Let’s just get something straight right now, brides:
Your wedding day is NOT going to be perfect, and that is completely okay.
Can you just breathe in and out real fast with me, and let yourself realize that? And let yourself be okay with that?
Good. This is one of my very favorite photos from our wedding day for a whole lot of reasons… but one of them is that you can see my little sparkly belt is starting to literally detach from my dress at the end of the day, and I have quite a few lovely leaves in my train. Ha!! I still remember dancing with my dad during our father-daughter dance to Humble & Kind, when my dad whispered to me that my belt had started to come off, and asking if I wanted to do anything to fix it. I remember just laughing and shrugging on the dance floor because it just totally didn’t even matter. I, miss type-A/total perfectionist, was far too happy to have even noticed or to care once I found out!!
And those leaves in my train? My dress was practically half tulle, guys, so it was basically a magnet for grass, sticks and leaves… let’s just be real! But those leaves were from the three sets of portrait time we did together, just us, on our day. Again- I was way too happy to care or notice by the end of the day!! (Although, I promise you I didn’t walk down the aisle dragging leaves with me- ha!)
After going through our own wedding and shooting just a few (????), I can assure you that random little things will go wrong, rip, get muddy, get forgotten, or get messy on your wedding day, and guess what… it’s OKAY. One of my favorite quotes about weddings days that “if you bring the happy, your day will be beautiful.” (Lysa Terkeurst) And it’s so dang true. It’s my hope that you, sweet bride, will decide today, right now, that even when (not if!) your day isn’t perfect, you’ll embrace it all in its imperfect glory… and that you’ll let the weight of the expectations that has been on your shoulders dissolve.
Because no matter what, it’s about marrying your best friend and celebrating the start of a forever- and you’ll likely be way too happy to ever even notice. Plus, perfection is overrated in the first place.
