Katie & Jon’s beautiful wedding was published in The Knot Minnesota Magazine and it’s easy to see why-these two are so happy and beautiful! Thank you to The Knot for choosing my work to be published in your Spring/Summer issue!
Katie & Jon’s beautiful wedding was published in The Knot Minnesota Magazine and it’s easy to see why-these two are so happy and beautiful! Thank you to The Knot for choosing my work to be published in your Spring/Summer issue!
The most important aspect of beautiful wedding and engagement photos is that you look natural and comfortable. Because let’s face it, even if the lighting and posing looks great, if you don’t like your expression then none of the other stuff really matters right? This is why I spend a lot of time listening and making sure you feel comfortable, I guide you through and make it super fun, easy (and work quickly) with you and your whole wedding party. It takes years of experience to get good enough and fast enough that you know what you’re doing so the focus can be on taking care of your couples. If you are stopping to think too long about camera adjustments or composition, you loose precious time that can be spent on a different scene or the wedding party going off to mingle during cocktail hour (which in itself can be a great photo opportunity right? Wedding couples we work with (and wedding parties) frequently say they can tell we know what we’re doing and that we’ve obviously had a lot of experience or that we make it look so easy. We make it look easy because it is easy for us, we’ve been doing this for a long time, our cameras are an extension of us. Read what our couples say (link to live reviews) and learn more about us on my website. www.mhuberphotography.com I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had people tell me they wished they had hired a more experienced professional like me to photograph their wedding. It really saddens me to hear stories about people who waited months to get their wedding images back only to be disappointed in both the quality and quantity of their images. Our couples understand and appreciate what goes into quality professional wedding photography. I would be happy to explain all of the technical aspects and the behind the scenes of what goes into every wedding, but for now I just thought I would share one of the biggest differences our couples notice-how easy it is to work with us and how easy we make it for them to relax and feel natural for photos because this is the most important aspect of a photograph of yourself right? After the engagement session our couples tell us “thank you so much for making that so easy and making us feel comfortable” By that point I have shown them some images throughout the session so they know what to look forward to when they see the previews and feel good about what was captured. This helps tremendously for the wedding day as well. Our couples know we are going to make them look good and capture lots of great images of the wedding, they trust us and are able to just experience the day, be in the moment and just “take in” the whole thing without a single worry about the photography.
I absolutely love Pad Thai….BUT, the only time I have ever had it at a restaurant and actually liked it was at Big Bowl. I have ordered it so many times all over during our travels but am so disappointed. I have been tweaking a recipe over the years and I think I have finally have it (dare I say) perfected. I have it pictured above with sesame seeds but I don’t usually use them. Also, pictured is my daughter’s cute doggo “Junie” they were over visiting for the day. She is the sweetest dog I have ever met, you can follow her story on here Instagram
So, anyhoo….back to the recipe:
Must have:
Crushed peanuts
Fresh Bean Sprouts
Fresh lime juice (one or 2 limes)
Fresh cilantro
large cuts of green onion
Flat Thai rice noodles
the sauce (recipe below)
Optional:
julienne carrots-about 2 large
about a half of an onion thick sliced
rough chopped garlic 2 large cloves
snap peas chopped-handful
1 large jalapeno pepper (mandolin or very thin sliced)
1 or 2 chili thai peppers (mandolin or very thin sliced)
Cubed firm tofu
Make the rice noodles, rinse in cold water, strain, set aside.
Make the sauce-in small saucepan combine and heat on high:
(heat just to boil then set aside)
3 T. Fish sauce
1 heaping T. chili oil sauce (see pic below) got this at Whole Foods
1 T. Soy Sauce
5 T. brown sugar
1 T. rice vinegar
If you like it really spicy you can add Sriracha to add more heat or more hot sliced peppers.
In a large fry pan, heat up about 5T. peanut oil on high, add cubed tofu or other desired protein, heat until a little crispy on edges. Some of it will stick to the pan, that’s ok. Add garlic & onions, then carrots, toss. Remove pan from heat, squeeze the juice of 1/2 of a lime over everything in the pan, let it sit and “sweat”. Once things cool down a bit it will loosen and a spoon or spatula will easily scrape everything loose that’s stuck to the pan. Now bring back to high heat, add noodles and sauce, mix around in pan, then push everything over to the side, add a T. butter to the pan, then 2 eggs, stir them up a bit so they will be “scrambled” and let sit a bit. Once pan has heated up nicely and eggs are almost cooked fully, mix everything up. remove from heat again and add rest of ingredients (crushed peanuts, green onions, cilantro, fresh bean sprouts, more lime juice) just before you plate the food (or even after its plated-will look pretty)
This stuff is magical, you HAVE to get some…seriously so good!!!
Many of you know our daughter got married on our property last Saturday and it was one of the happiest days of my life! I wanted to share the behind the scenes details of how we saved thousands on her beautiful wedding. According to the Knot the average wedding in the Midwest is $39,000 with the average number of guests being 136. We were able to keep under the budget of $20,000 with 120 guests.
My daughter and her fiancé wanted to get married on our property, which I was absolutely thrilled about! I’ve been photographing weddings since 1988. I’ve gotten to know a lot of vendors, who is really good, who is not so good, who is less expensive but still awesome etc., and also learned a lot about what goes into planning a wedding.
Things that helped keep the cost down:
The two areas that we splurged a bit: Photography and Flowers. Photography because after the wedding all you have left are the photographs and we value high quality photography of course, and for flowers of course we hired one of the best in the Twin Cities: Terri Uy-Lennon but we saved by not doing flowers for parents or grandparents. We also saved flower petals from the rehearsal dinner for the flower girls to scatter down the aisle, and Terri designed the large greenery swag to double as a head table decoration (we just had a designated person remove it after the ceremony and place it on the head table). Well designed floral arrangements can really make a big difference in the décor, it was important to me to not go cheap on the flowers, so I was really glad my daughter agreed. People kept asking me: “So who is going to photograph your daughter’s wedding, you’re not going to are you?” My answer was of course not, I wanted to be in the pictures, not be the one taking them, I wanted to be just a mom, not working at my daughter’s wedding! But obviously I know a lot of photographers, so I made a list of about 10 photographers and let her choose. She invited me along for some of the interviews, which was fun. In the end she chose Melissa Hesse from Rivets and Roses and we couldn’t have been happier with her choice! Melissa and her assistant Lucy did an excellent job, they were very professional and worked very hard to capture everything that was happening. The images are perfect and I can’t imagine a better fit for my daughter’s wedding.
More advice/things I learned:
These are just a few things I wanted to jot down before I forgot, I will update this post when I have more time, but feel free to contact me if you have any questions! More photos coming soon!!!
My beautiful daughter Athena on the left and her beautiful bride Carleigh on the right. What an amazing day I’ll never forget!
Sometimes someone taking a picture during the ceremony can be really cute, but sometimes it can actually ruin your wedding photos. If you are willing to take that chance, that’s up to you of course, but here’s a few things to consider:
This is an adorable image that I captured of the bride’s dad taking pictures during the ceremony:
A news story with some real life examples:
Wonder how couples enforce an unplugged wedding? To start with, just for the record I’m all for unplugged for the simple reason that it’s important to me as a person to be present and focused, I feel your guests should have that, but I do also realize it’s not my wedding, so if you decide it’s not for you then I support you 100% and can work around whatever your guests do! I would like to add that of the hundreds of weddings that I have photographed that have been unplugged, not one of my couples has regretted the decision. Back to enforcement: First things first, make it clear to your guests from the beginning, then repeat. Any opportunity to make your wishes known should be taken. Your wedding website, even invites can include instructions for your guests. Spread the word among friends and family that you will need their help getting the word out. You can be funny or formal, whichever your style, just make it known. Signs tend to get ignored at weddings, so consider having your officiant make an announcement that you request their full and complete presence so they can feel “all the feels”.
Another thing to consider is who you hire to capture video of your wedding. Have you seen those large steady cams? How about one of those just inches from your face as you recite your vows during the ceremony? Some very talented videographers may be very good at capturing footage for commercial ads, but may not have the ability, talent or correct equipment to properly capture a wedding. The videographer you hire should have lenses that are able to zoom in from a distance during the ceremony, so they don’t become a part of the ceremony and block everyone’s view (including guests and your photographer’s view).