Saturday I had the honor of working with the lovely Jennifer and talented Billy on their wedding day! They got married on the sand outside of Hotel Laguna and moved the party indoors for their reception. Their colors were Tiffany Blue and Brown- and the event turned out GORGEOUS with their satin linens, candle centerpieces, and great design decor!
When I arrived at the Hotel, Jen had just gotten her hair done and was looking gorgeous!
And she took a few minutes to show me their personal flowers:
The bridesmaid bouquets were all roses and the bridal bouquet was strictly tulips. Gorgeous!
Flower girl basket
I went downstairs then, to the reception room and started helping with the set up! So, here’s a few pictures of the joint efforts [the groomsmen were actually quite a help! Of course, all of the items were in their changing room, so they may not had too much of a choice!]:
[Billy, our groom, is a graphic designer, and made up these great table name cards. They're GORGEOUS and each table name, which were beaches, had a different icon on the top! He also made the invitations himself as well as the large seating chart they used, which you'll see later...]
Favors, which were gel candles with mini beaches in them, even had their little monogram logo on them!
Here’s their gorgeous flowers on their sweetheart table!!!
Her toss bouquet:
The cake!!!
[Here's one of the cake by candle-light, from a bit later in the evening]:
On a more serious note: Billy’s father passed away just before he and Jennifer met. They really found an honoring way to keep him as a part of their special day. First, their homage to him at his family table:
All of these elements were a total surprise to Billy. They also had a small picture on their sweetheart table by his plate of his father. It was really touching.
Here’s some shots of the whole room [or, most of it anyway] during it’s makeover:
And here’s some decor in the lobby right outside of the reception room:
Onto the cocktail area… Here’s their guestbook table:
The florist, Mia, went to highschool with Jennifer and had such GREAT touches. I loved her flowers and her personality, and the best part is that she worked her butt off in order to change and be there for the ceremony and reception as a guest! These baskets with the mini boxes are full of rose petals to toss during the ceremony’s recessional. We handed them out to guests prior to the ceremony. So cute!:
Here is the previously mentioned seating chart:
Their card box was actually a gift from a family member who had already gotten married and made it for her own wedding. Change the picture, and voila! Gorgeous card box!:
They kept the cocktail area set up simple, just by providing large shells as centerpieces for the tables:
The ceremony, as I said, took place on the sand! Jen and Billy really wanted to keep it simple and so they opted to just decorate with two large bamboo pillars and some tiki torches on the aisle. It really turned out gorgeous [just wait until you see the guests all crowded in!]:
Their table for the rose presentation and the sand ceremony:
Here’s a few shots of the staircase rail and the floral decor:
Some pre-ceremony awkward shots of our handsome groom:
The guy’s flowers [loved them!!]:
Billy was SO committed to not seeing his bride before she walked down the aisle! This is a picture of him, standing alone, halfway to the ceremony site, without any of his guys, because he heard that she was coming down the elevator, which was inside the building around the corner! It was too cute!!
Getting pinned and striking a pose for me:
And here is my gorgeous Jennifer on her way out to get married!
Note the detail on her bouquet, also a surprise for Billy:
The guests finding a good spot at the ceremony site:
The begining of the processional:
And, the girls:
Flower girl and ring bearer [set #1]:
And set #2:
The bride!!!
The best part about this whole beach ceremony is that I got to sneak many different shots because I could walk behind the whole party and not be noticed!
The rose presentation [to both of their mothers]:
At the begining of the ceremony, the priest asked the crowd to gather in close around the bride and groom. I got some photos from the staircase overlooking the site and it was truly gorgeous:
Vows, rings, sand ceremony:
[That would be the maid of honor, Jen's sister Sheyanne, getting emotional during the ceremony]…
LOVE the way they ended up holding hands during the ceremony:
This cute little couple in the background you may recognize! That’s Amber and Trevor, who I worked with in April! Trevor is Jennifer’s cousin and that’s how Jen heard about me. Amber is making cute little lovey eyes with her husband during the ceremony. I loved getting to see them!
Yep, you’re right. The ceremony musician was none other than my loving HUSBAND! He and his friend, Jesse, stepped in for Jennifer last minute when her guitarist [who was a family friend] backed out!:
Recessing to “You and Me” by Lifehouse, sang by the adorable Josh Auer [and Jen taking a slow, slow walk to soak it in and listen, as she begged Billy to have this song!]:
And here they are in the after-moments [with her sister fixing her hair, as the amazing maid of honor that she was!]:
Her parents:
After the ceremony, the bride and groom went off to take pictures and I headed back into the reception room- which had an enormous view of the beach! So, here’s a terrible shot of me sneaking a pic of them taking pictures [wow, did that sentance even make sense??]:
And here’s how the room looked when I got back in [special thanks to my MOM who came in to assist for me in a pinch!]:
Here’s the table name for the sweetheart table! Too cute!!:
Baskets of dancing shoes on the dance floor [baskets and idea supplied by Amber!]:
After pictures, wasting some time while the DJ got the party ready for the grand entrance:
The grand entrance!:
Speeches [apologies for the atrocious pictures!]:
Jennifer, just being beautiful:
And my two lovely couples greeting one another!:
First dance time!
About halfway through, Billy’s mom strung a garland of money around the new husband and wife as a gift. It was so cute, and really a great little gift from the family:
A close up of that cute garland of money:
Father/Daughter dance:
Mother/Son dance:
I turned the flash off for this picture before the cake got cut:
And the cutting:
[This picture will make a bit more sense when you see what happened to the cake while they were cutting it! It looked more like they clawed it out rather than used a knife! We got a great laugh from it]
Here’s the hole they put in their cake!
Yum!
Time flies by…. Bouquet toss!
Garter time!
Bringing on the manly praise:
Jen promising NOT to help him!
Enjoying his moment as “the man”:
A few shots of the money dance:
And while Jen was doing that, Billy was……
Okay, okay, Jen got her moment as well:
You can tell they are surrounded with such love in their friends and family!
Here’s two of the ‘maids getting their groove on:
A fave pic of mine: the centerpeice without my flash on my camera [actually IN focus!!]
The last dance, compliments of Marvin Gaye!
Jen’s smile was always finding my camera- and I love her for it!
All in all, this wedding was such a huge blessing to me! I loved getting to know Jen and Billy, and we’ve become great friends in the process! She promised me we’d get together and go to Disneyland for dinner one night after life calms down- I’m holding you two to it! Josh and I are already planning our evening! :)
I’ll leave you with this, which is how I felt at the end of the night as well! Our ring bearer made a gret effort and made it up until around 11:30pm- which was great for him. But, things quickly turned down hill and his dad improvised for him!
Thanks again to Amber and Trevor for singing my praises and telling Jennifer about me! I loved being a part of BOTH of your days!
