young love...

back when i was a make up artist (in another life), and did a LOT of bridal make up, i always took a picture of me and my bride. this wedding however, i was the photographer. it's my first *real* wedding shoot, and while i did the bridal make up for it as well, i didn't have time (or even think about) to snap a picture of miss april and myself. luckily my handy dandy bff who came to act as my assistant for the day, snapped this without me knowing while i was putting the finishing touches of gloss on my bride...

this wedding was so fun. i've been to PLENTY of formal weddings in ballrooms, over looking the ocean, in super huge 5 star hotels (my own wedding included), but this one beat them all. it was in a little relatively unknown town, and the ceremony was held in a 110 year old church. the reception was at a little lake in the country, under a pavilion. but i'm going to to tell you what made it so incredible. not only could you FEEL and SEE that this couple was so totally gaga over one another, but you felt like you had stepped into a scene from "sweet home alabama". everyone was laughing, smiling, dancing. i was an outsider, having never met any of them, including the bride and groom until that day, and they took me in and treated me like family. they were so friendly, and both sides of the families were talking and dancing with each other. i've never seen anything like it. and throughout the day, you saw just how much everyone there (and there was a LOT of people) truly loved and were happy for shane & april. it was so touching. for me, seeing things through the lens provides so much more clarity for me. it puts situations in a *box*, if you will, and lets you see "stories" that you might miss if you were just standing there looking at the bigger picture. i saw husbands and wives looking at each other adoringly. i saw the mother of the groom looking so proudly at her son. i saw the way shane & april looked at each other when they thought that noone else was looking. shane, april & the entire wedding party were a blast to work with, as they were up to doing anything i suggested. i had so much fun with them, and i loved being able to glance into this couples life, and see the closeness they had with each other, and with their friends and family. here are just a few of my favorites from that day, if you'd like to see more, go to my flickr http://flickr.com/photos/millajane i'm not putting all of them up, but my most favs will be appearing on flickr.


her wedding shoes. i loved them! so cute!



she is by far the sweetest thing i've met in a long while. it's easy to see why she has so many people around her that love her. if you meet april, you adore her. it's that simple. she's a doll.





april & shane fit well together. she's the bubbly, energy packed, endless chatterbug ( which is probably why we got on so well ;) ), and he's the quiet "guys guy", who listens to her, looks at her adoringly and shakes his head smiling and laughing at her. it's easy to see he's totally in love with her, and her with him. his relationship with his brother and his friends impressed me. they are so close. you can tell that those bunch of guys would do anything for one another. it's so rare to see that these days. the entire wedding was refreshing. and all the jitters i had about photographing this wedding vanished after a couple minutes of meeting these two. it was a great experience, and i'd do a thousand weddings if i knew that they would be like shane & aprils.

this was the first one i edited, and it is still my most favorite.