Griffith Park is absolutely beautiful this time of year! Add in a super sweet and stylish couple, and the photos essentially take themselves :) I was totally bummed when Angela told me their wedding date and I realized I was booked (they’re having a beautiful vintage wedding in Oklahoma no less!) but was overjoyed when they set up an engagement session!

I adore the lovely hand-painted canvases they brought – so simple, unique and romantic – and enjoyed exploring the park with this super fun & creative couple. So much of the park was covered in beautiful springtime blossoms – just dreamy! Any couple I’ve worked with can attest to the fact that I physically canNOT walk past a collection of colorful flowers without stopping for some photos, and I was overjoyed to find that Angela totally shared my love for colorful blooms :)

Angela & BJ – thank you so much for the opportunity to be a tiny part of this exciting time in your lives! Will be sending happy vibes to you on your wedding day!

When it comes time to chat about the engagement session, I always encourage couples to think of ways to incorporate a bit of who they are. Weddings with personalized touches are my favorite, but engagement sessions give additional free reign for meaningful locations, outfits that are perfectly “you”, and any fun props or themes – the possibilities are endless! :)

Suzanne & Robert took the idea of a personalized engagement session and ran with it! They both love the outdoors, & in her emails, Suzanne painted a picture of them camping, with hot chocolate, a tent, and lush natural surroundings. And so for the second half of Suzanne & Robert’s session, we ventured into the hills for a mini camping trip. I love all the details they gathered {Suzanne even brought along her trusty SLR} & their outfit choices as well – the perfect blend of rustic + outdoorsy + stylish, which fit the settings perfectly! We had so much fun setting up the scene & running around the area. And props to Robert & Scott for pitching the tent in what has to be the fastest time I’ve seen – and I’ve done some lightening-fast tent setups in my Girl Scouting days (okay, I lie, we were much better at selling cookies than pitching tents.)

Part of what makes my job so insanely awesome is getting to experience stories in the making and then saving those stories in my camera. The other part is getting to hear stories from way before I ever even came along. One of my favorites is the “how we met” story – over the phone or email or a hot cup of coffee, I have heard tons of hopelessly romantic & wonderful versions. Christin & Andrew’s story, however, might have reached a whole new level of romantic, I believe my exact words when she told it to me were, “it’s like out of a movie!”

They met on a plane from DC to LA – Andrew, who was sitting a row or two behind Christin, sent her a sweet message thanks to Virgin America’s high-tech futuristic seat-to-seat messaging system. They spent the remainder of the flight talking, which turned into numerous trips cross-country, and now, an engagement. Christin wanted to tie their romantic beginnings into the session and we eventually came up with the idea of paper airplanes. We folded a couple larger ones and tons of teensy colorful ones (out of origami, which is my crafting nemesis – I’m positive all those nose-diving airplanes were mine).

Christin & Andrew – we had such a fun afternoon with you! Thank you for allowing us to share a bit of your story :)

P.S. This session was featured on the ever-lovely & inspirational Ever Ours blog! Thank you Lydia!

On the right they’re making “infinity hearts” – a cute symbol of their own creation!