Cristina and Ernst met in a place neither of them were from, and this beautiful Italian-Dutch family that has travelled the globe is now calling Groningen home. Their beautiful and goofy daughters, Carolina and Isabella, made my work so easy on Sunday morning in the Noorderplantsoen. We got really lucky with some nice spring weather in my very favorite place in the city!
This is Eleanor, she is tiny, and she is very patient. Her aunt, my friend Irene through Stichting Didi, asked me to take photos of her newborn niece in Den Haag, and I was happy to oblige! Eleanor's mom, Christy, is American, and her dad, Matthieu, is Dutch, and these two actually met in the exact same way as my fiancee and I - she studied abroad, fell in love, and got her Dutch significant other much more into American college sports. They are a great family, and it was a fun time hanging out with them in their beautiful apartment in the center of Den Haag, along with their four pet rabbits. One of the bunnies makes a cameo in the shoot, and almost every toy Eleanor has is also a bunny of some kind, so it wound up being a bit of a theme.
This weekend, I was a gift! My friend Jeroen, whose awesome wedding I shot a couple of years ago, was brainstorming about what to get his mom, Josee, for her 60th birthday and Mother's Day, and luckily he and his sisters decided to give their mom the gift of an afternoon of family photography. It was a really fun and beautiful time, the family rented a house at the Noordzee Résidence De Banjaard near the seaside town of Middelburg, and it was my first time traveling to this unique area of the Netherlands. I was welcomed warmly, with generous plates of pasta and Belgian pastries (dessert with lunch, now THAT is a vacation weekend), and was lucky to get to photograph such a nice family in this idyllic setting.
This scene really just felt like walking into a magazine cover, for a story about family and enjoying quality time and good food. It was awesome :)
And so, a month after doing a maternity shoot with her mom and dad, I got to spend the afternoon taking photos of Anna. She is already such a laid-back and pleasant personality, much like her mom. I channeled a little Anne Geddes (hopefully in a good way), since there's is simply no way around the preciousness of a newborn, and I'm looking forward to getting to see her grow up!
Michelle's mom has been staying with the family since shortly after Anna was born, so we wanted to get a multigenerational photo while she is here visiting from America.
When Dutch families have a child, it's traditional to put up the congratulations cards up in the house on display, so I figured we may as well have a photo of the reason for all the cards. Congratulations, my friends!
This wedding was featured on the Dutch wedding blog Wedspiration on March 8, 2012.
Happy New Year! I am very excited to share my first wedding of 2012, Barb and Edwin's ceremony at the Stadhuis in Den Bosch on a gloriously clear day (which in the Netherlands is indeed a miracle!). This international couple met in Canada, Barb's homeland, while Edwin worked at her company, and they hit it off immediately. It's always nice to meet other international couples, and seeing two people cross borders and oceans to find each other is a beautiful thing. The ceremony was, to use a great Dutch term, gezellig, with just immediate family and closest friends, and the wedding room at the Stadhuis was beautiful. Congratulations and gefeliciteerd!
Merry Christmas and fijne feestdagen! Today I'm blogging from the quiet Frisian village of Warns, taking it easy on tweede kerstdag, as it is called here. But, way back this summer, I was lucky enough to end up in the same level two Dutch class as another awesome American woman who's now calling Groningen home. Michelle and Jeroen were so nice to work with, they're just effortlessly photogenic and were very sweet with each other, and their soon-to-arrive baby. It was an unbelievably beautiful day in Groningen on Christmas eve, and I really enjoyed getting to be a part of this time with them.
Nate and Alicia are a lot of fun. I actually knew Nate's sister better than I knew him, since she and I were in the same grade in high school, but last Christmas I met these two at an ugly Christmas sweater party - I really brought my A game, with snowflake-covered stirrup pants - and then six months later I had the good fortune to be their engagement photographer. They chose Old Salem for their shoot, a colonial-era Moravian area in Winston-Salem, which was a lovely location to explore.
Jason and Amber are two of my favorite people from Pennsylvania on the planet. Well, even among people not from Pennsylvania, they're pretty great. They met in college at Penn State and wound up in Danville, Virginia, where Jason worked as a sports reporter at the Danville Register & Bee, which is how I met him when I was working there as a staff photographer. We did their engagement photos at the Danville-Pittsylvania County Fair, which was just ridiculously fun - tons of color and lights, and a hilarious pair of friends.
These two are not only beautiful, super photogenic and totally adventurous, they are also two of my closest friends, so it was so much fun to spend their wedding day with them in Harderwijk. Karin and Jeroen looked like movie stars, and her glamorous red dress brightened up the cold February day. This was my first Dutch wedding, and I fell so in love with the gezellig atmosphere of the bride and groom's families enjoying coffee together before the ceremony. Adding to the lovefest, my fiancee Elger helped me out immensely by shooting the wedding with me. The whole day was completely relaxed and reflected their personalities to the smallest details. And really, what's not to like about a bride in a red dress?
Bob and Randy! I had the amazing privilege of shooting the Biltmore Estate’s first ever gay commitment ceremony on Saturday, Oct. 17th, along with one of my best friends and photo role models, Lauren Carroll. Bob and Randy are both incredibly sweet guys who are clearly in love, they were both living in New York when they met ten years ago (but they met at Key West, coincidentally), and now live together in North Carolina. They spent the day surrounded by wonderful and supportive friends and family, from a fun rehearsal to an after party with catering from Bojangles. They were a blast to hang out with, especially during their pillow fight! Last year, they adopted a precious little boy, and Sarah Whitmeyer of Whitmeyer Photography did a shoot of their new addition. Congratulations and Mazeltov to Bob and Randy!
Jake and Sarah's fall wedding in the mountains was warm and friendly, in spite of the chilly rain throughout the day. Staying indoors was definitely a good idea, and the view of the beautiful Appalachian mountains from the Champion Hills Country Club in Hendersonville made for an etheral backdrop. Jake's father was the officiant for the wedding, making it an even more personal and meaningful ceremony. Thanks again to Sarah Whitmeyer, owner of Whitmeyer Photography, for the opportunity to share this day.
This is the very first wedding I had the privilege to shoot, in Charlotte in May of 2008, and Jeff and Erin were such a friendly and fun couple to spend the day with. They met at N.C. State University as students, and their personal wedding was such a sweet ceremony - they were so excited to be married, that they actually began walking down the aisle before the ceremony was really finished! And their enthusiasm to head to the reception was totally understandable - they had a FUNFETTI wedding cake, and danced the night away. Now, three years later, they have just had a lovely little girl. I want to thank Sarah Whitmeyer of Whitmeyer Photography in Asheville, North Carolina, for having me as her assistant for this great wedding, and giving me my first experience with the world of wedding photography.
