Ayu and Michael have been an absolute JOY to work with!!! I first received a message from Ayu back in 2014 letting me know she was searching for a photographer for her 2016 wedding. I was completely blown away that she had considered booking so far in advance, but at the same time I was absolutely thrilled. I knew this would allow us more than enough time to get to know each other, and it would allow us time to prepare her wedding day timeline and talk about all of the wonderful things there is to talk about when you’re planning to marry the man of your dreams. Also, booking some her most important vendors first gave her months of time to relax knowing the major details were already taken care of.
Shortly after talking with Ayu and Michael I discovered that sunflowers were Ayu’s absolute favorite, so it was a no-brainer to decide to wait until the summer for their engagement portrait session. I knew that Burnside Farms would be the perfect place for us to begin our session because I had been there once before with my daughter. We planned on starting our evening at the farm picking sunflowers and then ending our night in Downtown Leesburg near the courthouse. It was quite hot and humid the day we met, so the bright sun in the sunflowers fields made for a sweaty 30 minutes. But these guys were pros and you would never know how hot it really was by looking at their pictures.
We hopped in the cars for a quick drive to Leesburg, which gave us some time to grab a cool drink and crank the AC. Thankfully, all of us were refreshed and ready to go again when we arrived. Leesburg seemed to be much cooler as the sun started to set and we ended their session with some of my most favorite portraits. And I had to laugh when I pulled out my phone to take a peek at Ayu’s engagement Pinterest board because we ended up finding ourselves in the exact same location in an image she had pinned! Of course we recreated this shot and they nailed it perfectly!
My ALL TIME FAVORITE portrait!
Congratulations on your engagement, Ayu and Michael!!! Here’s to the start of many, many exciting years together writing your love story!
