Alisha had us fill out this book tonight called “how well do you know your bride/groom” (I got through 50 out of 100 before I had to thrown in the towel).  It was interesting trying to identify what the other person would do in given situations, how they’d think, feel, react, etc.  It got me thinking as I was browsing through some images tonight… these images below all mean something to me because I was there and present for what happened (obviously).  But what I see and what the person in them sees might be totally different.  And as the viewer of this blog, yet another perspective.  But it really is fun seeing the huge range of emotions and how we view them in the setting of a wedding…

What do you identify with in each of these images?

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So I was watching the NBA draft last night and saw a suit I really loved.  What do you think of this option?


I also briefly considered this look too but I think the one above might work better.

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I apologize in advance, but all the emails I received in the last 2 days have been mistakingly deleted off my server.   If you sent us an email in the last 48 hours and haven't received a response please re-send your email.  Because of being a blackberry newb I hit delete from device and server rather than just from device.  Ali and I snuck up to the Turning Stone Casino and Resort the last 2 days for some massage and a relaxing mini getaway due to needing to be recharged in the middle of busy season. 

Speaking of which, here are a couple random thoughts…..

- This is probably going to sound cheap, but what's up with the assumption by so many people in the service industry that a tip is mandatory?  Like just because you are at a job and punched it that you deserve to be tipped?  That attitude bothers me when I go to places like that.  On a totally unrelated note, Alisha is strongly recommending an all inclusive honeymoon by the way :)  No seriously we are in the service industry ourselves and we never expect a tip… ever.  Sometimes we do get tipped, and it's really awesome when we do, but it's totally unexpected and never really crosses our mind.  Like I remember one of my favorite couples Amy and Dave who I photographed a couple years ago got us a couples massage over a Mirbeau among other things as a thank you after the wedding.  I'd say it made our day but it was more like made our month.  It was just so out of the blue and unexpected that we were like a kid in a candy store when that was given to us.  Isn't that the idea behind a tip though?

- I have become increasingly more interested (borderline obsessed) with reading and learning about marketing lately.  I mean I've followed extremely popular blogs in the past like Seth Godin's or Andy Sernovitz's, but now my entire blog reader is filled up with marketing blogs and I'm listening to audio books constantly.  One of the surprising things I've encountered is how differently I view the mainstream advertising now.  Like for me I think of the best ideas out there by any credit card company is that Capital One Card Lab.  What a genius idea, instead of forcing yourself upon people and spamming the hell out of them, create a card which is totally customizable and in which people come to you.  Make it so much cooler and with such better options that people actually want to come to you.  But the ads are soooo awful on TV.  You may immediately know what I'm talking about, the ones that have the the scary looking scientists in an underground lab, uploading pics of him skiing (what?!), and yelling "it's alive!"  C'mon guys, you are totally ruining a great idea!  Don't let your advertising screw up your marketing.

That's it for random thoughts for today, back to work!

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gave Alisha some inspiration this weekend :)  I originally had a beautiful wedding for the 21st, but unfortunately that fell through so then I was supposed to have the weekend off.  Because the world couldn't possibly see me doing nothing on the weekend I ended up shooting a Lillie Studios wedding (congrats to Deirdre and Brian!) on Saturday and then tagged along with Alisha on Sunday because her wedding was right next to my Sat. location (and I got paid in massage for all that work!). 

Ali really loved Tracy's flowers from her wedding on Sunday though, and wants to do something very similar for our own.  What do you think?



Here is the beautiful couple themselves!  Check Alisha's blog for their entire wedding soon to come.

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Well I think we have our wedding colors.  As mentioned in an earlier entry Alisha and Sabrina liked the color scheme of pink, slate gray, and irovy.  It initially started off as a wild card because it was so different and definitely a harder scheme to pull off than our other choices, however because we like a challenge and like being a little different I think we're going to go with this.  It's not a common choice at all, and I don't think either one of us have seen this done at any of our own weddings (if someone has and I missed it please let me know!) but that's part of the excitement.  Doing things differently is important to a couple who lives and breathes weddings for a living.

We couldn't really find anything online about it but then Sabrina sent me this link from the Martha Stewart blog.


I also had a tough time visioning the lines and tables, but Sabrina says something like this gray linen with the ivory runner and pink flowered centerpieces and I'm digging it


Alisha has her dress all picked out (more later) and I now have an idea of what I'm going to wear as well – gray suit with a white dress shirt and pink, grey, and ivory pinstripe tie. 

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This weekend I had the opportunity to shoot probably my favorite
engagement shoot of the year so far.  The reason I say this, and I
never really have "favorites," is because of how challenged I was
photographically with Seema and Mo's engagement shoot.  We picked a day
that called for 50/50 rain, and when we touched base earlier in the day
about canceling it we decided that it was nice right now and we'll take
our chances.  When I stepped out of my car right before the shoot the
water in the streets was up to mid-shoe because it was thunderstorming
so hard.  So much for our choice!  We didn't even step outside until
almost a half hour after our scheduled shoot time.  Fortunately at that
point the rain held off long enough for us to meet at Columbus Circle
and see if we could maybe sneak some shots in.

Trouble was, that at point it was basically dark, still lightly
raining, and I was in a place I had never been.  Talk about being
challenged as a photographer!  I absolutely loved it though, and it was
great to be put to the challenge so much.  Seema and Mo are an awesome
couple and I wanted to make sure I was able to get some some amazing
shots because I like them so much… so ya know, no added pressure :) 
I feel amped with the stuff we were able to get though, and ended up
being able to spend some time with the both of them as well which was
great.

I tried to really use the rain in our advantage for some cool effects rather than against us.
My fav!



You can see how hard it's pouring in this shot…

Thanks for an awesome shoot you two!

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I hope everyone has a great weekend, and Happy Father's Day to all the Dads out there!  This is what Lillie made me at school :))

and this was my card

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One big hurtle I face as I try to look at suits is I need to dress according to the wedding colors.  Without knowing what our wedding colors are going to be it's hard to visualize my suit.  One thing that's absolutely out for me is black.  Because we are going to be having it on a lake and it's going to be more about color, black is definitely out for me. 

The colors we have narrowed it down to are as follows:

Brown and Blue or
Brown and Pink or
Grey and Pink

Grey and Pink is sort of the wild card at this point, Alisha saw something that inspired her with those colors and now she loves them.  Sabrina, our fabulous wedding coordinator (and good friend), agrees and loves them too so something tells me that's what we're going to end up with. 

Here is what I'd envision myself looking like if we chose those colors (the tie is a little more orange than pink but you get the idea):


If I wanted to go more casual I could also wear just a dress shirt underneath with no tie, and do something like the suit above with just this shirt:

 
If we decide to do a different color scheme like brown and blue (or pink instead of blue) then I could do either a dark brown suit with a brown and blue pinstripe tie or a khaki suit like this below:


Thoughts??

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This has probably been the topic we've talked about the most since day 1.  Most would assume that would have been about the photography, but we both already know who that's going to be.  He or She is for another day though :)

We've always thought since day 1 that she would wear a Monique Lhuillier.  Monique's gorgeous designs have been a favorite of ours for a couple years now.  I've been fortunate enough to have some of my own brides wear them which just further proved to us that they come off the runway and look even more amazing in real life. 

That idea has been put on hold though, because the Oscar De La Renta show we went to back in April was simply amazing. 


We both felt that was one of the best shows we've seen and Ali and I both strongly considered having her wear an Oscar.  Here is a link to some of our favs from that show.

Finding out more information on the exclusive brand of Oscar was tougher than we had imagined though… but fortunately for us our good friend (and fellow planner on her upcoming wedding) Tracy Freedman from Wedding Style passed along the name of the PR person over at Oscar for us.  That's cheating a little bit I realize but we all know it's ok to cheat a little when it comes to planning a wedding :)

Stay tuned to see what Alisha chooses!!

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We've gotten lots and lots of questions lately about our wedding now that we're finally engaged and I must say…. you all are a lot faster than us!  I've had people contacting me about hiring me who got engaged after us.  People have asked about our date….. we haven't even picked out a location in the world yet which we think we want to do it in! 

However I'm pleased to share tonight that I think we might have finally decided on a location.  We've talked about Hawaii, Mexico, even Bermuda has come up in the last couple days… Cape Cod entered the discussion, but ultimately we think what we've decided is to get married just 45 minutes away.  Skaneateles Lake to be exact.  You see this afternoon Alisha and I skipped out on the office (I admit it!) and brought the jetski up to one of our favorite places, Skaneateles Lake for the day to ride around and swim.  It was beautiful and it was just another day at "the lake" as we've called it for a couple years. 

Many people who know me know that I actually spent summers on Skaneateles Lake all my life.  We even have pictures of me floating in a raft with my parents when I was 3 (which is priceless because now we have the same exact thing with Lillie now that she's the same age).  It's very sentimental to me and has been for a number of years.  One of the best memories I have with my older brother who passed about 8 years ago was of the 2 of us floating around Skaneateles Lake one sunny afternoon when we were both in school.  After his passing for some reason I always felt a calm and peaceful mood when going out on Skaneateles Lake.  People who have lost a loved one I'm sure can relate when I say it sounds quirky, but sometimes there is just a place or object or sound or taste that can put you in a place to remember a person… and Skaneateles Lake has always had that aura with me.

Anyway, tonight we came up with the idea to rent a large lakehouse for a week and have the wedding there!  Invite up our friends and family to celebrate the week with us.  Loved ones from out of town can just stay at the house with us even.  It would provide a beautiful setting, something special to us personally, and allow us the time and setting to really enjoy some quality time with our family and friends (which is really important to us).  Here is a picture to give you an idea of the type of setting we have in mind:

To those of you who follow this blog and know Skaneateles well…. if you know of any places and/or people who have a house that would accommodate exactly what we're looking for please feel free to pass it on.  We found a house online that we love, but are open to exploring options. 

Thanks for following along with me this morning and please check back as I'll be blogging about our wedding as we plan it :)  That should add a fun twist to the blog for the next year!

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