Ashleigh and Alan

With all this cold winter weather let’s warm ourselves up with a little look back at a nice summer wedding.

Ashleigh and Alan got married on a lovely sunny August day in the beautiful Clontarf Castle. The sun was splitting the skies as we went off to take the family portraits at St Anne’s Park but in all honesty, we hardly had to step outside all day because everything took place right in the castle – from getting ready, ceremony and reception. I don’t know about other wedding photographers but I love it when the bride and groom are getting ready in the same hotel – it means you can pop from room to room nice and easy to get shots and spend less time on the road.

Aside from the ease of this shoot, this wedding was such a laugh. Ashleigh is mad. She wont mind me saying that. Some of her friends are mad too. She wont mind me saying that either. Trust me, I got quite the introduction when I arrived in the room that day to take the preparation shots. The less said the better but you know who you are! While Ashleigh is quite hyper and full of banter, Alan is super relaxed and calm. I got a great laugh when Alan’s mum was getting on to Alan’s brother Philip, the best man, that he was wearing a different jacket from the fitting and that it was too short for him. Were either Alan or Philip concerened? Not one bit. They took everything in their stride and just laughed it off.

Ashleigh and Alan were on the phone to each other all morning. I thought that was quite sweet. “Yeah, Dave’s here – he’s taking pictures of me right now – on the phone!”

The ceremony was lovely. Short but very sweet and with more laughs thrown in thanks to Ashleigh’s friend Dee and her reading from “the book of Captain Corelli’s Mandolinn” – Oh how we laughed.

After the ceremony I jumped in the car with Ashleigh and Alan as we went for a few shots in the rose gardens.

It was gorgeous out with lots of people out and about enjoying the weather. I’ll never forget one little girl, who looked like she was straight off the set of Little Miss Sunshine. She came speeding along on her little scooter, stopped and said to Ashleigh “Are you getting married?” – “I’m already married – do you like my dress”. And with her mouth gaping wide open and a look of wonderment she slowly said “Yeeeeah”. Then snapped back to reality and scooted off again as happy as can be. Very cute.

Later back at the hotel Ashleigh and Alan took a little walk around the empty dinning room to have some time alone together as their guests where being entertained by the brilliant Jack Wise. You may have seen a sneak peak post called “Magic is Magic” where I mentioned him before at this very wedding.

It wasn’t long before it was time for dinner and speeches. With more laughs, usually at poor Alan’s expense, (mind you that is the role of the bestman) and another bit of slagging for Dee and her reading.

I want to thank Ashleigh and Alan for being such a super couple and giving me a brilliant wedding to shoot. It really was so much fun from start to finish. You always know you’ve done a good job when your asked to stay and enjoy yourself and I wish to this day I had because I know it would have been brilliant. Thanks guys!