First I want to say a little something about this venue, Tri Bella in Mesa, AZ. Daniell and Diane picked this wedding venue because they fell in love with the red exposed brick. After capturing the moments of their day and bringing back their photos to the computer, I absolutely fell in love with it too. It’s because they chose this venue that I had something in mind with the ring shot. I knew I wanted to find a space in the wall for their rings. While I was photographing, I asked Joceline, my associate, to go search for cracks in the wall and she did just that. It turned out perfectly how I wanted it.

Daniell and Diane had so many significant moments more than probably any wedding I think I have ever photographed. The bride walked down to Peter Gabriels, “In Your Eyes.” The barn door opened as she entered right on the lyric that said, “Love.” And if you were an outsider looking in, you didn’t know the significance. But for Daniell, it was because he often called his bride, “Love.” So it was a dramatic entrance and sentimental to the two of them.

The colors that they chose went so overwhelmingly well with this venue and the red brick. The guys were in cobalt blue and the girls were in a mixture of corals and pinks. Everything from the flowers to the outfits worked so well for this wedding venue.

And let’s just talk about the flower girl for a minute. Oh my word! She was gorgeous, along with her dress.

But the dress has a story to it. It is originally from Ukraine. The bride ordered it before the war started over there and then they received an email that there would be a delay. So the bride thought, “Well, of course there is going to be a delay, there’s a war.” So they started to not count on it due to what was happening over in Ukraine and they weren’t upset about it – because there was a war going on. So they went ahead and ordered another one. To their surprise, the dress from Ukraine arrived earlier than the one that they ordered as a backup. They were amazed and didn’t expect that at all! What a wild story and it made the dress even more special coming all the way from Ukraine in the middle of a war.

Oh and this flower girl, she definitely stole the show, not in front of the bride of course, but just look at her?!

Even the bridal suite was the exposed red brick. While a small space, it was still absolutely beautiful. I was loving all the photos in it. So right after the ceremony, we went to the bridal suite to sign the marriage certificate. During this time, I asked the event venue coordinator to grab the bride and groom a drink.

I wanted to empty the room and take literally just a few moments together with no one else before they headed to the reception surrounded by people. So you will see a couple photos below with drinks in their hands, just because we wanted them to take a moment of letting it sink in as Mr. and Mrs. Stelter. I wanted this for them.

Being a photographer isn’t about just taking pictures, most of the time it is creating moments.

There are always so many wedding photos that I would love to post of wedding days, and it’s always so hard of what to choose, especially when you have a unique wedding venue such as Tri Bella in Mesa, AZ. However, I think what struck out to me a lot that day was the details. As I mentioned earlier, there was a lot of significance in every detail of this day.

There is a photo that we took of Reese’s Pieces on the desert table. And it was significant as the groom has always told the bride, “I love you to pieces, like Reese’s.” He will sometimes just leave her bags of Reese’s Pieces just lying around. There were just so many significant pieces of the wedding day. And we loved capturing them, as well as their love. I’m so glad we were a part in telling their story. That’s what this is all about behind the camera.