Wow, what a year it’s been… Last September, our wedding was the biggest news of our lives and now… THIS is the biggest (little) news of our lives. We’re having a baby! Christie and I couldn’t be more excited and we can’t wait to meet him or her due February 25, 2012! We thank you all for your prayers and support and we’ll be updating the blog as things progress and our little baby continues to grow. Pictures and video below…
We actually got this great news on the day before Father’s Day, June 18 at 5am. Christie had been feeling “funny” for a couple of weeks so we bought some tests and she just couldn’t wait take one. Imagine my surprise, being woken up at 5am to Christie whispering in my ear… “I’m pregant!”, while shoving the test stick in my face. It took awhile for my eyes to adjust and for my brain to catch up to those two life-changing words… “I’m pregant!”.
Christie and I were married on September 25, 2010 in the beautiful Los Rios district of San Juan Capistrano, California and it honestly was our dream wedding. We only had six months to plan and design, but all the DIY work was well worth it and to quote many of our guests and ourselves, “the whole wedding was magical.” We left our celebration that evening wanting more and just glowing from the love, warmth and fun shared with our family and friends. PS – If you’d like to read and view more about our wedding, check out the detailed post on Green Wedding Shoes and show some love to our amazing vendors.
We were lucky enough to spend the first two nights of our honeymoon in a ridiculous three-room suite with a priceless ocean view at the amazing Montage Resort in Laguna Beach! Long story, but this was always my dream to begin my honeymoon at the Montage and we were so blessed to be able to do just that. We thoroughly enjoyed being pampered, the flowing champaign, meals on our private balcony and hearing the “congratulations” all weekend from the gracious staff.
From the Montage, we hopped on a plane and spent the next seven days in beautiful Maui, mostly in our favorite place to stay on the best beach in Maui… Napili Sunset on Napili Bay. Seriously, a great find and a less expensive, more humble place to stay for a week in paradise. We didn’t have much money for extra, fun adventures so we decided to have absolutely no agenda for each day and we mostly just relaxed on the beach. I brought several cameras but didn’t shoot that much… wanted to focus more on the time with my beautiful new bride. Below are some selects from my 5D, Holga 135 and a cheap underwater disposable 35mm camera. It was great to revisit these images and remember this amazing time in our lives.
This post isn’t about any of my images that I shot, but about my proposal to my amazing and beautiful fiance’, Christie. First of all, a BIG thanks to Jeffrey Neal and Cami Jane for helping pull this whole thing off. Now for the story…
Christie and I had been talking about getting married for awhile but she had NO idea this was going to happen when it did on that Friday, April 2, 2010. I had been thinking about this idea for a few months and fortunately I’ve been blessed with amazing friends and fellow photographers who I knew would help me with my sneaky plan.
Since I wanted the whole event captured on photo (and video), but didn’t want to have any hidden photographers because I would’ve been too nervous and stressed out, I thought I’d just put the camera directly in front of Christie’s face… further throwing her off. A couple months before, I had been mentioning to Christie that Jeff had a mentor session coming up with Cami and he needed a couple to model for him. When Christie asked, “why us?”, I just said, “well, because Jeff knows us and we know the photo shoot process so well…” You see, Christie has been on quite a few of my shoots so she really knows how the whole thing works.
I went over to Jeff’s house that Friday morning to drop off the ring and the new point-and-shoot digital camera I bought for Christie which would be used to film the video. (more on that later) Since I didn’t want to have the ring in my pocket for the beginning of the “mentor session”, I had Jeff keep it in his camera bag to quickly hand it to me when Christie was turned around.
So, Christie and I arrived at the location and I could tell that Jeff and Cami were a little nervous, as was I… but Christie had no idea. Both Jeff and Cami played of the “mentor session” perfectly! We shot for about 15 minutes before Jeff started setting up the actual proposal. So, as you’ll see in the photos, there are a few rad shots from Jeff for the “mentor session”. Once I could tell Jeff was setting it up, I got nervous… and as you can see in the video, I had to kneel and stand a few times because I didn’t want Christie to turn around until Jeff was absolutely ready to shoot the whole thing. That was such a defining moment in my life, many thoughts were running through my head but the main one was “I can’t believe this is actually happening right now!”
Christie’s reaction was EXACTLY what I was looking for… total shock, surprise and amazement over the situation, us finally being engaged… and the RING! I did good. Not going to lie. Guys, if you need a referral, I went to Eli’s Jewelry up in LA in the jewelry district. Legit. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to get any good macro shots of the ring so I leave you with an iPhone shot from after the proposal.
Christie needed a new digital camera… so I bought the awesome Canon 780 IS, which shoots HD video, and placed a label on it reading “Christie Elliott”… her new name once we’re married. I wanted her to have a new camera during our engagement period so she could use it for all the outings and planning that comes along with a wedding. I also wanted to keep this a surprise… so, when Jeff and Cami met up early at the location, Cami took the camera and hid it in her camera bag during the shoot. She knew that when Jeff was setting up the actual proposal, it was her cue to start filming… and she did it perfectly! After I proposed and we started walking back to the car, Cami sneakily gave me the camera so once Christie and I got home, I could go upstairs, wrap it and then give it to her later… with the actual proposal video on it. And that’s exactly what I did… I know, pretty cool.
If you’ve read this far… thank you. Christie and I are so excited for our wedding this September in San Juan Capistrano! Thanks to all of our loved ones for their love and support and I can’t wait to share more of our wedding story with you guys!
*A quick disclaimer: Jeffrey Neal was gracious enough to shoot these images but I edited them all with my processing.
