Just a quick little post before I go take care of my 250 mosquito bites!  That’s just a fun price you pay when you take pictures in the TN humidity out by the lake!  There were so many mosquitos that I actually squashed one on my camera button while taking a picture!  Just lovely!  HA!  Hopefully all the mosquitoes will have better things to do in July when they get married here on the lake! What a perfect place to get married!  Well let me introduce you to Justin & Marti!

About us: Mike and I first met in college. We began dating shortly after we met. I once asked Mike when he knew he was in love with me, he told me that when he decided to take me to meet his Granny he knew that he had fallen in love. At the time of our wedding we were 1 month shy of being together for 5 years! As my sister would say…”The Best is yet to Come”

Vanessa Lashlee (Gholson) – Hermitage, TN Friendship Christian HighSchool
Mike Lashlee – Clarksville, TN Clarksville HighSchool
Wedding date & time? September 26, 2009 1:00pm
Ceremony – Nashville City Club
# guests 150
Reception location – Nashville City Club
My wedding style:   I would say that my wedding style is slightly eclectic. Our wedding was a traditional wedding with modern touches and ideas. My advice is to make it your own.

The week of our wedding I made myself a single promise, I will not stress out. This is my advice for every bride out there. In my experience once you stress out about one thing it becomes easier to get stressed about the next thing. I woke up the morning of my wedding to a grey sky filled with thunder and lightning. Now we were lucky because my husband had put his foot down almost from the moment of the proposal and said that we would be having an indoor wedding because he knows that I stress most about things that I do not have control over, such as the weather, but we had planned to have all of our pictures done outside. I knew that I had to stick to the promise I had made myself so instead of freaking out I just called my mom and asked her to please go get us some umbrellas. Being the amazing woman that my mom is she was able to not only get us umbrellas but they were cherry red and lime green…from the Dollar Store!! Between our fabulous umbrellas and Mike Cowart’s imagination and ability to work with any lighting situation our wedding day rain turned into a blessing. Many photographers I had met with talked so much about how they only use natural lighting but I am glad that we hired a photographer that not only used natural lighting but also knew how to use artificial light to light up a very rainy day!  We were able to use our gorgeous hotel for indoor pictures then headed out into the rain with our umbrellas for pictures and memories that I would not trade for all the sunshine in the world. Thank you to Mike Cowart and our wedding party for their part in making this experience fun and memorable!

Mike from Myrick Studios included a sample below of how artificial lighting helped versus using only natural lighting!

o       My colors and why I choose them? Our colors were cherry red and lime green. We chose these colors over our other options after seeing a spread in Bride Magazine that was beautiful. It also represents Mike and I because one of Mike’s favorite colors is green and I love red!
o       My theme? My advice here is to not feel like you have to have a theme. We did not have an overall theme and our wedding came together beautifully. My theme as a bride was classic old school hollywood…think Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn.
o       Wedding wow factor?  I do not think there was one wow factor. I think our guests enjoyed how we did everything just a little bit different. For food we served a brunch with traditional items like bacon, sausage, and fruit but we also served scrambled eggs in martini glasses with a plethora of toppings to add and we had a waffle bar with fresh fruit toppings and different syrups. One thing that I loved is that not a single one of our flower arrrangements was the same…and there were flowers everywhere…I loved it!
o       Favors? Our favors were Granny’s homemade chocolate chip cookies. Mike’s grandmother spent the day before the wedding baking 600 of her delicious cookies…she is the best and so are her cookies!
o       Personalized touches? Along with the help of my college roommates mother, Denise Gibson who owns Judy’s Flowers and Gifts in Tazewell, TN, my mother, sister, and friends designed and made all of the floral arrangements for the wedding. Denise also created and constructed the most gorgeous ceremony arch out of curly willow and hanging crystals. I also wanted a specific area for Mike and all of his friends to hang out so we used the library at the City Club as a “man’s room”. We left all of the big leather furniture in there and brought in pictures of Mike and his friends and family. We kept wedding decore light with mostly green and black and only one big green floral piece. My advice is to make it a priority to do something just for your groom…after all it is his wedding too
o       Gift for bridesmaids? Kamrose and Cross earrings from their Jacquline Kennedy line Groomsmen? monogrammed silk ties >

o       Most special moment for me? This is a tie. The first special moment is when my Dad walked me down the isle. He was in a bad motorcycle accident this past June and was not released to walk until the week before the wedding. It was a blessing and it came just in time! The other special moment was my first dance with my husband. I have been waiting for this moment for a long time and words can not describe how special and joyful this short amount of time is.

My dress may have been a little bit of a wow factor. I had a zipper installed in the hem between the beaded bodice and the taffeta bottom so when it came time for dancing the bottom of the dress came off…it made for a great suprise for Mike and a fabulous leaving dress!    

o       My faves – highly recommend: I highly recommend all of my vendors but there are a few that stand out for a bride on a budget. For great linens at exceptionable prices go with Elegant Presentation. They are a company I found online who ship their products nationwide. They sent me unlimited fabric samples and even shipped me a chair cover so I could make sure it was the right size. For chairs I used Party Providers. Their prices were the best I found and their service and delivery was impeccable. By far our photographer has delivered the best product for the price. Mike’s work is amazing and he is easy and fun to work with. The photography was one of our top priorities in our wedding and Mike Cowart exceeded all of Mike and I’s expectations! >
o       How I found my vendors – bridal shows, wedding planning resources, friends? I found most of our vendors through hours and hours of online research! >
My wedding rewind:
o       What I would do differently if planning again? Mike and I actually talked about this on our wedding night and to be honest we couldnt think of a single thing! Little things are going to go wrong but in the end the entire day was a year and a half of planning turned into perfection!
o       Biggest waste of time or money? The biggest waste of time was the time spent stressing. Do not stress because in the end it all comes together. For us we were on a strict budget so there was no room for wasted money. My advice is to sit down with your fiance in the beginning and pick out what is most important to each of you, 2 or 3 things, and put the bulk of your budget towards those things. Be creative with everything else!
o       Best value for the service/product? Our linens from Elegant Presentation and I will say it again, our photographer! You will NOT be disappointed!

o       Neatest find? My something old and something blue. While going through my mom’s jewelry I found a blue rhinestone brooch that was stunning, come to find out it belonged to my mom’s grandmother. It had been passed down through 3 generations and on my wedding day it was pinned to my veil. 

My wedding vendors:
Wedding Planner: Me
Cake: Family friend
Caterer: Nashville City Club
Photography: Myrick Studios
Hotel Accomodations: Doubletree Suites Nashville/Hotel Indigo
Invitations: Carlson Craft
Bridal Gown: A Joyous Occasion Sottero & Midgley
Bridesmaids Dresses: A Joyous Occasion Bari Jay
Tuxes: Jos A Bank
Rings: Cumberland Gold Cookeville, TN
Music: Audio Pro Cookeville, TN
Linens: Elegant Presentation
Chairs: Party Providers Lebanon, TN

I really appreciate Veronica & Steven trusting me enough to fly me down to shoot their wedding… it was an experience that I will never forget!

Here are a few shots that we did on their engagement shoot in Veronica’s hometown in Ecuador.

The image in the top left-hand corner is the view looking out the front door of this church. I was taking pictures of their ceremony and turned around and I was absolutely blown away by this view.  The picture doesn’t even do it justice. It was like looking out and seeing a painting by God.

Veronica & Steven asked me to ride along with them from the church to the reception to capture some of images of their ride.  Even though I couldn’t understand a word that the driver was saying, I was so captivated by this guy.. he looked liked something from the movies!

The food in Ecuador….oh the food… I could go on forever about the food.  At their reception, they had this amazing candy while guests arrived at the reception and for dinner, they served salmon that just melted in my mouth!  The image in the top right was taken from the reception at sunset.  Absolutely amazing…

For their first dance, Veronica wanted to surprise Steven by having fireworks go off during their song.  She surprised me as well because I was just shooting away and about 30 second into their dance, I see this huge flame go off in my camera and I thought the place was on fire! But after the initial shock, I was able to make a few adjustments in my camera and capture these images below… I loved the bubbles and the fire together…

I can’t really put into words what their reception was like… not only did they have a 9-HOUR reception, (6pm-3am) but during one of those hours, they had a “CRAZY HOUR!”  The “Crazy Hour” is a time where these guys came dressed up in costumes doing acrobats and playing drums! Unbelievable!! They also brought masks and fun hats for everybody to wear.  At one point during the Crazy Hour, they had a contest where they would do a specific kind of acrobatic trick and they made members of the bridal party perform the SAME acrobatic trick as a contest to see which team was better!  Too funny!  A few of the bridesmaids were in total shock when they realized that they had to climb onto the groomsmen’s shoulders in their dresses and flip over BACKWARDS!

I love the look of this groomsman in the middle-right picture.  I asked him what the look on his face was for…and he said, “dude, the bridesmaid had been dancing in her shoes for 7 hours and now those shoe-less feet were in my face!”

After a beautiful wedding and a reception that I will never forget, the next day Veronica & Steven wanted to do a “Day After” shoot.  Here are some images from the shoot on my last night in Ecuador. I hope to get back soon!  If you’d like to hear more details on how Veronica planned her wedding abroad, click this link!

Ashley’s Brideguide – A Real Wedding…

Chris & Claire actually met in Memphis…so they just HAD to have a picture with Elvis in it!

I love this series of pictures below..I just had them take turns being in the background. But when it was Claire’s turn, I noticed that she was looking at something else and wasn’t looking at the camera and I shouted “CLAIRE!! STOP LOOKING AT CHRIS’S BUTT AND LOOK AT THE CAMERA!!” LOL! That got a HUGE smile to come across her face!

August 1, 2009… time for the BIG day for these guys!  Claire and her bridesmaids got ready at Claire’s mom’s house and wanted to have her pictures done there because of the beautiful scenery at the lake house and I really tried to convince them to let me get a shot of them jumping off of the dock into the lake but I think we’re going to plan that for a later date!

On to the wedding…they got married at a place called “Carrigan Farms”.  I had no idea what to expect when I tried to picture a wedding at a rock quarry but WOW, was I so thrilled when I pulled up to this location!  I pulled up and the guys were ready with flasks in hand for their turn!

I really do appreciate them trusting me enough to hire me to drive out to NC to shoot their wedding. They are a truly beautiful couple and it was a absolute pleasure being able to watch them share this moment with each other.

Thanks again, Chris & Claire for this experience with you guys!  I really tried to get some “L.O.V.E.” for you two on camera, but the “E” fizzled out right during the picture!