Make sure you pop the bubbles. It’s engagement time! Are you planning to get engaged in the year 2018? (Raising my arm) Do you have any big holiday-related proposals? Congrats to everyone who is having a blast celebrating their engagement!
I had such a wonderful time reading previous Editor Claire’s Real Bride Diaries (you should definitely check out her stunning Irish Barn Wedding!) As she embarks on her new life adventure, I’m amazed at the fact that as the new Managing Editor, I’m now able to publish my proposal and thoughts on the wedding as well!
In reality, I’d agreed with BM for a month prior to the time Jack (my brunette-haired, blue-eyed, Texas handsome hunk) and I were engaged, which means that my years of wedding-related obsessing could be used to great effect.
I’m planning to share a lot of tips and tricks I’ve learned from my time in the business for wedding photographers, as well as the answers I have found to my personal wedding-related questions, such as how can I take care of this gorgeous stone on my finger? There will also be lots of conversation and a discussion about the stress of planning (and ways to make it positive!)
Before we move on to the rest of it, we should do a bit of Jack and Claire’s storytelling. Let’s get started, shall we?
How We Met
Our story began with a couple of other weddings in the middle of Texas. A few years back, I shot an event in Comfort, Texas (great name, right?) and came across an entire group of Texas girls who resided in New York who I am certain will be my friends for the rest of my life. They helped me during the time that my wedding went out of control, and there was no water available. I ended up trapped in the trunk of the Subaru, and the next day, I was stranded fifty miles from San Antonio.
After shooting another photo of the couple’s Hill Country weddings and adopting the whole group of amazing Texpat New York ladies, I got to meet their husband, who is my upcoming spouse, Jack. We were having a reunion with some Austin acquaintances down just across the road from the apartment I shared in my East Village Manhattan apartment, and it was the first time I saw love. The next night, he informed his friend that he was in love with me. On the next morning, I was on our first date, sipping champagne, eating Japanese seafood, and Asahi dancing in the seedy East Village dive bars. He proposed to me to get married on our first date, then on a second date, and the third.
The Proposal
In the span of three years, we traveled around the world with each other in three years – Vietnam, Croatia, Paris, Mexico, the West Coast and South, the South, New England, and on and on. We also decorated a house adorned with cactus situated in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Following his job change, I thought of surprising Jack with a trip (a real holiday and not a wedding-crashing trip!) to Greece and booked our villas with private views and even our private pool that we have on the balcony of our home in Santorini.
I didn’t realize Jack had planned to surprise me, too.
We arrived in Athens and walked to the dock for the ferry early at 6 am on the following morning. We then headed to the quaint, sleepy islands of Milos. After a giddy and choppy boat ride, we took a breather on some of the most stunning unspoiled islands I’ve seen in the Mediterranean.
The charming owner of our home pointed out the tiny Dr. Seuss-like mountain that is located on the island, with a small church on top of it, as “the best sunset on the island.” After a full day of home-cooked desserts as well as eggplant salad, fresh fish, and swimming poolside, I went up that mountain in the idyllic town of Plaka to enjoy a sunset on the Aegean.
