Wedding Venue Sneak Peek

  This is where Austin and I will be getting married in September (without the garbage can chillin' stage left...)  It may not be the most impressive work of photography, but it was the best church photo I could dig up for a Good Friday shot to share with you... since I'm sick in bed and can't go digging in my office to find some of my older work.  I'm excited about the wedding and this building is so beautiful, so I'm glad we were able to settle on it for the ceremony.  Anyway, here's your sneak peek on that :o)  Wishing you all a lovely Easter Weekend, stay tuned!

Photo of the Day: New Threads

I am so very much looking forward to seeing my wedding gown all finished!  This photo was taken in a dutch market, but the sharing of this photo was inspired by my excitement over my gown :o)  For those of you who don't know, I decided to repurpose my mum's gown, and my aunt is the one performing this labour of love for me!  We're keeping the same basic structure, just updating some of the fabrics (read: less lace!).  This was never a dream of mine, or of my mothers, but we're both very excited about it.  It's going to be gorgeous :o)  For the sewers out there, I hope you enjoy the photo, for the brides out there, I hope you enjoy the story :o)

Photo of the Day: Wedding Bliss

Congratulations to my friend Cindy and her new husband (as of this evening) Mike!  Cindy and I met at church camp many many years ago and I have become friends with just about her entire family.  Her brother was one of my housemates for awhile back in college as well.  This particular photo was taken back in 2007 at the first wedding I ever got paid to shoot :o)  I'm happy to report that the couple is still happily married today (unfortunately not the case with other weddings I've shot...!)  For those of you in need of a wedding photographer, or for those of you who know someone who is in need of a wedding photographer... send me a note!  :o)  I'm ridiculously reasonable and willing to travel if need be!  Check out some of my other wedding shots on my website www.ShutterbugDesign.com

In all honesty though, this entry is a heartfelt congratulations to Cindy and Mike, may you have a lifetime of wonderful experiences and adventures together as a married couple!  Can't wait to join the club!  :o)

Photo of the Day: Wedding Plans

I love this photos for a bunch of reasons... one is because I actually shot it on my T-Mobile G1 (the Google Phone) and was thrilled with the results!  Another reason is because those leaves photographed beautifully and they are for the wedding, which means they'll look awesome in the wedding photos!  :o)  Smudge was trying to "help" put them away with me... meaning I had to work double time to get them taken care of before she destroyed them all.

Photo of the Day

I took today's photo last night of my parents, and I absolutely love it. I'm putting together a page on our wedding website that introduces people to our families since not all of our friends have had the opportunity to meet the whole group... mom likes another shot better so I am using my blog to still get this one out there :o)

Wedding Updates

Well we officially set a date and location about a week ago now... 18 September 2010 at Bluewater Campgrounds in Lexington, MI. That is the place where we met a little over 4 years ago. We also set up a wedding website through theknot.com where we can keep people posted on the plans as they develop (http://www.theknot.com/ourwedding/RachelvanRossum&AustinThorp)

I also had my first wedding nightmare last night... I'm chalking it up the the stress I've been under this week (not wedding related) and the fact that I spent from 3.30pm on yesterday sick in bed, but it was a terrible dream nonetheless. I dreamed that somehow invitations for the wedding had been sent out (I hadn't even seen them, no idea how they got out or why we knew about it) and they had the wrong year on them (2009 instead of 2010) and so the whole dream took place on 18 sept 2009, with me stressed to the max and crying my eyes out because absolutely everything was wrong... there was no photographer, we were getting married in a small chapel in a shopping mall (like in the hospitals how they have a chapel room, only we were in a mall... I don't know either...) no one had brought my jewelry, my dress hadn't been touched at all so it didn't fit quite perfectly and it was still covered in lace, and most of our guests were unable to make it due to the extremely short notice. I was absolutely beside myself.

So here's to that not becoming reality and here's to me feeling better today so that I think I can make it into work this afternoon (had to call in yesterday only a half hour before my shift... that was AWFUL I hate doing that and try to avoid it at all costs but it really couldn't be helped yesterday, I was super out of it)... just needed somewhere to get the dream out of my system so I can not get hung up on it! Yikes!

Photo of the day

I am in a wonderful fall mood today! I biked over to Starbucks to meet my friend Erica for a workday (we both work from home so we meet up periodically to work somewhere else and keep each other company). Her husband Michael joined us a little while ago and is hanging out for a bit before heading into the office, so it's good times. The way the sun is shining today makes me think of a warm fall day, plus I got 2 samples of fake fall leaves in the mail yesterday that I had ordered to compare for wedding decorations, so my world is shiny :o)
I took this photo last fall in my backyard. The wind was blowing leaves everywhere and I was so inspired. I love fall, and any warm sunny fall day with amazing colours that I can run around and shoot for awhile is always a great day in my book!

Wedding Updates

So Austin and I have started some of the planning for the wedding and are pretty excited about it... we're hoping to have (at the very least) the ceremony at the Royal Park in the conservatory because we've both spent so much time there and love that room oh so very very much... it's the only location we've really been able to both say "yeah, that has meaning" so far. We'll be meeting with them this week to see if it's within our budget or not, if not it'll be time to come up with a plan B but with my incredibly long standing relationship with most of their sales and management team I'm hoping we can work something really great out!

We're also hoping to have a really great home-cooked meal for the dinner piece... we're talkin' multiple grills being fired up and everyone just kickin' back and enjoying some quality food and each others' company... we haven't solidified that decision yet, but if we do absolutely decide that I can't wait to ask the team we have in mind, coz I think it'll be a total blast to have them in the kitchen backin' us that day :o)

We're on the fence on some of the lesser decisions like music and ceremony details (though we did make one decision about the ceremony, yay!) but hopefully by this time next week we'll have a location locked down and we can start working all out on the guest list and other pieces. I have someone in mind that I would like to ask to head up our decorating campaign and can't wait to make the final decision on locale because she will make it look oh so amazing (I haven't asked her even to consider it yet so until then she will remain nameless).

The coolest part for me so far is discovering just how in sync Austin and I really are... so far on any of the major decisions any idea he or I have come up with the other has been in nearly perfect agreement... I knew we were well paired and very compatible before this (obviously or we wouldn't be getting married!) but it's just cool to see that our values really are extremely similar and we are both having fun with the planning!

If anyone has any cool ideas, especially ones that are eco-friendly, please feel free to post comments or send them to me in an email... we're open to many suggestions... especially pertaining to the ceremony at this point... we are very anti-cookie cutter on most events, so we're wanting to come up with creative ideas that really express our personalities (laid back, fun loving, socially and environmentally conscious, stress free - as much as possible! and creative... I mean come on, we're both artists!)

For my photo of the day followers, here's one to go with the theme of today's post :o)


I took this photo at our friends Airen & Tim's wedding a couple of years ago. They had it up in the mountains in Asheville, NC at a place where they go every year with their bike group (as in motorcycles). It was one of the most casual and simple weddings I'd ever been to (in a good way!) honest to goodness backyard wedding with a small boombox for music, a friend liscenced online to perform the ceremony, and a bring your own meat BBQ afterward! We had so much fun that weekend driving down there and back, and I got some great photos for my portfolio at the same time (yes, Airen picked her bouquet herself off the side of the road, how cool is that?)

We're Engaged!!!!!

That's right y'all, he asked me to marry him!!!!!!!! It's been just over a week and I'm still grinnin' like a fool...! :o) Since most everyone keeps asking the same questions I'll try and capture some of the essentials here so you can get the whole scoop :o)

WHO: Austin Scott Thorp & Rachel Elizabeth van Rossum
We've been dating for nearly 4 years, I met Austin at a family church camp and we hit it off right away... we hung out a lot and started dating a few months later and we've been pretty inseparable ever since... Austin is a musician who not only won my heart but won me over to country music... a genre I had no tolerance for before I met him... but I love his sound and it's been a real adventure learning to be a part of the music industry!

WHEN & WHERE: Friday 17 April 2009, evening- the Berkley Front (Berkley, MI)

HOW: here's the story kids!
Austin was a part of this great gig that his mandolin player Ben had coordinated. There were several artists performing and this girl was on stage before Austin went on. He and I were just hanging out in the back of the room dancing and sitting at the bar chatting. He was really impressed with the girl on stage and said "She should play at our wedding!" Well, he and I say things like that all the time and it means nothing... so I was like "yeah ok great... just as long as you ask me before you ask her!" Later we were sitting at the bar and he said the same thing, so I responded in the same way. He turned around, looked me right in the eye and said "will you marry me?" ... to which I responded "are you kidding me??" (yes I actually said that!) he said "no, I'm serious" and I said "don't mess with me... you do NOT joke about this...!" ... and so we went back and forth a few times, me being convinced he was not actually proposing to me... it wasn't until he said "well, I don't have a ring..." that I went "Oh my god you're serious!!!! Of course!!! Yes!!!!"

It was amazing... I kept asking him all night "really?? we're engaged??" even the next morning! :o)

We decided to keep it quiet until we could tell our parents at the same time (they love each other and all get along really well) so I manipulated everyone into getting together for dinner. The soonest we could get everyone together was Tuesday night so I was basically flipping out for 4 days waiting to tell my folks... it's amazing I didn't make myself sick! We got everyone to meet in Ferndale at a place called Maria's Front Room (or something like that). It was this amazing little Italian place that couldn't have been more perfect for our announcement. We managed to control ourselves and let our folks catch up a bit before I made Austin spill the beans... I was pretty sure I wouldn't be able to eat if we hadn't told them yet, as it turned out I barely ate even afterward! :o) So we're sitting there and Austin says "well there's a reason we wanted everyone to be here together tonight... I asked Rachel to marry me and bought her a ring..." Donna (Austin's mom) started crying and jumped out of her chair to run over and hug him, my mum said "are you kidding?!" and grabbed my hand... and our dads both started grinning. It was awesome. hugs and congratulations and smiles all around and then came the questions and the suggestions and the random giggles and smiles... it was fantastic!

The Ring: Austin and I had gone out ring shopping Monday night and actually ended up walking out of the store with a ring. I had expected it to be a longer process, checking many stores, price shopping a ton, and making sure we had really found the perfect ring... turns out we found it in 40 minutes :o) We bought it at Rogers & Hollands and just had a phenomenal experience. We even had the perfect soundtrack! Every song that came on over the speakers while we were discussing the ring and making our decision was one we both loved... very cool... it was as if the stars had alligned. He bought me an incredibly beautiful ring, and we got it for 60% off so that made it even more amazing!! :o)

The Plans: Since both Austin and I still live at home we've decided to first take a look at our finances and our housing situation before we set a date for the wedding. In all reality I think we'll probably be setting a date within the next couple of months as we start a serious house hunt. Our goal is to make our wedding as stress free as possible... as I like to say: easy breezy beautiful! (I should copyright that, no? lol) We intend to make it as simple and comfortable as we can and just enjoy the whole process. The only 2 things we have absolutely settled on are: 1- we're getting married (I still am not used to hearing that!!!) and 2- my uncle Steve from TN is going to perform the ceremony. Whenever we go down to Nashville we stay with Steve & Cherry and Austin has stayed with them the times I haven't been able to go along. They've known me my whole life, so it was an easy decision for us because he knows both of us very well and has been a pivotal person in our relationship with each other.

New Blog Feature: So from now on, in addition to the Photo of the Day feature on this blog and the occasional non-photo related entry, there will now also be periodic wedding updates :o) That way friends and family can follow along with what's going on. :o)

In Conclusion: OMG I'M GETTING MARRIED!!!!! AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!! :oD YAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!