Love Flashback Awards | 2013

Hello everyone!

We have been working VERY hard these past few days to get ready for our 2nd annual contest! We are so super excited! Last year this contest was SO much fun, and everyone worked so hard at it. This year our contest has been a little bit different!
Last year we had about 10 entries which included wedding day photography as well as engagements. We only had 10 because that is all the weddings and engagements that we did the WHOLE year!
So now, we have grown from doing 6 weddings in 2012 to a whopping 17 in 2013! While that might not sound like a lot to some, it has really made a difference to us!

While preparing for the contest, I have had such a good time perusing through all of the wonderful memories 2013 weddings have given us. Take a look for yourself:

I will always remember Traci and Shannon's day as the most perfect winter wedding. What are the chances that there would be a sunny and 65 degree day in January??  It was PERFECT for their outdoor wedding. Traci put so much work into every handmade detail, and her love for Shannon was so evident in every photo. :)

Lance and I were skeptical about booking Marcie and Tyler's wedding, since we had a VERY important wedding of our own the weekend after, but I am SO glad we did! This was one of the most fun and relaxing weddings we went to, and it was the first one I cried at. I totally boohooed behind the camera while Marcie danced with her sweet grandfather. It was timeless.

No amount of rain could have rained on their parade! Although, the April showers did their best on this day it was an absolutely gorgeous wedding. Lance and I both grew up with Morgan and her family, and it was so much fun to be around all of our friends all day long. Not to mention, it is so much fun to photograph a couple who are so GORGEOUS together, right? : )

Aimee and Landon's Old State House wedding was just to breathtaking for words. The weather was perfect, the venue was perfect, the stringed orchestra was perfect, and their sweet love for each other was perfect as well. We felt so honored to play a small part in this perfect couple's sweet day.

Ok, THIS couple knows how to have a GREAT time! They were both so energetic and in love all day long, it just made everyone around smile! Their reception was by far the most fun we attended all year long. It was complete with fried chicken, and several dance challenges going on. It was a BLAST!

Kim and Tony's wedding was our 2nd wedding at The Barn at Twin Oaks, and we have joked that every time we come it rains. This was the case not their wedding day, but the skies parted and the ground dried just in time for some wonderful first look photos as well as an outdoor ceremony! The whole day was just gorgeous.

The main thing I remember about this adorable Mt. Nebo wedding is that Jennifer's dress was GORGEOUS! It was the most beautiful dress I have ever seen in my life, and it still tops at number one 7 months later. :) Jen and Wesley's cute country-chic wedding was so sweet, as was their love for each other!

I don't know why but Sam and Colton's wedding seemed like just yesterday. Maybe it is because it was so full of people we love, as well as it being so full of Sam and Colton's love for each other. This September day was definitely a hot one, but everything about every detail was so beautiful, it made up for it!

Andrea and Ethan's down to earth country wedding was so gorgeous! I loved the cotton accents every where and we ALWAYS love shooting at the Pointe Remove Lodge. Andrea and Ethan's wedding party was so fun, as is the ADORABLE couple. Their engagement shoot from June is still one of my favorites to date.

We hadn't met Gail before we showed up to their wedding day, and boy were we in for a surprise. She is one of the most jaw-dropping gorgeous people you will ever meet. She was so laid back, as was her wedding party, and her sweet husband. This day at The Barn was one for the history books.

It was so fun to see The Barn's transformation within just a few days from Gail and Brian's wedding to Lindsy and Keith's. They really can do anything. Lindsy and Keith are a wonderful couple who had so many great moments during their wedding day. One thing that I will always remember is the poor bridesmaid who got attacked by fire-ants right before she had to get dressed. She sobered up with Benadryl and went on! Now THAT is dedication! I hope everyone has a friend like that! :P

Emma and Brett's wedding was.to.die.for. Especially the light blue antique car they brought along! I loved all of the fall colors, especially their bouquets. Emma and Brett's first look really sticks out in my mind as one of the sweetest all year.

Taylor and Dalton are one of those couples that every one calls "so-stinkin-cute". They are so infatuated with each other and it was so apparent on this day, surrounded by so many good friends and family. I was so impressed with all of the hard work Taylor and Dalton put into their wedding. Each and every detail was personalized by them.

Wow. Audra and Isaac's wedding was amazing. Audra and her family put so much work into making their day so, "them" and it truly paid off. The day was threatened by rain, but it held out all day long, making for some richly colored "cloudy" pictures. Lance and I were convinced that we like cloudy days for photos better than super sunny, after this adorable wedding.

Brittney and Jake had the PERFECT fall day for their wedding. It wasn't too cold but it wasn't hot anymore and the fall leaves were RIGHT at their peek. Their wedding was at the beautiful College of the Ozarks campus, and all of their details were so adorable.

Brittanie and Taylor just happened to plan their wedding during Arkansas ice-apocalypse of 2013.  We did manage to get there for their beautiful day and I'm so glad that we did! It is very rare that anyone in Arkansas gets to have "snowy" wedding photos, and these two were blessed enough to have them! :)

Catie and Seth's "Winter Wonderland" wedding was our last wedding of the year. They totally transformed their home church to create an amazing winter woodland in their ceremony cite and their reception hall. It was amazing!!

Well, I hope you enjoyed reminiscing with me through our 17 weddings of 2013!
Now for the exciting part: Starting tomorrow we are having our 2nd annual Love Flashback Awards contest. This is our way of saying thank you to all of our wonderful couples who made our year amazing. Without YOU we wouldn't be where we are!

Here's what you do:
Tomorrow we will post these pictures on Facebook. The photo with the most likes and shares (they will be added together) by 5pm on Sunday will receive a FREE 20 page lay flat album and a 16x20 canvas wall hanging.
MAKE SURE THAT EVERYONE WHO LIKES AND SHARES YOUR PHOTO LIKES OUR PHOTOGRAPHY PAGE OR THEIR VOTE WILL NOT COUNT!

We are so excited about GIVING away free stuff, so GOOD LUCK! :D

Happy, Happy Tuesday!

Savanah | Chase {Engagements}

Hello everyone!

We have another adorable engagement session to share with you today!
We have known Savanah for a while because of the camp that we both volunteer for in the summer. We met Chase last year at about this same time when he asked us to take his senior pictures. We went out in the middle of no where to his families cabin to take pictures complete with a tree stand, a duck pond with decoys and his adorable little lab puppy.
The lab puppy wasn't the only thing that grew over the corse of the year! Savanah and Chase's relationship grew as well and this past fall he finally popped the question (we all knew it was coming,haha)!

Savanah and Chase are high school sweethearts and actually had quite an interesting story to tell about the time they first met. We will  leave it up to them to tell you their "interesting"story sometime! What I can tell you is that these two are absolutely perfect together. They seem like they have been married for 30 years already, and they are two peas in a pod. They had us laughing the WHOLE entire time, plus we got to see some amazing country side. Just take a look:

 Aren't their dogs PRECIOUS?!! 

 If you know this family, you know they love to be outside, so of course we had to get a couple of shots in their "element". 

So, they may or may not have tried to teach me how to shoot a bow. Yeah, you can probably guess how that one turned out! (Notice the closed eyes, hahaha) 

We were on our way back to our car when we noticed the moon. It was AMAZING! So glad we had a chance to capture it! 

These two crazy love birds are getting married next October and we couldn't be more excited!

Happy, Happy Sunday everyone!

Anna | Justin {Christmas Engagements}

Hello Everyone!

We met up with Anna and Justin last Saturday and they were PREPARED! Lance and I are both planners to the MAX when it comes to things we are both passionate about, and that's what we loved about Anna and Justin. They had everything you could think of to have a perfect "Christmas Themed" e-shoot, and it was just that. Perfect.

We really enjoyed getting to know Anna and Justin, and we had so much fun trekking through Yell County with them. :P

We typically ask each couple when we can to write up their love story. As you know, I'm a sucker for a good love story, and I LOVED Anna and Justin's take on theirs. So sit back and relax, and feel all gooshy for a couple of minutes. (You know you want to, haha)

Truth is, I had a crush on Justin for years before we started dating. I am pretty sure he didn't even know I existed. I had watched him from afar, but I never said anything. I mean he was handsome and funny, but way out of my league. My junior year of prom I went with a friend that happened to be Justin's best friend. We actually went to Justin's house to take pictures with him and his date. I guess it is okay now to admit how I could not stop staring or thinking about him that entire night. Over the summer a lot changed. I changed. I lost about 60 pounds and gained self confidence. Justin had graduated and was attending college in Clarksville but still lived in Paris. Now when I say I went to maybe 5 football games my entire high school career, that would be stretching it. However, it just so happened that I went to this game and Justin was there about two seats behind me. I was with my best-friend Sara and I remember working up to courage to go talk to him. When I finally went over and sat by him (with Sara as backup) he talked to me for a whole sum of maybe ten minutes. Then he pulled this whole, “I'm going to go study for a test” line. He did make me give him a hug before he left though, so I felt as if I made progress. A few days later I saw that Justin had posted a status on Facebook. Since I had possibly been stalking his profile I knew this didn't happen often so I needed to jump on this opportunity. His status was some movie quote that I had no idea about, but did that stop me? No. I commented on it, and it ended up with him getting my phone number and texting me. We talked for a couple days and then he started picking me up from school and taking me home. We went on our first date (my first date ever) to a football game and dinner. At dinner Justin ate a salad, because he claimed his mom made him eat before he left his house. Justin was my first real boyfriend, and I had no idea that one day I would be marrying him. -Anna

The truth is I didn't really know Anna. I mean we both went to the same school and my best friend took her to prom my senior year. We took pictures before prom and I do remember taking picture where me and Coop ( my best friend) switched places so I was standing behind Anna. As the year went on, I graduated high school and got accepted to play tennis for U of O in Clarksville. I still lived at home and just drove back and forth to school. At one of our matches I got hurt and had to be put on crutches. One Friday night me and a couple of friends decided to go to the football game. I was standing up in the stands with my crutches of course and then Anna came and stood by me. I thought she was beautiful, she had changed a lot. As the game went on, me and my friends said we were going to “study” (actually we were going to play x box.) As I was leaving I asked Anna for a hug. She looked at me like I was crazy. Couple days later I had made a facebok status about movie I had seen. Anna commented on it and we went back and forth for a while and then I finally sent her a message with my number. Then we started texting back and forth. I used to race to Paris after my class just to make sure I would be in time to pick her up from school. - Justin

Our Proposal Story: 

Honestly I had no idea what Justin was getting me for my birthday, and that was killing me. I had done everything I could think of but he wasn't budging. It was Tuesday, July 3^rd. We were having our Wednesday night church service that night due to the holiday on our usual night. I went straight from work to the church and right to the platform. I am the praise and worship leader, and that meant I would be in front of everyone. I did not have a bottle of water so I was signaling for Justin to go get one for me, yet he was oblivious. I was starting to get really mad at him. He finally caught on and brought me a cup of water after I was done. I was so preoccupied with my water that I hadn't noticed my dad had handed Justin the microphone and that everyone was staring. When I did realize this, I had no idea what was going on and almost choked. Then he got down on one knee and asked if I would marry him. I was absolutely speechless! In my mind I was processing it all and trying to believe this was actually happening. Well, the fact that I hadn't answered had the room silent, then I heard someone say “Yes!” Turns out that it was me! It was the best birthday gift I had ever been given. I knew that God had made this man just for me. It is now six months until our big day, and I am still trying to tell myself this is real. -Anna

It all started with Anna's dad and I working out one afternoon. When I asked if I could ask him something and he said go ahead. So I asked him if I could ask Anna to marry me. He said yes I could, so later that week my mom and I went to Zales. When we were looking at rings I had one that I had looked at online, but when we got to the store I didn't like it as much. Then my mom and  I both, at same time, picked the ring that was the one! I knew Anna would do everything she could to find her birthday gift because she hates surprises, so I hid it in the ceiling at her parent's house.  For over a week she did everything trying to find it (the only reason she didn't was because she couldn't reach it). Then it was finally time. I had carried the ring around in my pocket all day waiting for that night. Anna was the worship leader at church so I decided that I would propose to her right when she got done singing. I was extremely nervous and I couldn't even look at her when she got there. I had my family come to this service (pretending to be there for her birthday), and I arranged for a hidden photographer. When Anna was done singing I got the mic from her dad and started giving this long speech about how much she meant to me and the many reasons why I love her, but typical Anna didn't hear a word of it. She was paying no attention to the fact that I was talking to her. I knew I had to act quick so when I finally had her attention I got down on one knee and asked her to marry me, and she said... NOTHING. She stared at me like I was crazy in complete silence. Just when I was about to panic, she finally said yes! We hugged and of course when I tried to kiss her, she punched me. I am thankful that God has given me not just someone to go with me throughout my life, but someone to live it with me to its fullest. -Justin

*cue collective sigh* :) 

I love it when both parties of the relationship are in on it 100%, and that is DEFINITELY the case with these two high school sweethearts.

Now time for some tree trimin', hot chocolate sippin', tree climin' fun!!!!! 

Happy, happy Saturday!

and after a session like that, I just have to say MERRY CHRISTMAS!