Wednesday, March 28, 2012

No looking! Well...maybe


It’s been a long time since I’ve written a post.  Ironically, I think my last post started about the same way.  I never forget that I have this little online diary, but my life has just been a bit too busy to document lately.  That strikes me as sad somehow, but oh well…rather have a wonderful, busy life and no time to document than have plenty of time to document and no life!

So what’s new with me?  I’m getting married in 45 days!!!!  I’m so excited I can barely see straight.  Most of the planning is done now…so the “just waiting” has started.  It feels like May 12th will NEVER come, but I’m sure it will.  I’m trying to savor it, but it’s hard because I just want to be Mrs. Josiah Coburn!

We got engagement pics done by the lovely Amanda Curcio, proud owner of Amanda Truth Photography (one of which is pictured above).  If you’d like to see Amanda’s favorites from the engagement session (as well as some very sweet words she said about Josiah and I), you can do that here.

I’ve been struggling over ONE decision for the wedding…first look or no first look?  For those of you who haven’t obsessed over every detail of a wedding lately and are unaware of what a “first look” is, let me explain.

Instead of the bride and groom seeing each other for the first time AT the ceremony, they have an intimate moment before the ceremony where the groom closes his eyes and then turns around and sees his blushing bride all dolled up in her wedding day finery. 

I love tradition, so I didn’t even THINK about doing a first look…at first.  I just KNEW I wanted him to be completely surprised as I came down the aisle.  I mean, sure, it would make it A LOT easier to take pictures before the ceremony so there isn’t as much wait time for our guests between the ceremony and reception (which I have been REALLY stressing about), but sometimes tradition shouldn’t be abandoned for what is simply convenient right?  Easier isn’t always better…

In this case, though, I’m having second thoughts.  My lovely aforementioned photographer said she would happily do whatever I wanted, but having done a ton of research for her own wedding (which is coming this fall) she made some very convincing points about the first look.
  1.  It DOES give you more time to take the pictures.  Definitely.  There’s just no arguing that point
  2. It gives the bride and groom time to have a private moment on their wedding day and “get the jitters out” so to speak.  Many brides and grooms report being MUCH more relaxed after the firt look session and portraits.
  3. You get a lot more pictures because you have time to take them!!
And after all that…I still wasn’t sold.  However, she also provided me some links to some other photographer’s blogs about the subject…and the pictures and testimonials totally got me.  I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these priceless moments caught on camera shared just between the bride and groom (okay, there’s a photographer there, too, but whatever).  The genuine emotion in some of them was just amazing…I actually got teary-eyed!

So, we’re going to do a first look and I feel SO much better about it.  I love knowing that I won’t have to be stressed between the ceremony and reception wondering if I’m keeping my guests waiting too long because most of the shots will already be done!

The links Amanda gave me are:


I’m not as familiar with Jasmine, but I’ve been looking at Lauryn and Katelyn’s blogs quite a bit thanks to Amanda (the former is Amanda’s photog for her wedding and she just did a workshop with the latter), and I honestly have sort of a non-romantic internet crush on both of these lovely ladies.  They are young, spunky, and write about their craft so passionately!  I would love to have a sit-down with them sometime because they seem like genuinely wonderful people.  So…look them up! (Amanda, too!)

That’s all for now.  I am completely happy to have made my decision, and I’m VERY happy with the decision I’ve made.  I’ll write again after the wedding to tell alllllll about it!