Family means everything

We’ll never forget the lesson we learned about family from some dear friends of ours.

Three months after their wedding, the bride’s beloved Grandpa passed away. He hadn't been well for a while and had been too ill to attend their wedding. Just before we left the house to make our way to the ceremony, she asked us to take a photo of her, in her white dress, with her Grandpa. 

Our friend called us to tell us what had happened. She said the most important, most cherished photo from the whole day was not of her and her husband - it was that photo we took with Grandpa. It was the last photo ever taken of the two of them together. Just Grandpa and his little princess on her Big Day.

We learned so much from that. Perhaps we think we are taking beautiful pictures, but as the months roll into years, those pictures become so much more than what they were when they were taken. 

Those photographs become storytellers and secret keepers. They became treasured family heirlooms. They hold history and memories and allow us to bring back the ones we love into our hearts and conversations.

We took this lesson to Michael and Katarina’s wedding day.

Michael’s grandparents couldn't make it up the stairs to the ceremony location. They stayed on the grass on a park bench to watch and listen from safety. While Michael and Katarina were mid-vows, we spotted this beautiful moment of happy tears and captured it for them to cherish one day.