Nontraditional, Offbeat and Alternative Wedding Photographers » Lara Swanson Photographer in VA, MD, and Washington DC

June’s a crazy wedding photography month, which means I had a hard time finding spare time to do this two-day challenge! Brad and I ended up making the Danish Braid at my parents’ house, and I used my father’s point-and-shoot (which is why the photos look different than other months!). Even though the preparation photos don’t look as tasty, the end result was magnificent.

Here’s the thing – it involves spreading 2 sticks of butter over dough, and folding this dough over and over. The proofing time between each set of folds was a 1/2 hour, so it took all night to finish! This is me spreading on the butter:

Here’s the dough after the first “turn”. Check out all that butter in the middle.

Here’s the braid after all is said and done on the second day, when it’s ready to go in the oven with its delicious apple filling:

And here it is out of the oven:

Yum. Total yum. I forgot to halve the dough, so the proportion of filling-to-dough isn’t quite right. Still just as tasty though.

Today’s the Daring Bakers posting day, which means I won’t be posting tomorrow (Monday). Check back on Tuesday for a slideshow of this weekend’s amazing bike ride wedding!

Nicki and Billy had outdoor games and sports at their alternative reception after everybody finished eating and the cake was cut. Fun was definitely had by all – and it was so great to photograph! Lots of laughter and smiles; it definitely reminded everyone that a reception doesn’t have to be dinner and dancing :)

An awesome new client of mine sent me a link to an article on green weddings at The Nature Conservancy: http://www.nature.org/activities/art25063.html

They brought up one statistic that I’ve seen before, but haven’t mentioned on this blog: in 2007, brides.com polled and found that 33 percent of future brides and grooms in the US were planning eco-friendly weddings.

I know many of you are also going green, so I definitely thought this would be an article you’d like to check out. They had one idea that I’m definitely keeping in mind for down the road:

If there’s a baby on the way, or you’re planning to start a family soon, have eight trees planted on your child’s behalf, says Sanjayan.

No babies yet, but maybe we should plant some trees to offset our 2007 wedding’s footprint?

Also, I saw that today in the New York Times they posted about going green for your honeymoon: http://travel.nytimes.com/2008/06/22/travel/22green.html?8dpc

This part made me chuckle out loud because of the name, though I think it’s a great idea:

Some even choose to go “wwoofing” — an acronym for World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms (www.wwoof.org) — an organization that helps volunteers find farms where they can work in exchange for food and lodging and the chance to learn more about sustainable ways of living.

As always, I want to remind our clients of how earth-friendly we strive to be with our work.

Today we celebrate the first day we started blogging daily, back in June of 2007. So much has happened since then, and I’d like to bring you the top ten posts (by pageviews) of the year! They’ll make you laugh, they’ll make you cry, they’ll make you wonder why the heck they have so many views (apparently tons of people are searching on Google about Jamaican wedding cake traditions!). Enjoy!

1. Tips for Self Posing (with a whopping 6K pageviews!)
2. Geeky Weddings
3. Lindsay & Lee’s engagement session
4. A Jamaican Wedding Cake Tradition
5. Beth & Ben’s teaser
6. How to Decrease Redness on Skin
7. KiSS wedding albums
8. Bridesmaid Tradition
9. iPod at your Wedding Reception
10. Rebecca & Ian’s engagement session

On June 30, 2007 I photographed Megan and Ciara at their wedding at the Unitarian Church in Arlington. It was one of the first same-sex weddings I’d photographed and to this day, it’s high on my list of all-time favorites. When I started emailing Megan recently about some same-sex wedding resources, she told me that she was pregnant – I nearly jumped for joy. They were so great to work with before, I knew I wanted to photograph their maternity portraits! Megan, Ciara, and their son Tyler all came over for a totally rad portrait session at our house.

We started out with some beautiful family portraits:

Then it was time for Tyler and Megan to have some fun with poses on their own:

Ciara and Megan were just as easy and beautiful to work with as when I photographed their wedding a year ago:

Check out these hands (and check out the wide-open aperture!)

These next three are my favorites. I LOVE the silhouette of Megan’s pregnant belly, which was a totally impromptu and creative idea, the old-school look of the hands, and their gorgeousness in this portrait.

All hands on deck! Wanna bet Alexis was holding theirs, just as they were holding her?

Aimee wrote to me the other day and said, In a world where pink, brown and green still rule the roost, I thought I would shake things up a bit. So I created this fun little contest which is open to anyone who wants to participate.

The couple with the most unique color combination for their wedding day will win $50 OFF of the design fees for their custom invitations purchased through Creative Montage!

1. Submit your color inspiration board with your unique color combination by emailing sales@creativemontage.com. Be sure to include “Color Contest” in the subject of the email so that they don’t think it’s junk mail. The submissions must be submitted by June 30th at midnight (cst) in order to qualify.

2. Once you have submitted your inspiration board entry, complete the online price quote form so that they can provide pricing for your custom invitations.

3. Boards will be posted on the Creative Montage blog on July 1st and readers will get a chance to vote for their favorite. Voting will remain open until July 6th at midnight (cst).

4. The winner will be announced on July 7th on the blog (so be sure to keep checking back) and will then receive their $50 OFF code for their custom invitation design fee. If the winner doesn’t respond, the prize will go to the runner up.

As Aimee says, We hope everyone who reads this spreads the word! This is a fun little way to get a discount on the custom invites that you always dreamed of!

The fine print: this contest is only valid on new customers and not those with custom invitations or accessories in process. Prize is valid on the design fees for our custom invitations ONLY and not on the cost of printed goods. This offer can not be combined with other offers or discounts and is not valid on a “design only” option.

I’ve posted their wedding details, now it’s time for the wedding reception details! My second shooters and I were blown away by Brit and Mac’s attention to detail at their wedding, and really love how it all came together.

When you walked into the reception room at the Torpedo Factory, you were greeted with this gorgeous gobo of their monogram and stunning lighting around the room.

When you walked up towards the gobo, you saw these details on the cake table:

Here’s the cake itself and a shot of a guest table:

How did guests find their seat? With a seating chart using photos of their beloved dogs, of course. Each table was marked with the corresponding puppy portrait!

The centerpieces were stunning, as were the individually-marked guest favors:

Here’s a broader table centerpiece photo and a shot of the bathroom basket details:

I just love the color in this wedding. Here’s the menu and a shot of the kids’ activities table: