Abi Ruth » Blog

I’m back, with more from Matt & Kadie’s awesome wedding day. Here are some of my favorite detail shots. Kadie wore a beautiful lace gown and very cool neutral suede heels that looked to be quite comfortable while also stylish. Kadie’s mom, Kathy, whipped up her all-white-roses bridal bouquet, as well as doing the lovely table arrangements and all the other flower stuff too. Pretty impressive, Kathy. :)I patted myself on the back for the cheeky use of this church sign. ;)Towers of cupcakes arranged on an antique furniture piece? oh yeahhh.Each table had a unique centerpiece made up of a few blooms and some antique pieces.Kadie’s sister, Mackenzie, does amazing hand-lettering work. She did all the signs for the wedding. So lovely!I’ve got several more posts to do from this wedding. I’m breaking it down into categories so there’s not one hundred fifty-plus photos in on post. ha.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Fourth of July holiday celebrating America and the freedom we enjoy. This country isn’t perfect. No country is. Because countries are made up of humans and humans are not perfect. We are all desperately in need of a deep and personal relationship with God. And America gives us such freedom to pursue God with all of our hearts. If we do that, daily, I believe we will see radical changes for the better, here and around the world. God can provide peace and justice. He loves and forgives and shows mercy and gives grace. We should do the same. I’m so thankful to have been born into a nation where the message of Christ Jesus is freely shared! I am oh so grateful to have the opportunity to live without fear, to live with power and love and self-discipline {2 Timothy 1:7}. I will strive my whole life to better my community and my country instead of tearing it down.

~abi~

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Last month, I photographed Matt & Kadie‘s amazingly fun wedding. And I’ve got about one hundred and sixty-three favorite photos to share from it. But first I want to chat about some of my thoughts on blogging and weddings and Instagram and, and, and…

In the past, there’s been times when I’ve shared weddings in multiple posts, like I am going to do with this one. But then it seemed like that must not be a good idea for some reason, because no one else {other photographers who blog} ever does it. Several years ago, I backed way off on the number of weddings I shoot a year. I still love shooting weddings. In fact, I love it even more now that I shoot about five a year. But I’m kinda bad about sharing them. One reason is, I already spend a lot of hours editing a wedding. So adding hours {and hours} to cull and edit images for a blog post can lose its appeal. But I don’t usually share my photography work on Instagram {other than, say, a screenshot from my blog to show that I have a new post up}. And I know most photographers share a ton of their work via Instagram, and that’s awesome and I love seeing their pretty photos. But I like blogging {really, I do}. I like being able to easily go back and find images {without scrolling through an ig feed forever}. I like being able to pin images. And I really like having my Instagram just be something for me, not necessarily my business. I know most people would say you and your business are one and the same, and I totally agree with that. I do. But I like Instagram to be instant, fun, no-pressure images of my life. And while I love my client-friends, I want to be sharing more snippets about me than official photos of them. Make sense? I did share a few initial faves from Matt & Kadie’s wedding on my Instagram because I was super excited about them. But overall, I think I’ll stick with sharing iPhone pix over there and my photography photos on here. But on top of all that stuff I was thinking about, I was also thinking how the really cool pix people share on Instagram {and I’m referring to photographers who share their work that way} kind of seem to make more of an impact because there’s usually only one {or a few} shared at a time. So I was thinking I should break up my blog posts some and share them in smaller, more bite-sized pieces. And this works out well, because I also realllllly, truly want to be posting on here more often. It’s obvious I’m not good at narrowing down favorites to share, and I also suck at not chatting a lot in my posts. So smaller posts might help with posting more regularly.

Whew. Enough of all the over-explaining. Let’s talk about Matt & Kadie. They’re hot, obviously. And they’re cool. And their wedding was so fun! I have much more to share, but I thought it made sense to start off with photos of the lovely couple themselves. They chose not to see each other before their ceremony; and while they were saying their vows indoors, the rain was pouring down outside. But wouldn’t you know it, the rain stopped and the golden light shone on us for their portraits together after the ceremony. {Let me just insert a little #protip to brides & grooms here: We photographers loooove it when couples see each other before their ceremonies, sure. But look, the photos can be just as great even if you choose not to see each other before. It’s okay. It’s your wedding! Do things the way you want to!}Who knew parking lot stripes could look so rad?? We did.Kadie had the most perfect wavy, shiny, pretty bridal hair, didn’t she?Oh man. Melt my heart.Stahhhp it. Models.During their engagement session, we talked about how Kadie hates PDA. Good thing there was no one around except for me and my camera for these portraits. ;) {Side note: I don’t think Matt minds PDA one little bit.}Well look at this happy little accident. :)Pros at soft smiles. #nbd“Whoa, look how hot my new spouse is!” <– I’m good at reading minds sometimes.Kadie, why are you so pretty? Matt, why is your hair so cool? :)Goodness, you two. I just love you and your love. Photographing your wedding was truly a joy. Congrats!

~abi~

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