Ashley & Brian / A North Carolina Mountaintop "I Do"

I have been dying to share these photos with you all for quite some time now. And a'las the time as arrived. Just a week off of my Peruvian jungle adventure (I am sharing those photos soon, I promise) I made my way to the North Carolina mountains for Ashley and Brian's Blowing Rock wedding. Getting hired by Ashley and Brian, the brother of Allison a bride I photographed two years in NC, was like getting the best kind of compliment. They saw me in action, saw the result and wanted me at their own special day. I love it!

Ashley and Brian met in college at Appalachian State University in Boone, NC, which happened to be right around the corner from their mountaintop wedding venue. And despite "uncooperative weather" (a.k.a. torrential downpour come ceremony time) the day turned out to be a truly beautiful celebration of a truly beautiful pair complete with a post ceremony mountain scape photo shoot and a ski lift ride to the reception.

If you know me at all you are aware that I am a fairly sentimental person, but photographing weddings is seriously hard work. I am busy, busy, busy coordinating things, fiddling with the dials on the camera, grasping a reflector in one hand a camera in the other standing on one foot on a chair looking for light, praying that I can be omnipresent and invisible at the same time and trying to predict the future, to name a few. (Thank the dear Lord for my second shooter Pam. Thanks, Pam!) The enormity of it all typically doesn't hit me until the day starts to wind down. At Ashley and Brian's wedding it was midway through the reception during the toasts. Standing in the corner with my eye to the camera I watched as Ashley and Brian's loved ones passed the mic around the room. I swear there had to have been at least twenty toasts. From moms, dads, grandparents, siblings, best friends, god parents, and on and on, everyone took no hesitation in publicly professing their love and adoration for these two as individuals and as a pair. As my vision became hazy from the tears clouding up my eyes I seriously had to give myself a little talking too (inside my head, of course). "Carrie, pull yourself together!" I literally almost lost it. These two were the real deal and it was evident to all who sat on the sidelines watching their lives. And here they were, gathered around, cheering them on and raising glasses. How. absolutely. beautiful. sob.

Congrats to you, Ashley and Brian! I loved being there to capture your day and to cheer you on.



































Here are a few of those infamous toasts...