I have a love/hate relationship with weddings. Sometimes I think they’re beautiful and gorgeous and such a display of love and happiness, and then other days I think they’re a circus of crazy family, last-minute disasters, wasteful spending, and unreal expectations all rolled up into one big ball of stress. I don’t know that I’ll ever land firmly on one side or the other. I imagine I’ll probably teeter between the two opinions for the rest of my life. But for this particular moment, I’m a fan of weddings. I’m especially a fan of Jennie and Rich’s wedding. I just posted my favorite pictures from their wedding over on my photography blog, but since they’re family and all, I decided to post some more favorites over here. Don’t worry, there will be no duplicates. You’ll get a totally new, fresh set of pictures here. These are just more of what I consider to be the funny/interesting pictures of the day. Some of them have a story to go along with them. Some of them I like to make up stories for. This is going to be a rather long post, by the way…

For example, several people were working to fold programs on the morning of the wedding. Bethany? She was carefully rubbing each and every one of them across her face.

I was amazed at how calm and peaceful Jennie was all day. Here she’s sitting in her dad’s shirt, working on writing/editing her vows while she waits for her turn to get her hair done. She may have been freaking out on the inside, but she certainly didn’t show it.

This is one of those that I said I like to make up a story for. I feel like Nicolas is just kinda looking Luke up and down like, “Hmph. I KNOW you are not trying to wear the same suit as me.”

And I feel like this is one of those Sandlot kind of moments for Luke. “Whoa…..”

I love that Amanda (Matron of Honor) is wearing Jennie & Rich’s rings as well as her own here. She’s copying Jennie’s vows onto neater, smaller sheets.

And during the last few minutes before going out Jennie got hungry. Did I mention they had LOADS of food set out for everyone who was there at the church getting ready? Yeah, somewhere in there the groomsmen found out, and at this point celery was really the only thing left.

I love Josh’s face here. I think I called him a girl for complaining about the sun or something. I know, right? What was I thinking? I’ve heard horror stories about Josh’s revenge. You don’t just make fun of him and get off scott-free. This face says, “That may have been funny, but you’re about to get it.”

Nicolas and his “Buddy”

One disadvantage of being the photographer at a family member’s wedding is that you don’t really get to socialize with family. This was as close as I got to these two all day.

I’m told that Nicolas wanted to walk down the aisle with Buddy, and that’s why he’s so upset here, but regardless of the reason, there’s no denying that he was one unhappy kid. And everyone thought it was adorable.

Typical.

5 generations in one picture.

I love this little girl, and couldn’t resist taking the picture. Yep. She’s as sweet as she looks.

I know Nicolas has made it into several of these pictures, but he’s just such a character. So much personality.

I know that Jennie is gorgeous, and it’s hard not to look at her, but in these two pictures I want you to ignore her and notice Smiley in the background. First, he’s like “These bubbles don’t work.” (and I can hear him grumbling as he says it). The next one is like, “Ah…bubbles!” Nevermind that the bride and groom are leaving and EVERYONE ELSE is watching them. Smiley is much more interested in his bubbles.

This picture is just classic. Bride’s dad leaning in to her; Groom’s mom leaning in to him. I imagine neither one of them really wanted to let go.

And finally, the church put up a congrats message on their sign in…you guessed it, pink and brown.

What a fun day!

I know we have been terrible bloggers as of late, but we have been extremely busy.  Without having to sit here for to long, I just want to share a couple of pics Diana took a few days ago before one of our runs.  This is what we get to walk out the door to on a daily basis.

Yesterday Tedashii released his sophomore album, “Identity Crisis.” Let me just say, if you do not have a copy of it you are really missing out on an amazing album. Tedashii is on board with Reach Records,and if you have not checked out the other artists with Reach Records, head on over to their site and be informed, blessed and amazed by the way these guys take Bible and preach it through their music.

You can find Tedashii’s album here:
Physical Copy
Download (from ReachRecords)
iTunes

Here is one of my favorite tracks.  Turn the bass up!

Click here if the player isn’t showing up

I really hope you that you sang that title in your head to the Carmen Sandiego tune. Because I did when I typed it.

April is gone and we’re smack dab in the middle of May without so much as a peep from jakeanddiana.com. We were doing so well there for a while…not too sure what happened. Anyway, for those of you who care, the mouse family that resides in our living room wall has had three recent deaths in the family. We’re not entirely certain how many relatives they left behind, though. Sam is no good at mouse-catching, but is extremely good at barking and running the opposite direction. We still love him though.

I am SO happy with my new job (though I still miss my old co-workers a lot). Jake is gearing up for a busy summer of day camp with the neighborhood kids, and is also diligently working toward finishing out the semester strong…well, at least finishing anyway. We’re hoping and praying for a December graduation for him, but it’ll take some work (and currently non-existent funds) to get it done.

I’ve been busier than I had expected with this photography business venture I’ve set out on, and I’m loving it! I shot my first wedding last Saturday for a friend of mine (and cousin of Jake’s…go figure) at Pensacola Beach. Tabitha looked stunning…

You can see some more of the pictures blogged here. I’ll be shooting either weddings, portraits, or engagement sessions for 4 of the next 5 weekends (plus one this afternoon). I’m so excited! So many of you are responsible for helping me to make these contacts and book the sessions, and I cannot thank you enough. We have such awesome friends and family! If you care and are interested in seeing what’s going on with “Diana Bondurant Photography” (I still think that makes me sound way too serious and official and stuff…), be sure to keep up with my other blog at www.dianabondurant.com/blog.

Okay, that’ll be enough “life-update” for now, I think. But I do have a few more Sam pictures to share, if you don’t mind. Shannon and Shawna said I could.

It has been a long time coming… now we are finally finished with our bathroom. Actually, we have been done with the bathroom for a few weeks, but we just have not got around to showing it off. Here are a few pics of the “before” and “after.” You can jump on over to flickr and see more. Don’t hold Diana accountable for the after shots, you can blame them on me. I stole her camera for a minute. (I used it once today Charlie )