Wedding Formals and First Look 2016

Oh my gosh it's almost been a full year of being married!! May 14th is the day. It would be an understatement if I said that it's been the best year of my life. I realize I haven't posted hardly ANY of my wedding photos including our bridals/formals. I'll probably be over-posting here. Whatever. That's what blogs are for, right? 

Our formals were taken by the amazing Maria Camila again! (she also did our engagements) We did the shoot a couple weeks before our wedding day (which I am SO glad we did rather than day of) She did a beautiful job! I'm not even going to leave any pictures out on this one even if I think I look weird, just because I think she did a great job!

Hair done by my cute, neighbor girl, Miss Morgan Kussee! Oh my heck she is so good with hair. Even though I didn't need them, I used a couple hair extensions for a more fuller braid, and I'm glad I did. I think I curled my hair myself, and Morgan did the braid. I had Morgan practice on me the week before our Formal shoot, so I decided then that I wanted extensions. I don't own any so I texted everyone I knew to see if they owned any with my matching hair color and finally was able to obtain some from a friend of a friend (Thanks Ans!) to borrow. Use your resources people! Don't spend $200 for hair extensions if you'll only use them for one event.

The flowers in my hair were placed by my sweet little sister, Camryn (17). I loved having these in my hair! I chose to do flowers rather than a veil and I am happy with that choice. Funny story, I actually forgot to tell my florist that I was going to do my Bridals a couple weeks before the wedding and totally didn't ask for a bouquet and fresh flowers for my hair on the day of the shoot.... whoops. So I was bouquet-less. Oh well:) As for the flowers that I actually used, they were fake. I picked them out the NIGHT BEFORE the shoot at Bennion Crafts in Kaysville, just 5 minutes before they closed!! *phew* Life saver. 

Make-up done by Taylor Russell in Farmington. I wanted a more natural look and that's exactly what she did! She's amazing, I highly recommend her! She definitely knows what she's doing.

Dress is from Latter-Day Bride at the Gateway in SLC. I had looked at a few places before this but I didn't have enough time for a dress to be altered with sleeves and what-not so I figured Latter-Day Bride would be just the right place to find a dress that doesn't need any complicated altering. I made an appointment to try on dresses and was looking for something simple and elegant. The lady helping me picked out some dresses that fit my description and the third dress I tried on I fell in love with!! I seriously didn't want to take it off. SOLD! Fortunately they had my size in stock AND the dress was made for my exact height so I didn't even need to get it hemmed, what?? Zero alterations were needed. What a miracle! And also such a convenience. That means I got to take it home that day:) Because my dress is so simple, the price was so cheap!! My budget? $1,000. My dress? $500! That is a steal. Seriously, not a lot of people can say that they only spent $500. Happy day! That also makes me not feel so bad for keeping it rather than selling it.

For shoes I wore some tan gladiator-like sandals. Not sure if you can even see them in these pics but I just got them from somewhere online. They cost me nothing more than $30 I'm sure. I couldn't do heels because I'm so tall next to Tanner;)

As for jewelry, I hardly wore any. I wore some diamond earrings on my wedding day that were given to me by my sweet mother-in-law! However, I must have forgotten to wear them for the shoot. That's okay though:) I didn't wear any necklaces or bracelets, just my Engagement/Wedding ring on my left hand and a rose gold ring on my right that I got from Tanner earlier in dating as a promise ring, as I was originally going to wait 18 months for him while he lived in England. But you know, God had different plans and of course always better plans than our own. Long story short, Tanner's visa was pushed back giving us time to plan for and have a wedding before it was time to move to England!

My eyelashes were done the day before this shoot by Jackee Belnap in Bountiful! She's a friend of Tanner's and now a friend of mine! We love the Belnaps! The currently live in England too:) This was my first time ever getting eyelash extension and I fell in love! Seriously if you want to pamper yourself and you've never gotten extensions for your eyelashes before, just do it. It's literally the best and so low maintenance. My reason for getting them was because I wanted some more volume for my eyelashes but didn't want to use too much eyeliner and didn't want to have to wear glue-on lashes. So I got extensions! I had to get them refilled for the actual wedding day and it was so nice to have them on during the honeymoon! 

Enjoy the pics! Btw, Tanner doesn't like getting his picture taken, but he can totally be a model when he needs to be. *heart eyes*

**Summary of this day at the end of the photos

OH my gosh he's just so attractive!

How it all went down

Early morning of the day of the shoot, I drove over to my neighbor Morgan's house to get my hair done after I curled it myself. Afterwards I drove to Farmington to have my make up done by Taylor, went home, had Camryn pin the flowers in my hair, then I took Camryn with me to the shoot, 'cause wouldn't you want your sister aka BFF there to make sure everything is in check?? What would I do without her! I went in just some sweats and carried my dress with me. We met at Tanner's house and I walked in on him and I was so embarrassed that he saw me with my hair and make-up done before the first look!! haha. so dramatic. At least I wasn't in my dress yet. I quickly said hi and ran upstairs to the guest bathroom with Camryn and put on my dress. I soon realized that I had forgotten to bring my sandals! I had no shoes to wear with my dress and I was not about to take the photos while barefoot.. Shoot. My family's house is 20 minutes from Tanner's family's house and I didn't have time to drive all the way there and back so I called up my brother and fortunately he was able to bring them to me and save the day!! GO HARRISON! Tanner left to go to the place where we would take photos before I came downstairs. Camryn and I got a ride there from Camila and I think we might've listened to some Drake in the car because his album had just been released then lol.

We parked, met up with Tanner and I had to hide myself 'cause you know, "first look". Camila pointed Tanner to walk up to a certain spot as we followed him. He kept looking back and almost seeing me, that little stinker. Finally we were able to take the first look pics and I'm honestly glad that we didn't do a video of it, and pictures only because it's the most awkward thing. Maybe some people who do video's doesn't seem so awkward because there is music to go with it, but in reality, it's mostly just weird when your are both in plain sight. Or maybe it's just me and I'm an awkward person? 

During pictures it was kind of hard for me to relax because the sleeves of my dress were kind of restricting. I couldn't raise my arms very high, so when it came to hugging tanner, it was awkward. We made it work, though. :) Also, like I mentioned before, I didn't have a bouquet for this shoot haha oops. Besides that, it was a fun shoot! and It was so nice and fun to have Camryn there. We were on a moutain side right off of the road where many people were walking up and down for a family walk/hike or a run. Everyone that passed us would stop and stare, talk about us, or congratulate us, or compliment me on my dress. I felt like a celebrity! So much attention on us by strangers and it wasn't even our wedding day yet. 

Hope you enjoyed this post as much as I do! 
Have a good day,

XOXO Sierra