Amy & James

Finally, time for the wedding!

And what a wedding it was, beginning with a splendid service in Amy and James's local church. Chris (or 'Father of the Bride' as he shall henceforth be known, or 'Uncle Chris' as I used to call him) told me that the vicar was very happy to conduct the service as usually people opt for the larger church nearby - he was certainly very enthusiastic during the ceremony, putting in the right amount of solemnity and humour for the occasion, and involving everyone in the union of our friends.

I say friends but really I see them more as family, I've known Amy all my life because Chris and my Dad (also Chris!) went to university together* and they have stayed in touch all this time. When they had families it was only natural that we all met each other, hence I grew up calling Chris 'Uncle' and Nell 'Auntie' and thinking of Amy, her sister Susie and brother John as my cousins. James has been turning up at their family events and ours as well for some time too and while he's not got the family history as it were he has played football with my younger cousins and that makes him a legend in his own right!

After the service we headed to Shenley Park and its walled garden for the reception - from approximately 1pm all the way through to midnight! This was also the time where I got to spring into action as pseudo-official-informal-crowd-and-speech-photographer - hurrah! This basically translates as instead of pointing my camear in the usual direction (at Amy and James) I pointed it back at all the other guests - at one point I even got their official photographer as well before she headed away. I have to say I much prefer shooting weddings and other events this way (proper stealth photography) as it avoids the same posed looks you sometimes get everywhere**. It also means there's not as much pressure as on someone who has to shoot the ceremony/formal shots/etc and, as a guest, it gave me a chance to enjoy the party and celebrate for them too :-)

I'm going to end with the reasoning behind choosing this particular photo for the Blip:
- First and foremost until I've finished my edits I'm awaiting the bride and groom's permission to proudly display photos everywhere - if I'm asked to do something I'll do it right!
- Secondly, as I've mentioned above, I was looking for the unusual shots - everyone else has their kiss on the gazebo - I have the shot after everyone else looked away and got to watch the original moment happen :-)
- Thirdly, the dancing shots are all, universally, proper wedding dancing shots - they'll be needed for blackmail purposes I'm sure so I'm not putting them up here*** :-D


Unusually, here's a future Blip to the 'Aftermath' of Sunday beecause I didn't want to back-Blip this!

And here's the footnotes!
*Uncle Chris mentioned in his speech he has known my Dad longer than he's known Auntie Nell - may we all have such friendships!
**There is a downside though, and that's the posed looks usually always look awesome - some of the informal snapshots are just plain scary!
***Or as Uncle Chris put it when I told him there were photos of him boogying down: 'oh s**t'.