Lisa + Henry | Waldenwoods Wedding in Hartland, Michigan

wedding photo at waldenwods in hartland, michigan taken by detroit area wedding photographer little blue bird photography

Where to start. This wedding was such a fun story to tell. The sweetest couple. Awesome wedding party. Beautiful venue. And rain. While rain might sound like a bad thing, it made this wedding day pretty exciting, and I did my best to capture every minute.

For this wedding, I had Rachel from Adventure Photo Stories as my second shooter - we have too much fun together and tell wedding stories in a very similar way and always have each other's back.

We arrived for detail photos and getting ready stuff in the early afternoon. There was some concern about rain, so we took full advantage of the sunshine upon our arrival and did as many portraits outside that we could. The girls got ready in the little cottage up the hill while the guys had the house above the ceremony spot overlooking the lake. This was my third time at Waldenwoods, and I would shoot there again in a heartbeat.

I have decided to share a little more than my average with this blog - lately, I have been getting questions about the seriousness of my photos. I have been asked about the variety of serious and smiley and whether or not there will be a good combination of the two in the gallery. Let me be clear - I love happy couples. I love smiles and laughter. I just want the smiles in my photos to be actual real ones. I post only a tiny fraction of the photos delivered per wedding on my website and blog, and just due to personal preference, I usually post the dramatic couples photos as those are my favorite. But to be honest, each wedding gallery is SO MUCH MORE than a few dramatic bride and groom photos. There are tears of joy. There is laughter. There is fun and dancing and joy and hugs and speeches and smiles and family photos and really a whole day wrapped up into around 1000 photos. A long time ago, I had a series of brides who were disappointed that people weren't smiling at the camera for every photo, and so I stopped posting those smile-at-the-camera style photos on my website to clear up any confusion. But perhaps it is time to post more? During every wedding, I will always take smile at the camera photos, BUT there will always be more actual real candid smiles than fake ones and the amount of posed dramatic serious photos will always outweigh the smile at the camera ones.

Ahem. Moving on.

Lisa and Henry opted not to do a first look, and so the first time that they saw each other was as Lisa walked down the aisle with her mom. BUT this wedding day would not go off without a little bit of weather drama. As we were waiting for the ceremony to begin, the guests and I could see the rain moving toward us across the lake. Everyone ran for cover and waited for the rain to pass.

*of course I had to capture the birds flying across the lake* ^

After a few minutes, seats were dried, and the sun came out for ceremony 2.0. There was a beautiful fog over the lake, and it was a truly lovely ceremony.

Following the ceremony, we did family formals, wedding party and bride and groom photos. Of course, the rain came back again, and there was much running for cover and a few soaked wedding party members. No cameras were harmed during the taking of these photos luckily, and it turns out that running and hiding from the rain while taking photos at the same time is kind of fun.

After portraits were done, Lisa and Henry had their reception in the tent, and the party was on. Overall, this wedding was a joy to be apart of, and I can't wait to go back to Waldenwoods again. Until next time, xo.