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We photographed Julie and Jake’s engagement at the start of this year and after meeting them I knew that their wedding was going to be a one-of-a-kind!

We started the day at Julie’s parent’s house, taking photos of the dress and other details, before Julie arrived from the hair salon to get into her wedding dress. Julie was an absolutely stunning bride and her dress had beautiful and ornate decorative stitching throughout, which looked really cool.

Jake and Julie’s wedding was at the Sacred Heart Catholic church in downtown Calgary in a ceremony with smiles and happy tears. After the ceremony and family photos, we went to the high school where Julie and Jake first met, on the south side of Calgary, to start their portrait time and then we drove up to Inglewood to finish the portraits there.

The reception was held at Commonwealth Hall in the north east of Calgary and the decor for the reception was amazing. There was a huge tent set up in the main hall area with bright-coloured up-lights along the floor and a chandelier hanging from the centre of the tent. And check out the cake! That is such an amazingly stylish cake!

Julie and Jake had a game of tossing a big dice to see if they would kiss or whether some other fun event would take place. Each side had a different outcome, but it seemed to land on the kissing side quite a lot.

The reception was a really cool party, with belly dancers who performed and kicked off the dancing. I love it when everyone gets out on the dance floor! Before we left we did some more portraits, because it makes for a great way to wrap up the story of their day together. Here are (quite) a few of my favourites:

Congrats to Mark and Whitney!  They were married recently at the River of Life church here in Lethbridge.  Mark is from London and several people from his family and his friends flew out from England to be here on his wedding day, which was very cool.  Oh, and the speeches were hilarious!  It’s hard to beat the British sense of humour when it comes to reception speeches.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.  The day started for us at the hair salon with Whitney and her bridesmaids—and her eight flower girls!  Yes, eight!  I’ve never seen so many at a wedding.  They were all very cute.  :)

Their wedding ceremony was quiet and authentic, starting with worship music—that bit wasn’t quiet!—and including our first ever foot-washing ceremony.  Well, not ours, per se; Mark demonstrated his love of Whitney and willingness to serve her needs by washing her feet.  It was, like the rest of the service, a sincere and open showing of their love.

The reception at the Galt museum was amazing!  The tables were decorated with large ice sculptures and the cake was incredible.  It was a very elegant occasion for sure.  And, of course, there is the great view through the huge windows all around the room.  Check out the images toward the end of the slideshow below to see what I mean.  The speeches were both heart-felt and funny.  We have so many photos of people laughing at the speeches toasting the groom, poor Mark.  Whitney’s dad—also named Mark—and Mark the groom gave two touching speeches at the end.  It was an honour to shoot their wedding and we wish Mark and Whitney the best in their marriage. You can see a short slideshow of their wedding below.