Lauren & John | Summer Wedding Portraits at Twin Lakes Park in Greensburg, PA

[PART 2]
If you missed Part 1 of Lauren & John’s engagement session – go back & see it here!

Back at the beginning of 2020, John went to a jeweler in Pittsburgh & ordered an engagement ring for Lauren. Marriage was obviously in their future & it was time to make it officially official. But that was at the beginning of 2020 – when things were still “normal”.

And then, COVID-19 showed up & sent the entire world into chaos. John eagerly awaited news of Lauren’s engagement ring – hoping that it would slip thru all of the channels & still arrive in time. See, John & Lauren had planned a trip to go down to Virginia to visit John’s family & John’s plan (pre-pandemic) was to propose to Lauren before that trip, so they could announce their engagement to his family in person.

Unfortunately, when the jeweler called John – instead of good news (that the ring had arrived & he could come pick it up), it was sad news: the ring was stuck in Texas with an unknown timeframe as to when it would make it’s way up to Pittsburgh.

Literally as the entire world was beginning to shut down, Lauren & John drove down to Virginia to visit John’s family. In line with their laid-back, not overly romantic personalities, they simply announced to John’s family: “We’re getting married!” – even though there was no official proposal or ring yet. And it was perfect.

Finally, the ring did arrive in Pittsburgh. John took the call from the jeweler as he & Lauren were sitting at the table together. He hung up from the call & said, “Well, do you want to go pick up your ring with me?” and that was that. And it was perfect.

They had planned to get married the first weekend of October. They rented a big house down at Deep Creek Lake, Maryland (which automatically made them my very favorite people) & they began planning a “backyard” style casual wedding. But as more and more regulations have come into effect, they just decided: why wait? So, on a whim, they eloped – with just their immediate family present – in their living room. And it was perfect.

And so, we technically already had “engagement photos” scheduled when Lauren emailed me & said: “We got married! Do you think we can change up our engagement session a bit?” They still hope to have some sort of celebration, sometime in the future, where they can safely gather all of their friends & family together & celebrate their new marriage.

Until then, Lauren & John simply wanted photos together, in their wedding attire, in order to announce their marriage to the world! And thus, we came up with our “half-and-half” engagement session – half traditional engagement session (which I blogged on Tuesday) and half bride & groom portraits. It was SO much fun!

Can we just talk about how dreamy this light was?! We caught the sun just as it was sliding down over the mountain. I had Lauren & John stand together & we “re-created” their wedding ceremony. It was cheesy & funny & totally un-scripted, but it was so much fun.

Of course, they had to have a few photos with masks to commemorate these crazy days! That way, one day, when their kids & grandkids ask about how they got married – they’ll be able to tell them the whole crazy story!