Rob and Lauren Blog

I’m not sure what it is about Punjabis, but they sure know how to party! Without fail, when I hear the dhol going, and the bhangra pumping, I just get so amped up. 

 If you haven’t yet listened to bhangra music, make sure to find yourself some! Punjabi MC is a good intro to it. It’s guaranteed to get you going on a Monday!

Lauren :)

Wow, what a wedding. Two cities and hundreds of loved ones celebrating together for these amazing people. The venues were stunning, the ceremonies powerful, the dancing insane, we got to see a ton of “flients” and catch up…But the best part of all was being lucky enough to get to hang out with Vini and Money. You guys are amazing. Thanks again for sharing your time with us. We’re really really honored.

We started last weekend in Calgary for the Shagan ceremony, where the families celebrated the engagement.

 We snuck them outside for some quick portraits. Loves it.

 Ok, straight up. Punjabis know how to party. If you ever get invited to one of their dances, you’d be a fool not to go. But bring earplugs :)

 Then a week later, we were back in Calgary for the wedding. It was one of those extremely rare times when we were up early enough to see the sun rise. Worth it.

 Money’s nephew about to have his pagh (turban) tied.

 Vini’s mother put handprints on the wall of their home after the maya ceremony.

 One of my favourite ceremonies: the baraat. Money rides in on a white horse, his face covered by the sehra.

 The ceremony was held at the gorgeous Sikh Society of Calgary gurdwara.

Money just about to enter.

Reading from the holy scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib.

Money enters Vini’s parents house to take her with him. He has to pay off her sisters to be allowed entry.

And then, tied together with a scarf, he leads her away in the highly emotional doli ceremony.

Vini and her father, after hugging goodbye.

Her mother and uncles console her.

And Money’s father and uncle throw coins behind the car.

And then some portraits around Calgary. Nice.

We love the silliness.

I think this one is my fav :)

And then we all drove back to Edmonton, for a ceremony welcoming Vini into Money’s parents home. Money’s mother feeds them both sweets.

And then the final day! The reception in Edmonton. I think this is both to most trippy and most awesome ring shot Rob has ever done.

Epic first dance.

Hope you all enjoyed those images! As always, we love comments!!

Tomorrow Rob and I take off. Hopefully I’ll have time to set up a few blog posts that will publish while we’re gone, but who knows :) If not, you’ll have these gorgeous kids to look at while we’re away! And remember, check back in a couple weeks to see what we’re up to. It’s gonna be mind blasting!!

Lauren :)

I really hope  you guys really enjoy the images from day 2 of this crazy wedding extravaganza. I think there are some really special frames in here!

 Starting with this one. Isn’t the light gorgeous? A+ to Rob.

Oh, P.S. If you’re a shoe lover you might want to sit down. Things are going to get crazy. These are Robyn’s morning shoes.

And these are her evening shoes.

 Sush’s family comes from Kerala in South India. They are members of the Malankara Orthodox Church. It was our first time shooting a ceremony like this, and it was amazing. Sure, we had to stand for nearly 2 hours, but completely worth it. It was held in the stunning St. Josaphat’s Ukranian Catholic Church.

Waiting to start.

The ceremony was held primarily in Malayalam, their native language. That meant we didn’t generally know what was going on, but here they are blessing this chain for Sush. I believe it is called the “Blessing of the Crown” ceremony, as they used to use gold crowns.

Sush’s father swinging the thurible, which is filled with charcoal and incense.

Love this one of Robyn’s bridesmaids carrying her dress. When there is a combining of cultures in one frame (mendhi with a Western wedding dress) I just get so excited.

We returned to Sush’s parents house for a milk ceremony. Sush’s mom served them chocolate milk.

And they drank it. And that was pretty much the extent of the ceremony! Sometimes they are complex, and sometimes just very simple :)

Then it was time for some cool shots with this stunning bridal party.

Flowers from Swish. Awesome.

That would be a Bentley. Just look up the MSRP. I think you’ll be quite surprised :)

And I’ll finish up with a couple shots from their reception. Truly the most gorgeous reception decor we’ve ever seen. Huge props to the amazing people at Elegant Touches for their unbelievable work.

Sush waiting as Robyn gets ready for the reception. Doesn’t he look crazy cool?

Oh yeah. There were acrobats. It was insane.

Oh man, what a wedding. I started giggling when I was looking at the rings! So so so nice.

Yeah. Nuts right?

Lauren :)

I think my blog dudes would smack me if I uploaded the 49 images I got ready from this wedding all at once, so I’m going to do this over two days. Today you get to see part one of this wedding, and tomorrow will be part two :)

We started off with Robyn as she got ready for the Sikh ceremony.

 Yowza!

 Then it was time for the ceremony. The priest started everyone off with a prayer before the milni ceremony.

 The Nanaksar Gurdwara is seriously gorgeous.

 The ceremony ends with the offering of prasad to all the guests.

 See what I mean? What a gorgeous building.

I love these two. The background looks like a painting!

And our day ended with the doli. Sush and his guys had to bribe their way into Robyn’s house. I love these shots Rob got. He was squished in so tight that he could barely move. It made the shots seem so real, like I’m standing right there.

 For this one I feel like I’m part of the conversation. It’s a perspective we don’t usually get, being up that close and personal, but I love it so much.

 And for the record, they did finally manage to bribe the girls enough to get in :)

 And I’ll end on this one. Highly emotional, but so impactful. Sush leads her out of her parent’s home as they are tied together with a scarf. Robyn throws grains of rice as she leaves.

Come back tomorrow for the rest!

Lauren :)

Yep, the wedding day is so crazy huge that you’re getting it in parts. I’m seriously so excited to share all these images with you guys! Right now we’re spending a lot of our time indoors working on the computer, so I love getting to look at the ocean through these images :)

This wedding day was truly an adventure. We started off docking at St. Maarten. Sonal was SO excited!

 We then hopped on a bus and drove across the island. We were treated to some stunning views on our trip!

 Then it was time to hop on our private chartered boat.

 Goodbye St. Maarten!

Hello Anguilla! Anguilla was a nearby island that we all travelled to for the ceremony.

 And welcome to Cap Juluca, one of the most stunning resorts in the world. Trust me. You see this place in magazines like Condé Nast all the time!!

The rooms were so gorgeous.

And I loved this little detail. When in the Caribbean, you need some Pyrat Rum!

And those lucky boys got to get ready in this villa.

Raj’s jootis.

And one last peek at that stunning villa. Yes, this is the private swimming pool.

There is still so much more to come from this wedding day!! But I hope you enjoyed this little beginning.

Lauren :)

One of the stops on our cruise with Sonal & Raj was the lovely island of St. Kitts. The Carribbean is such a beautiful place, I just can’t get over how amazing the water looked!

 We had a bit of time to take some shots of Sonal and her friend Jenya goofing around. Jenya came all the way from Switzerland for the wedding! Fact: the Swiss have the most fantastically designed passports ever. Google it and you’ll see what I mean.

 As always, we just had to take some portraits of Sonal & Raj together. By the end of the whole trip, we had photographed them in five different countires. Yes. FIVE different countries. And they looked amazing in all five!

Have a great weekend everyone!!

Lauren :)

Can you imagine the awesomeness of doing a portrait session in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico?

Well you don’t have to imagine, because we did it! I think we could have shot there forever, except for the fact that it was crazy hot out! Nonetheless, it was amazing. I hope you enjoy these images!

 We were so excited to find this stunning patch of light.

 Yum! A gorgeous couple, beautiful light, and amazing colours. I think this might have been the most perfect little town ever!

 Isn’t this the best puppy ever? He was just chillin’ in the window, paws crossed, watching the world go by.

 Lol, man, it probably seems like all we do is take pictures of the animals we see while out shooting….But look how cute he is!!!

Ok, I promise this is the last one! While we were shooting under these huge trees we heard a noise from above. I looked up and saw a CAT climbing down the tree trunk! My first instinct was, of course, to take a photo!  What an adventurous little guy.

 But when all the craziness of tree-climbing cats was over, we went back to taking more stunning images of this gorgeous pair.

 Lauren :)

Hehe, mayhem. Don’t you love alliterations?

So, here we go! More of Sonal & Raj, yay!

The first day on board the ship Sonal & Raj planned a fun little mixer activity for all their guests to get to know each other. They got into groups and dressed one team member up as either a bride or a groom using toilet paper, streamers, feathers, and all sorts of other fun little things. I love this shot of Sonal’s mom getting her tiara put on :)

 And this guy was such a good sport as the ladies crafted a toilet paper turban for him!

 Then in the evenin the ladies got together for the mendhi party. I gotta say that the girls who did the mendhi were all starts! Imagine doing such precise and delicate work while a huge cruise ships rocks and sways!

 Sonal looked gorgeous as always. I love how her mom looks so happy to see her daughter all dressed up!

 Such beautiful colours, and sparkles from their jewelry!

In the meantime, well, this was the “mayhem”!

 Take a moment to really look at everyone in this image and see the little story that is going on. I love it!

 How much do you love those earrings??

 The final product!

 And yes, there is still a lot more to come!

P.S. DEFINITELY check in on Monday for an awesome new annoucement!! If you ever wanted some amazing photography by Rob & Lauren, you’re REALLY gonna wanna see this!

Lauren :)

Welcome to the first edition of Monday morning teasers! Every Monday following a wedding we will be blogging a few of our favorite shots of the day, so make sure to keep coming back!

Reina and Prav’s wedding was in the lovely little city of Calgary. The weather was beautiful in the morning, and even though it turned on us in the afternoon we still managed to get some wonderful images of these two very amazing people. I believe the following day Calgary experienced quite the snowstorm, so the weather was holding on just for these guys! Here are a few shots that caught my eye this morning.

 Enjoy your Monday everyone!

Cheers,

Lauren :)

Another teaser for you. We’re actually getting ready to head off again tomorrow, this time to Vancouver to hang out with a ton of awesome people! But that doesn’t mean you don’t get to see more pretty pictures.

This is one that we took after their wedding ceremony on the island of Anguilla, at the world famous Cap Juluca Resort.

 Lauren :)

Ok, I’m caving. Here’s a sneak peek at a couple photos from the wedding. I am just dying to share these, because, to be honest, I think they are some incredibly stunning images. A lot of the credit has to go to Sonal and Raj, who are just about the best posers out there :)

From a portrait session in San Juan.

 And wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. How amazing do these two look???? WOW!

 Many more will come in the next couple weeks. Until then, just enjoy.

Lauren :)

So here we go! The really awesome Western/Hindu hybrid wedding!

Funny story, actually. Rob and I moved into a new house last year, and needed to find a new dentist nearby. We picked the dental office about 3 minutes from our house and scheduled checkups. Rob’s was first, so I stayed home and was working while he was at the dentist. Then I got a text from him saying “The dentist is getting married. Are we free for this date?”

Turns out Rob got to talking about what we do and Ashim, our dentist, was looking for a photographer! Next thing you know, we’re chatting with the dental office receptionist at Ashim’s wedding! Too crazy.

Anyway, the wedding celebrations started off with a mendhi for Michelle. As she isn’t Indian, it was WAY more low key than usual with only a handful of close friends showing up, rather than a jam packed house. It was nice to enjoy the process in a bit of a quieter setting :) I was able to offer some advice as well, since none of the girls had mendhi done before, and I’ve seen it roughly a billion times now!

One photo request that we are ALWAYS happy to do is incorporating beloved pets into the shots. Michelle wanted some shots of their adorable dog, and during the mendhi was the only time we’d be able to! The puppy really wanted to play with us and get some belly rubs more than she wanted to take photos, but she sat still for a few :)

The result! Can you spot Ashim’s initials in there?

Now for the wedding day! Ashim was looking super good.

And Michelle’s dress was just stunning. It was the perfect choice for their hybrid wedding, as it was like a traditional dress with some Indian-esque flair!

I LOVE the light and feel of this one. Just getting ready to get into the car to see Ashim.

We did their photos before the ceremony and ran around the University of Alberta campus having all sorts of fun.

Trippy! But SO COOL.

Here’s a shot of Ashim’s amazing Jaguar and I bet this is one of his favorite photos of the day! So cool.

The ceremony was held at the Coast Edmonton East Hotel in Sherwood Park (that’s a mouthful!) which is a great spot for Hindu weddings. They are all set up to handle the fire ceremony, letting us get cool shots like this!

Michelle and Ashim take their walk around the fire.

The knot that symbolizes their connection.

Possibly one of the most unique and personal favours we’ve seen this year! Toothbrushes (remember Ashim is a dentist!) with the couple’s name and date on them!

The decorations and flowers were beautiful.

And such cool rings! They had Sanskrit inscribed on their matching bands.

The dancing is always a blast, and some guests were really getting into it!

There you have it! Hope you all enjoyed!

Cheers,
Lauren :)

So as many of you likely know, between January and April of this year Rob and I were traveling South East Asia and India. We were very fortunate to be able to do quite a few photo shoots while we were abroad, and one of the most memorable would certainly have been shooting at the Taj Mahal with Megha and Chakshu.

It was a crazy, stressful, and amazing experience, and resulted in some of the most striking images I think we’ve ever captured. For those of you who didn’t see it I’ll post a few shots here and you can go and see more on our The Wedding Travelers blog.

What was really special about the whole experience is that we actually stayed with Megha and Chakshu in their home for a week while we were in Gurgaon (a suburb just outside of New Delhi). They really made us feel at home at a point in our trip where we were longing to be back in Canada. Without them I don’t know what we would have done!! We also got to go to the Lodhi Gardens in Delhi for a photo session in their wedding clothes and got even more amazing photos! You can see more of these ones right here on The Wedding Travelers.

Well, the time had finally come for the event that initially brought us together with Megha and Chakshu, and that was their reception in Edmonton. Megha has been studying here for the past 7 years to become a really awesome pharmacist. The whole time she and Chakshu have been having one of the longest long distance relationships I’ve heard of. When you are around these two you can totally understand how they made it through such a challenge, they were definitely meant to be together. So we were very excited to see these two again since the last time we saw them was when we said good-bye in Delhi!

They were getting ready together in their room at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, which was really fun to see both of them at once!

Megha was all smiles. I think she was really excited to finally have reached this last stage in their wedding! She had been waiting months since their wedding in India to get to celebrate with her Canadian friends.

I LOVE this one. A little different for us, but it’s just so interesting.

And believe it or not, those two crazy kids, Mona & Mohit made ANOTHER appearance with ANOTHER crazy awesome dance! These guys get around :)

The night was filled with lots of laughs.

Now this was amazingly sweet. Chakshu surprised Megha with a song. He sang “When You Say Nothing At All” to her as well as played keyboard. And let me tell you, Chakshu can SING. Wow!!! It was incredible!

And then a very cool first dance!

Jaggo!

Then we snuck them outside for a few really cool shots with the city streets in the background.

And that’s that! It was such a long time coming, and so many amazing stops along the way, but we were so glad to spend so much time with Megha and Chakshu. We’ll never forget shooting at the Taj Mahal with them, and couldn’t have asked for better models. I hope you guys are enjoying life in India, and I know we’ll be seeing you again soon!

Lauren :)