It’s my turn now to be the bride, to be on the other side of the camera, and it’s harder than I thought it would be. I have so much more respect for my brides (not that I didn’t have much before) now that I am going through the process! It is overwhelming to say the least. Now I am glad to say the hardest part is OVER. Everyone has been asking “Who is going to shoot your wedding?”. It’s the first question I get asked. I can now say that it is going to be… BenQ Photography from Dallas, Texas!!
It was the hardest decision of my life & there is so much amazing talent out in the world of photography. Ben & Chrys stood out though. Their work is so fantastic. They work with both natural light & lighting, they also shoot in both digital & film sometimes. I am so excited to have them fly here May 21, 2011 (it’s official now!) to shoot our wedding!! Since I can not describe how fantastic they are look at some of their amazing work:
Bear with me… it’s really long! There is a video that Walter made at the bottom if you don’t want to read everything, but check it out even if you do read it
How did we meet?
We met in 6th grade in Sunday School, I was visiting Parkwood Baptist Church in Gastonia, NC. He apparently thought I was really pretty, I knew he was the kid who never talked & had a combover. (No, really he didn’t talk at all!) That’s kind of how it went for the next few months. I really got to know who he was when we had 180 weekend & the 6th grade girls had to stay at the Burks house (Walter’s house!). He of course wasn’t there, but Kelsey & Victoria (his sisters) told me all about him!
Fast forward a few more months, and Walter’s family moved to England. Some girls from England wanted to chat on AIM with some American girls. My mom thought it was necessary for me to get Walter’s screen name and talk to him “because he was probably lonely”. I, of course, did not want to talk to the kid with the nerdy combover who never talked, plus I figured he had no clue who I was anyway. She finally won, and we started talking. Over the next 6 months when he was in England we became best friends, and were for the next few years.
How it all started:
I hate to admit but a few months after Walter came back from England in 7th grade, he asked me out. He was my best friend in the whole world and I honestly didn’t want to lose him, so I said no I didn’t want to lose him as a friend (MAJOR MISTAKE!) I immediately regretted it because I really did like him a lot more than friends, I think everyone knew it too! Fast forward to 8th grade… I had decided that no matter what happened I wanted to go out with Walter! So I made sure to do everything I could think of to let him know I liked him. He asked me out on July 19th, 2004 (on AIM, ahhh middle school!) and we have been together ever since. And to answer the question, no we have never broken up, not even once!
To see a video of our 5th anniversary plus some really funny pictures of us (and yes that is him singing!):
The Engagement
The beginning
Well, we have dated for almost 6 years now, so of course I knew I was going to marry Walter, the question was just when. We decided together we wanted to get married the summer of 2011 a few months ago. So I knew I was getting married already. This helped because it gave me TONS of time to plan, which I needed. But this made it really hard on Walter to surprise me when he proposed. A week after we had told our parents, he gave me a letter. He told me he would give me a letter every single day until he proposed.
He handmade the letters to look vintage, because he knew I loved vintage things! He took regular paper & envelopes and made them look vintage with stamps! You can see below everything he used!
What the letters started as!
The ingredients
The final product!
In the end there were 27 letters!
Walter got me a cute matching box to keep everything in too!
In the letters, there were surprises & dates & fun little gifts!!
The actual day:
We went to the Outer Banks for my “birthday”. I got clues the week before to figure out where each place we were going was. We started the day at a great cafe & then went to Rodanthe. After Rodanthe, we went to Jockey Ridge State Park. We went to dinner & then to hike in Nags Head Woods to see the sunset. Nags Head Woods was in the middle of nowhere and I have no clue how Walter found it. We went through a neighborhood & then into the middle of nowhere. Some people told us people who have lived there 20 years didn’t even know about it! We hiked about a mile through the beautiful woods and ended up on a secluded beautiful beach. After looking around and taking some pictures we sat down to wait for sunset. Walter then pulled out a letter. Of course, my heart dropped. I was thinking this location was perfect for him to ask and of course I got a letter not a ring. This is what I saw when I opened the letter…
He grabs my hand and walks me over to the sand, tells me I’m beautiful & he loves me and gets down on one knee. It’s all a blur pretty much, but I remember he asked me to marry him & I said yes.
We stayed and watched the most beautiful sunset of my life and it was magical! Now onto the ring…
We are planning on getting married in May of 2011 & to everyone who wants to know… I have no clue who is going to be my wedding photographer (but I am looking at some people amazing people!)…
And I guess I have to say… we lived happily ever after? haha
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