Intimate, Chic BHLDN Wedding

The best wedding is the one infused with emotion and personality. Emotion cannot be planned (and shouldn’t be planned :-P) but personality is integral to the planning. When Sidney and Samuel described their vision for their wedding day, I was hooked — if ever a wedding was planned to be uniquely and personally them, this one is it.

Most particularly, family took priority. Sidney arranged pre-wedding photos of she and her sisters to mark and celebrate their family before her marriage. The ceremony attendees were only extended family. The decor focus of the ceremony was in memory of her grandmother.  Talk about a prime example of who these two are and how beautifully they are starting a new family unit as part of their deeply connected family.

(And check out how sweet the daddy-daughter moment was as Dad gave Sidney away.)

A second example of infusing personality into their wedding day came during the ceremony — a cord of three strands is not easily broken, Solomon wrote, so in honor of their commitment to keep Christ at the center of their marriage, they literally braided a cord to signify their strength with Christ. What a beautiful symbol of unity in Christ!

 

My selfishly personal favorite part of this personalization of their wedding day came in the way Sidney prioritized portraits of she and Samuel:  we had a solid chunk of time to cherish them, have multiple locations for variety in their portraits, and celebrate the “us” that had just been forged into “we“.

But, mostly, it meant that we had plenty of time to make her BHLDN wedding dress swish.   And when its such a very swishable dress? Whew. I am a fan!

 

Also: CHECK OUT THE FLOWERS! Both the gorgeous bouquet in her hand, of course, but also the flowering trees that bloomed just in time for them!

What the portraits don’t show is how intensely it rained up until their ceremony . . . and how giddy we were that the rain vanished during their ceremony . . . and how ecstatic we were that the sunshine came out in time for portraits! This will forever be forged in my memory as the day I didn’t have to use my rain plan. =D

 

While I’d be hard pressed to pick one specific favorite photo from this glorious chic wedding, the one below is at the top of the list of possibilities.  I bought a prism just for this shoot, used it at an engagement session four days prior, and promptly dropped it . . . shattering the glass all over the concrete.  So instead of a prism, this is drumroll please my cell phone screen.

CHECK OUT THAT SWISHABLE DRESS!   How gorgeous is she, though?! And that BHLDN wedding dress is absolutely stunning. (Did you know that Anthropologie’s wedding line is actually pronounced “Beholden”? I didn’t, either.) 

As the third prime example of how Sidney and Samuel personalized their wedding day, the real party (aka with ALL THEIR FRIENDS) happened at their church with a good ol’ BBQ and an open mic celebration of who they are and how much they have impacted so many people with their individual testimonies, their love story, and their ministry.  What a powerful, powerful celebration of friendship!

The evening closed with my personal favorite example of the personalization of their wedding day — Sidney and Samuel invited their friends and family to come pray over them as they start their life together. If there was a dry eye in the room, I would be very very surprised.

Thanks for letting me celebrate with you, you two! This was the best possible way to launch my 2019 wedding season!