few stores to find a light green polo that we thought would look great with mine. (Quick word of advice: we found the EXACT same Tommy Hilfinger polo at TJMaxx for half the price of Macy’s!)
Here are a few tips that I have when looking for engagement outfits because there certainly are LOTS of decisions to make:
If a picture says a thousand words, why are we all writing long invitations? Can’t I just post card everyone a photo and just leave it at that? Sounds like a good plan to me.
Engagement photos can say a lot, especially if you’re including them with invitations and on wedding blogs/websites. It’s more than just a documentation of how you looked on that day. Just as the style of the invitation may say lot about the wedding so can the photo. When the invitation arrives in the mail the invite is the first peek that the guests have at the theme and style of the wedding. Is it going to be formal, causal? Beach style, Vintage, dress-up, casual, a BBQ or picnic? If that invite can convey that much, even before reading the details, then a photo included can say even more. What does your photo say about you? What does your photo say about your wedding?
The number one thing for me would be for the friends/relatives that know us well to look at the photo and say, “that’s so Daisy Bud and Mr. Daisy.” I spent a long time debating if we were going to include engagement photos in our invitations, we decided to do it because the only decent picture of us together was one taken on a cell phone 3 years ago. (it really is a pretty cute picture), But, we thought it would be good to have something a bit nicer. The hard thing about photos for us in general is that Mr. Daisy is a photographer and so we almost never get in a photo together.
We have a great Wedding Photographer, Vanessa Menendez. She primarily does editorials, headshots and pageant photography. Fortunately she’s a good friend and we were able to snag her for the wedding, engagement photos, and a session of head shots for me. We met up in a sweet location about 20 minutes away from where I live and we took my headshots (of which I was in desperate need) and then headed off to the park to do the engagement photos we’re hoping to include in our invites.
This past weekend, Olive Dude and I happily decided that we would use Erin from Erin J. Photography to photograph our wedding. I loved her work the second I saw it, and, even though I feel like I looked at hundreds of photographers both around my area AND as far away as New York, my gut kept telling me that she was it. So – photographer – check that baby off the list.
In looking at photographers, I started wondering about videography. Initially, Olive Dude and I nixed the idea due to budget restrictions. However, I have heard from some married friends who did not get a videographer wish that they did. (That whole hindsight being 20/20 thing will really get you every time.)
Last night, while shamlessly watching The Real Housewives of Orange County, I found myself torn. This episode was about a surprise 40th vow renewal that Gretchen, one of the housewives, had planned for her parents. She took them to the church that they got married in, and they sat in the pew and watched their wedding video.
Gretchen’s mom (the bride) had a great reaction. Her first sentence was, “Oh my God – is this our wedding video?” (Meaning they clearly had not watched it in YEARS), but then she burst into tears and said happily “Oh my God. Look at us.” To which her husband of 40 years replied, “Who are those people?!” with a smile.
This particular video was the reason I HAD to go see our venue, the Chesapeake Bay Beach Club. I cry every time I watch it.
Are you like me where you’re either afraid of going to the dentist, too lazy to get real teeth whitening, and just don’t want to pay for it if you don’t have to? About a month ago, I got my yearly teeth cleaning and I asked my hygienist for non-professional teeth whitening options. She recommended the Crest 3d White Strips. Guess what I did the very next day? That’s right, I got the Professional Effects 3d White Strips (Pictured on the left).
Results: Out of a scale from 1-5 (1 being no effects to 5 my teeth are blinding white!), my rate would be a 2.5 out of 5. It wasn’t as white as I wanted it to be, but it did have SOME effect. I thought about posting up pictures of my teeth, but I don’t want to gross you out! =P Would I Recommend this Product?
Not really. I spent about $45 on it and the results weren’t what I wanted. I thought about returning it to the manufacturer and getting my money back, but I just thought it was too much of a hassle.
Photographer: 
.jpg "Wedding Party Attire")
.jpg "Wedding Party Attire")
Are you like me where you’re either afraid of going to the dentist, too lazy to get real teeth whitening, and just don’t want to pay for it if you don’t have to? About a month ago, I got my yearly teeth cleaning and I asked my hygienist for non-professional teeth whitening options. She recommended the Crest 3d White Strips. Guess what I did the very next day? That’s right, I got the Professional Effects 3d White Strips (Pictured on the left).
Results: Out of a scale from 1-5 (1 being no effects to 5 my teeth are blinding white!), my rate would be a 2.5 out of 5. It wasn’t as white as I wanted it to be, but it did have SOME effect. I thought about posting up pictures of my teeth, but I don’t want to gross you out! =P
