Today marks six whole months of marriage and I can’t stop thinking about how much faster these six months have gone by than the languishing ones leading up to the wedding. Funny how time has the power to feel different, even though technically it’s the same number of minutes and hours.
As of today, I’ve been a wife for:
- 4,380 hours
- 262,800 minutes
- 182 days
And I think I’m getting pretty good at it!
With everything that’s happened with the venue since they scammed us in October, I haven’t had a chance to share much about the happier side of the wedding. That’s the one saving grace about our experience – whether things went as planned or whether they went wildly off the rails, it was always going to be the happiest day of our lives.
While the hotel was in the process of botching our week, our photographers from The Lilypad Agency skillfully snapped photos that made it look like we were just frolicking in the waves without a care in the world.
I’d been Facebook friends with B.A. Van Sise from The Lilypad Agency for years, so I’d seen his work and knew I liked his editorial, creative style. He reached out to me after finding out Rick and I were engaged, and the rest is history. It was the easiest part of the whole wedding planning process!
B.A. and Kathryn Cooper were easy as pie to work with and I loved the fun approach they brought to our beach wedding. If we learned anything during our debacle (aside from where NOT to go in The Bahamas), it’s that it pays to choose real pros for photography. B.A. and Coop transformed a crappy experience, where we were all stressed and distraught, into dreamy wedding photos. I don’t know how they did it, but we are so grateful.
We had three days of shooting on our schedule.
- Day 1: Rick and I took pictures near the resort (avoiding the empty pools and construction zones as best we could!) in burner wedding clothes
- Day 2: Coop came on our family snorkeling excursion with Brendal and captured our hilarious underwater modeling efforts
- Day 3: The wedding day including preparation, the “I Dos” and the raucous reception
I’m sharing a few shots from Day 1 and Day 2 here and have lots more to come! I am so glad we booked the team for several days. You really can’t have too many photos of a once-in-a-lifetime event, you know? And shooting on Wednesday in our burner clothes really helped free up time to dance and mingle during the reception, instead of worrying about getting all the right shots while our guests ate conch fritters without us.
We put our burner clothes through the ringer! It was SO windy during our first shoot and the normally serene sea was so churned up, my arms nearly ripped off in the photos with the red fabric, and B.A. and Coop almost lost a couple of cameras in the process. The things we do for the perfect shot!
I’d like to point out that Rick is the opposite of me when it comes to photos. He never takes them, and if he does, they’re of the fish he catches, not of himself. So I just have to give him mad props for being such a good sport and rolling around in a wet suit in the sand with me. He really is a keeper!
On that first day of shooting, we swam, we dove and we climbed in a hole. And we only spent about $40 between the dress from Amazon and Rick’s suit from Goodwill! How great is that?
B.A. saw an old photo of a couple in the sand and decided to recreate it with us. Our friends dug the big hole and then we jumped in. It was SO windy that day, we ended up with sand in our teeth and eyes. The photos where my eyes are closed are sheer self-preservation, not blissful romance. But it sure looks like romance, doesn’t it?
Even though our freshest wedding memories are still mostly disappointment and regret over the money wasted, when I look at the photos, I know in a few years we’ll be able to laugh at the horror story and focus on the best parts of the week.
If we ever get around to that wedding redo we keep talking about, we’re bringing B.A. and Coop with us!
Want to reach out to The Lilypad Agency? Get in touch here.
Tell me, did you love or hate your wedding photos? I’ve heard so many horror stories… and I’m glad this particular part of our wedding debacle has a very happy ending!
