These Happy Golden Years: Dominic + Charity {A Valentine's Day Wedding}

For the last month, I have been reminded of Charity and Dominic's wedding every day as I have been working through editing their wedding photos. It was a privilege to capture their day and I've loved seeing their sweet smiles and adoring looks over and over. Every time I've done a wedding, I have worked with a different second shooter. This time I got to bring along my own favorite person and it was so fun to see him in that environment!

I love camp relationships. Not just the lovey dovey ones that end in wedding bells... but the friend to friend ones, where the same girls you teched with at age 14 are now doing each others hair, taking pictures, and standing up with the bride as her maid of honor. These girls are so naturally beautiful and it was a joy working with them! Charity was totally radiant

I think the fact that I am planning and thinking about wedding stuff so often made this day even more special and significant. All the little details stood out to me and I wanted to capture them so that the memory would last. I love all the little things that were so them!

Aren't these flowers beautiful? They were put together by Charity's sister-in-law, Samantha who runs Samantha Designs .

This is Charity's little nephew, he is so precious!

One of my favorite parts about this day..... the dressssssssss <3 *wow* it was super elegant and I could go on, but I'll let the pictures do the talking.

They decided to do a first look and it was so sweet. The way Dominic looks at his girl is super wonderful... you can see it in his eyes!

I think the best way to sum up these lovely people is through the words of the maid of honor, Emily Steffen. Her speech was thoughtful and it perfectly described them, so I figured I would just use her own words...

"I remember teching at Camp Barakel my junior year of high school and hearing the name Charity Hendrickson for the very first time. Her name was used only in conversation to talk about the beauty of her character, her servants heart, her love for the Lord and others, her joyfulness, etc. I heard about her so much, that it felt like I knew her and in all honesty I wanted to know her. Week ten of that summer God presented the opportunity for that. I finally met Charity Hendrickson.

The Charity Hendrickson that I had heard so much about. She was even more incredible than people said. I know that this is because of God's love pouring out of her. It is so clear. In One's lifetime, very few people can say that they have a type of friendship or friendships that are so God orchestrated. Those type of friendships that just click from the beginning and once the friendship began time nor distance could tear it apart. You could go years without seeing each other and the minute you saw each other again it was like it had always been. That is Charity's friendship to me. One of the very few God orchestrated friendships that I have. After that year at camp we spent summers serving along side of each other and I couldn't help but think what type of guy could deserve her?

Dominic I'm so glad it was you. Charity and I would go on walks or sit in the chapel dreaming and talking of what it would be like and what it will look like when we both met the men God had in store for us, what it would be like to fall in love and marry. Charity, your time is finally here! Dominic, you are a God fearing man who loves Charity whole heartedly. Just seeing the way you look at her says it all. I couldn't have picked a better man for her. I never thought a man could ever be good enough and then there was you. You are a servant, a gentleman, loving, and caring. I'm grateful that it was you. I pray for this new adventure God has for you both. May you continue to fall more in love with the Lord everyday and more in love with the each other because of it." - Emily Steffen

The smiles abound!

{P.S. this is Emily Steffen - she is awesome!}

{Family}

Then my personal favorite time, capturing the newly wedded couple as they giggle about being Mr. and Mrs., and get lost in the joy of realizing they are now married and kind of forget that other people exist ;). It was so cold outside (like -17 degrees without the windchill). But they did great and we even ventured outside for a few shots.

Then we went inside to this little back room that I had seen and I got my favorite photos from the day. I asked Charity if I could get some photos of just her, but when Dominic came to watch, they just kept looking at each other ;) It was precious so I let him jump in again.