Beautiful Day Photography’s Weblog

SO if you have checked out my engagement section of my website you will recognize Lisa and Dave from the fun San Francisco photos. After that shoot where we ran ALL over San Francisco, I was SUPER excited to be shooting their wedding. Not to mention we had our “dream team” working together again. Meg Perotti and Jessica Lehrman (my intern), and finally the amazing Ryan Larson from Savoir Flair wedding coordinating. Meg ACTUALLY has already beaten me to the punch with blogging about this wedding…(I had SO much more editing than her in my defense though:) But if you want to check out HER blog about Lisa and Dave’s wedding click on this link (Meg’s BLOG). We shot like 5000 photos! That tends to happen when everything is just SO beautiful and the couple is SO fun. So I am just going to put a bunch of photos here for your enjoyment. If this doesn’t satisfy your curiosity, click on this link (www.pictage.com) to see our favorite photos from that wedding.

We did ALL of our bridal portraits before the wedding, so we had a “first look” which I personally LOVE, because it gives us SO MUCH time to get amazing shots and helps to calm the nerves. Lisa is JUST like me though, where she LOVES to talk. She’s definitely got me beat on the words per minute , but it was SO cute, because the second we had them there standing together to pose for photos they were just lost in their own little world…talking, talking, talking:)

Between the stories of the hook-up-fest from the night before’s partying to Ryan’s details, to the KICK ass DJ girl who had EVERYONE dancing non-stop till the very end, to the amazing cake (OF COURSE by CAKE DIVAS again!!), to the hilarity of the Fraternity boys ALL together again (drink MF drink MF Drink MF DRINK!), Dave’s TEARING UP the dance floor, and of course JACK…(need I say more??)…I think this was a night to remember!!! The final hilarious touch is my intern, Jess, capturing me taking photos of the bride at the end of the night balancing a cocktail in one hand and the camera in the other!! OH LORD:) I LOVE YOU GUYS THOUGH and I am SO glad I was a part of your big day. I can’t wait till you relive that night through our photos and I hope you take a million more on your honeymoon!

So not only is Christy one of my BEST friends from Virginia, but I have had the pleasure of being her neighbor out here in Los Angeles, working together and shooting for both clothing lines she has been a designer for, shooting her wedding and SOON, very SOON being her West Coast Auntie to her first child Leilani Chantelle Bryant.

Yesterday we had the most AMAZING baby shower for her at Caroline’s house (the previous owner of Beau and Eros Clothing) and when you are a part of such an amazing, intimate event and have the luxury of being a creative person who has LOTS of creative friends….it’s pretty brilliant the little touches that can turn an ordinary event into an extraordinary one. First of all, I called in a favor from my FAVORITE cake place that does most of my weddings the Cake Divas. I gave them a drawing and the baby shower invitation (shown above) and they created a work of art, straight out of Alice in Wonderland! It was not only SUPER delicious, but so beautiful no one wanted to be the one to cut into it! They copied the “L” from the invitation and created a chocolate shield using it and took the silhouette of Christy pregnant on the invitation and recreated it on the top of the cake.

Now I have to brag about Caroline’s house….I felt like I was in Thailand. She not only was the owner of a clothing line, but she started up a company called Papillon Chic that staged houses that were for sale. She could EASILY be an interior designer. We had the best, healthy spread of food, sat outside on the patio underneath colored lanterns that matched the baby’s theme and the pillows and the whole house opens up so that every room is converted into an indoor/outdoor paradise surrounded by fountains and bamboo. Our table was a converted Tibetan door with legs. EVERY single corner of the house has amazing details such as this…Without decorations it would have been amazing….But now to brag about the decorations….

So Christy works for a NEW clothing line called SPIRIT ACTIVEWEAR, owned by the fabulous Maria (who ALSO coordinates events and I HIGHLY recommend her). Maria not ONLY designed and screenprinted 12 unique clothing pieces for little Leilani, but sent them out as the baby shower invitations and printed Leilani clothing tags and had the invite hanging off the garment as the tag. She THEN, brought the lanterns and candles and pillows and created a tree with little baby items hanging from it and framed photos everywhere…In fact, everywhere you LOOKED there were amazing little details. TRULY she went way above and beyond for this event. I have to include some photos of her details for you to enjoy…

AND FINALLY, since I put the “ass” in “class” at this event, I hosted the “everyone wear balloons so we can all be pregnant like Christy” game, the “taste testing baby food game” (which made us all want to barf…thank GOD eating the cake was shortly after that), the “let’s photoshop Christy to make her look pregnant” since I never actually TOOK of a photo of her pregnant, and of course my climbing all over the furniture taking photos….Either way, it was BEAUTIFUL and Caroline is renting out her place for events FYI! So I love you Christy, even though you don’t even LOOK pregnant! Seriously, you look like ME when I’m full..LOL. But you are like my sister and I can’t wait to meet little Leilani, since I am her “Tia Favorita”!!!

OK, so ALL I can say is GOOD JOB Match.com!!! For all of you who are skeptical about meeting “the one” online, you have not met Susanne and Michael. Apparently Michael’s sister found her and matched them up and the rest is a whirlwind love affair that brought us to yesterday’s shoot. They were SO cute and in their own world together that I barely had to direct them…I shot almost 600 photos in an hour, because they were just TOO cute. I had SUCH a blast yesterday that I HAVE to share a dozen or so of their photos. I truly feel that this wedding is going to be magazine worthy and WHAT a great story piece this will be about how they met. It gives those of you out there that are past their 20’s and feeling like they will never find their soulmate hope that you NEVER know what lies around the next corner… Other than the fact that they are both so tall that I will probably need a ladder at the wedding:). I think everything was perfect! I can’t wait for how emotional and beautiful the wedding is going to be.