Mike & Melissa | Elopement

Together for 10 years

I liked Melissa from the moment we connected. She was vivacious, funny, irreverent and also very anxious and on the fence about this whole elopement thing

She had been following us for years…literally YEARS. She knew she wanted to elope. She found the one and they had already been together 10 years and had a spunky blended family…

And they were finalized a big kitchen remodel…

And Melissa was on a 6 week maintenance chemo schedule.

There was always something else that took precedence and center stage….I get it, my mom gets chemo every month and some months if the medicine goes in too quick she will be sick for weeks. Its so hard to predict life when you are in these situations

But she kept coming back around and checking in. And I answered all the questions that came up for her about blizzards, and her kiddos getting sick and having to reschedule. 

I KNEW how badly she wanted this. And how she was trying to make time for it. And at each bend we connected briefly and she shared her struggles and I showed support and empathy as best as I could.

So much focus was on LIFE and all its business and complications…. this was not the couple that had a clean slate and 6 months to plan an elopement

This was a couple living their big messy life

But with each check in I could feel her starting to develop that confidence and that excitement and I told her ild be waiting when she was ready and that she totally deserved this day more than ANYONE because of all that she was balancing. 

Well that day came the week after x-mas. Melissa and mike went for it. She realized taht this wedding was not gonna plan itself and nothing was gonna happen if she didn’t make that commitment to herself and to this step that her and Mike wanted to take together in their relationship.

I feel like that because of all the hurdles that she faced her wedding turned out even more awesome than we could have ever expected. 

They are huge pizza nerds. Like me. So we stopped for a slice in a picturesque slice shop in midtown. We noticed the shop had a roll down gate and there were exactly 5 stools lining the counter facing the street

So even though it was the middle of winter. I asked the manager if he could roll up the gate so I could get some shots.

Bingo! He did! Coolest wedding photo/family photo (and they say NY-ers aren’t nice…hmph)

I kept hearing the kids talk about creme brûlée. So I did a quick search for French resturautns and found one with RAVE reviews. In the theater district. We took a chance and headed over there to see waht the maitre d could do for us….With a wink and a nod and a promise that we woudl be outta there before hte 6pm reservation they immediately seated us and 5 servings of creme brûlée and 2 champagnes and 3 coca colas quickly appeared.

Was such an honor to see Melissa and mike thru this life journey!

And what a freaking fun wedding day they had….the universe aligned.