THE WEDDING THAT CHANGED OUR LIVES
Did you know that our story starts with a wedding? It's true! October 30, 2010 was the day that changed both of our lives.
We actually met at THIS wedding, almost EIGHT years ago, at Erich & Ryanne's gorgeous wedding day! Mrs. Vondy (then Shannon Lee Images) was the pretty photographer and Mr. Vondy was a handsome groomsman.
For Mrs. Vondy, it started like any ordinary wedding, photographing details, capturing the girls laughing and sipping champagne, and getting the gorgeous bride into her dress. Afterward, I headed downstairs to capture some photos of the boys finishing getting ready. I never dreamed that I would be photographing my future husband. For me, we all headed on about our day relatively normally, first look, lots of portraits, ceremony, and more portraits. While loading my gear into my car to head to the reception, I overheard the groomsmen debating about their rides to the ceremony. Realizing they were trying to figure out how to fit everyone into the one last car (this was before uber existed you guys, thankfully) and I said something that would ultimately change my life forever.
"Does someone need a ride? I have an extra..." but before I could finish my sentence, a cute, VERY clean shaven (I seriously haven't seen him more clean shaven since!), somewhat adorable, groomsmen said "YES!" and came running over (he swears this was not planned). He slid into my passenger seat and although the exact conversation we had is very fuzzy, I do remember thinking "oh no, he's cute, but I'm working, don't think like that, but he's really funny too...". To be completely honest, I really never got him out of my head since. I accidentally passed the parking lot the first go around, but I was thankful I got a few more minutes with this handsome & funny groomsman. We went our separate ways until the end of the night when I found myself looking for him to say goodbye. I couldn't find him, but as fate would have it, I ran into him on the way to my car. I gave him my card (he still keeps it in his wallet to this day!) and before wine-mouthed drunken best man interrupted us, we said our goodbyes.
For Mr. Vondy, he was told by the bride & groom that he would like the photographer prior to the big day. When I saw Shannon, come down the stairs, I immediately turned into the cartoon character who's eyes turn into hearts and blast out of their face. I was smitten at first sight. Something about our car ride? That evening, I told the groom's father and another friend (who later would be a bride of ours when we became the vondys.), "I'm going to marry that girl." They both asked if I was drunk and insisted I be cut off from drinking further. Luckily, my proclamation came true.
Our best man (who was also a guest at this wedding) said during his speech at our wedding, exactly 4 years and 1 day after Erich & Ryanne's beautiful day, our story is the closest thing to love at first sight he's ever seen, and that couldn't be better said. We just knew.
Why are we telling you all of this? Well... we recently photographed this couple's SECOND child's newborn session! In fact, we documented their first baby's entire first year (we just attended her 3rd birthday party this past weekend! Maybe you caught Mr. Vondy's pink shoes and juice box drinking skills on our instagram stories last saturday?) Having started as Shannon Lee Images, who now solely focuses on families and babies, it's actually becoming a bit of a trend that we are lucky enough to not only photograph our couple's weddings, but we often get asked back into their lives to document them as they start families. We just love this special connection with our couples!
You can watch Erich & Ryanne's story below... You can click the little arrow thingys < > to watch their story unfold at your own pace... but you probably knew that already, didn't you?
If you want to see more of these sessions, you can head over to baby Andrew's blog post on Shannon Lee Images which links to these!
Are you one of our past wedding clients who wants to have a year package with your little one? We would love to capture your entire story! Contact us to learn more!
Want to learn more? Let's connect!
You can find us most days on instagram!
(we repost to facebook )
Also on our personal instagrams: @mrs.vondy & @mr.vondy.
AND if you're into baby/family stuff, head to: shannonleeimages.com and @shannonleeimages
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Do you like this post? Would you like to see more personal posts or do you prefer pretty weddings and engagements only? Do you have a unique "how we met" story as well? Share it! We love stories! (I mean, duh, we tell love stories for a living!)