Bridal Portraits: Take Two .... and three

Earlier this year I did a bridal portrait session with my good friend Jennie. She was visiting from LA so we decided to get some pictures while she was here. She did an amazing job and I was throughly impressed. Jennie is a great friend of mine who has agreed to come here to shoot our wedding, along with our other photographer, Sarah Whitesides. So I planned to do one session with Jennie, and one with Sarah.

When trying to plan my bridal session with Sarah, I had a really good idea! I decided to have my second bridal portrait session in Charleston SC. The reason why this is such a good idea is two-fold. On the one side, who could think of a better setting for bridal portraits? The whole town is a photo op! Then on the other hand I knew I would be spending the whole weekend in one of my favorite places on the planet!  Best idea ever, right?

Mom and I got to Charleston around 9:00 Friday night and decided to take it easy and get some rest before the big day on Saturday. Our photographer (who traveled with us) stopped by our room for a bit to check out my dress and chat and then we were in bed before we knew it. We woke up the next morning to a B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L sunny day with not one cloud in sight. We had a great brunch with some friends, got our nails done, and did a little shopping before we had to start getting ready for the shoot.

I headed into the salon around 3:00 and was all ready by 5 ish. I have to say, seeing everything all put together just about took my breath away. I haven't had everything on all at once yet with my dress, hair, veil, shoes, jewelry, etc... let me just say that I had a moment.

We headed outside about 5:30 to start our shoot and of course... it started raining. OUT OF NOWHERE!!!!  Perfect. Sarah and I spent the next hour and a half ducking into buildings, hiding under awnings, dodging mud puddles, and huddling under an umbrella. It was quite the opposite of what one would consider to be a lovely occasion. Of course this is just par for the course with someone like myself.

You can imagine my surprise to find that Sarah had actually gotten some really cool shots from the day... but we both agreed to give it another go on Sunday to see if we would have better luck. After all, we were still in Charleston and we both knew we weren't making another trip out. So, we made the best of an otherwise awful  not so fun situation, had dinner, hung out downtown (after it conveniently stopped raining), and got some rest before doing it all over again.

We got up on Sunday to another seemingly beautiful morning, had breakfast and headed out for the salon... again. It took a little longer to get ready this time because I didn't have a scheduled appointment for Sunday. My awesome hairdresser was so kind to squeeze me in! I got all ready to venture out... again... and this time the weather was PERFECT! Not too hot, bright, and beautiful! We got some really great shots and I cannot wait to see them!!!!