Craig and Melissa

I've known Craig since he was five. In fact, I've known almost an entire side of Craig's family since he was five. His sister was my best friend, his cousin my first crush, and his aunts, uncles, and grandmother spent much of their entire summers with me for years. In 2013, when Craig told me he was marrying Melissa, and asked if I would be his photographer, I responded with a (perhaps overly-emphatic) YES! With twenty years of catching up to do and what I knew about this family, this was guaranteed to be one hell of a good time.

The entire day took place at the gorgeous Gaelic College in St. Ann's, Cape Breton. I ordered up a few puffy white clouds to make the day perfect and then got on my way.

I started out with exclusive rights to the girls' dressing room:

Then took it outside to work the beautiful sunlight into this perfect ring shot:

Here comes the bride!

And there she goes!

Hook, line, and sinker.

Everyone seemed pretty happy with the outcome:

 

The nephew of the bride managed to ham it up a little, and still remain one of the best behaved kids I have ever shot as part of a wedding party. I could've kept this little guy!

Craig and his mom Sadie, who I swear has not aged a day since I met her in 1992.

Neither has his brother Kyle. ;)

Just before you reach the college, there is a waterside view of the glorious St. Ann's Bay. "Can we shoot the wedding party by the water?" You bet we can!

 Heh, that one was fun.

Little bridge up the road? Stop traffic? Mmhmm.

Then we sent the wedding party back to the reception to forage for food, and I spent some alone time with the bride and groom.

 

Melissa is incredibly photogenic. I could have spent hours with her!

There were other plans waiting for us all though.

Craig and Melissa are both teachers, so there was a bit of a theme:

The decorations, handled by cousin of the groom Amanda Cromwell-Landry and her husband Chris, were out of this world, right down to the baskets of granny smiths (apples? for teacher? I see what you did there!) that were the table centre pieces.

Wedding favours: etched shotglasses and free fill-ups. Don't mind if I do!

 There was no wine-glass clinking for these folks. To get the bride and groom to kiss, you had to get up and tell a funny story about one or both.

SUCCESS!

Interspersed among the stories were some fantastic speeches...

...followed by THE greatest speech I've ever witnessed being given by a bride. With it came some of the greatest natural facial expressions I've ever captured:

Then there was dancing. (This particularly notable manoeuver brought to you by Robert, father of the groom)

At the other end of the hall, at the behest of the mister and missus, I had set up my first photo booth. Don't ever be shy to ask me for something, or share your ideas; I was nervous, but these made it so very worth it!

This could be my favourite father-of-the-bride shot in existence.

I also adore this one of sisters Tonya, Faith, and Amanda.

After that, I kind of lost track of who everyone was, and just kept shooting. It was fabulous!

I recognized these two:

   

These two kind of looked familiar:

 Back at the reception, the party was still in full swing. I bowed out around midnight and headed back to my room. Once there, I discovered that the common area next to my room had been set up to house the after-party, and house it, it did! By around 1:30, revellers started pouring in, not yet ready to call it a night. There was singing and guitars, someone playing the spoons, and an accordion or two. In my bed, I dozed off occasionally, but at 5 am when the party outside started to wind down, I was smiling to myself and still enjoying the surreal feeling of being transported back to the campfires of twenty years before.