What a gorgeous wedding! I truly loved every minute of this and cannot speak highly enough of the venue!
Jessica and Ben tied the knot August 26, 2017 at Dodson Orchards, Fredericktown, MO. This place was beautiful! There was an outside ceremony in front of a unique and lovely arbor followed by a barn ceremony with a massive dance floor area and all of the shabby chic decorations you could ask for -- without going overboard! And oh, the lights! I discovered later why I loved it so much - there were no colored DJ lights, only ambient and any lighting that I added. The property also sported a cabin for the ladies to get ready in and I will be posting some photos from there as well. Even the restrooms were super cute. The building in the background of the first picture is actually the restroom barn!
Despite being August, the day wasn't unbearable, as far as weather goes. I actually had debated early on whether or not I should take this wedding. For a few years, I took the months of July and August off completely but when I met Jessica, I threw all of that out the window. I am so glad I did! I loved getting to know these two and photographing this wedding.
All of my couples fill out an information sheet for the wedding day and it includes an "about us" section that can be filled in for my blog. I loved what Jessica wrote:
"Ben... is from St. Louis, MO, Jess... is from Bountiful, UT. We met in Minot, North Dakota during the summer of 2010 and it was love at first sight. Since then, we have spent countless hours outside fishing, hunting, and backpacking. Our favorite things to do together are canoeing, camping, and beating each other at Mario Kart. We have 2 dogs, Buddy and Grizwold who usually go with us everywhere. We love to cook together (and of course eat!) Ben's weakness is yellow cake and cookie dough ice cream. Jessy's weakness is anything with too much chocolate. We've spent months road tripping across the country and have found that 'Home' is wherever we are together."
Love it!
One of my favorite things about the whole day was all of the dresses, not just the bridesmaids' dresses but both of the mothers' -- so pretty. I loved the beadwork and the color scheme of the bridesmaids.
I was also super excited to be able to break out my fish eye lens a couple of times during the night during various dances. That's always a lot of fun when it works out that way and in a venue like this, it was perfect.
Please check out my favorite images from their day below! And, yes -- that is a completely real sunset, I did not alter the sky at all in those photos! We were heading back to the barn after viewing the signing of the marriage certificate when we spotted it and snapped a few quick photos. Less than 2 minutes later, it was all gone!
