MacRay Wedding | Harrison Township, MI

Love love looooved photographing this wedding. Every detail was perfection and totally my personal style preference. These two lovebirds met online and when they started chatting, it turns out that they we actually in the same middle school class! Such a small sweet world.

The bride and groom got married at the school/church that they attended together, St Thecla Catholic Church in Clinton Township, MI. You could just see and feel the love and excitement between the two of them as they saw each other for the first time walking down the aisle.

The couple reserved time at the beautifully manicured Wahby Park in St Clair Shores for wedding portraits. Knowing that it was homecoming season and high school seniors gravitate towards parks like this one for photos all dolled up, I did my due diligence reasearching local high schools for their homecoming days, and finding the perfect park that would allow us to have exclusive access to where we wanted to be without teens surrounding us. We thought for sure this would be the place since there was only one local high school and we reserved a photography permit for a specific timeslot. Lo and behold, the place was SWARMING. Im talking hundreds of kids, their parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and likely almost the entire high school was at the park taking pictures. I quickly delegated my second photographer and a bridal party member with the paperwork to chat with those in charge. We were quickly escorted by employees of Blossom Heath that were more than willing to help. I put on my bossy pants and brought out my old cheerleading voice and cleared the areas that we were shooting at. Thankfully when you are wearing that beautiful white dress, people are always willing to comply. ;) They may have been out of my immediate vicinity, but there were constantly people popping into frame, walking by or in the foreground of photos, not on purpose, but totally unavoidable when you have that volume of people in one relatively small park. Using creative posing and lighting techniques (and yes a bit of photoshop) I was able to make it seem like we were intimately alone in the park.

After that whirlwind, my voice and my couple were ready for a bit of a break. We headed off to MacRay’s to capture wedding details and cocktail hour while the bride and groom enjoyed a few moments alone to really soak it all in.

Everything was going without a hitch, until dinner was taking just a bit longer than expected (suuuuper tasty though and worth the wait). We initially nixed our sunset photos since things were running a bit late, and I wanted the couple to enjoy their meal. As the sun dipped lower and lower, I couldn’t help but stare at that gorgeous show Mother Nature put on for us. I had to double check, because it was TOO good not to try..my little photographer heart was doing a backflip. The couple was actually super excited and ready to go and I’m SO happy they did! The colors kept changing from golds and pinks to a cotton candy sky painted in pinks, purples and delicate blues. They got another moment to breathe and enjoy each other while getting the most epic photos of the day. We ran back in, devoured the most delicious dinner and partied the night away.

After the wedding day was over the bride and groom expressed to me how grateful they were to go get those photos and that they were their absolute favorites of the day! Make sure that you do your wedding your way. If you want to leave your reception for a bit for some moments alone…do it. And if you bring your photographer with you….even better!