Aloha Gordon, Jayanne & Mami,
When John proposed over 10 years ago, we knew we wanted a destination wedding. Having worked for a photographer that did weddings as well as family portraits, I've seen some amazing work...and sadly, some pretty tragic work. All I cared about was getting married somewhere hot and having our special day captured by someone whose photography style and skills would meet or exceed my (admittedly very high) expectations. After all, it takes someone pretty amazing to be able to take those memories you have in your head and heart and transform them into something tangible that will take you right back to that moment in time...
As soon as I came across Gordon's website, I knew we (read: I) had to have him shoot our wedding. We booked immediately and roughly 6 months later on May 4th, 2005 we were wed by the illustrious Reverend Tino on beautiful Makena Cove Beach. The entire planning process was completely stress-free: we pretty much just had to obtain our wedding license a few days beforehand, get ourselves ready and show up. It was an incredible day--Reverend Tino was outstanding and the pictures were, of course, breathtaking. I can't tell you how many people commented on our images being 'surreal' and 'like a postcard'. Some people even accused us of having a fake backdrop! Needless to say, countless referrals were and continue to be made.
We always wanted to have children and had agreed that if we had a girl, we'd name her Makena and that we wanted to come back to renew our vows for our 10-year anniversary with our child(ren). At the 5-year anniversary mark, we started seriously talking about making this happen (and I started dropping hints about the ring aka my 'war medal'). Being a self-admitted Type-A personality (and a bit of a perfectionist/control freak), I contacted the fabulous Jayanne at least 18 months prior as I just had to have the same date, the same photographer, and, of course, the same officiant. Jayanne was awesome to deal with: she was on the ball with all the details, very accommodating with our requests, knowledgeable and always upbeat and positive--I loved getting her voicemails because they radiated the spirit of aloha (just thinking of her voice is making me smile as I type this).
Fast-forward 10 years to the day to us and our 3 children: 8 year old Dario and 3 year old twins Makena and Marco. It is beyond words to describe how it felt to stand on the same beach, with the same photographer and same officiant, most of our guests who attended the original wedding plus our children, all who were there to witness us renew our vows and profess our love for one another. To say it was amazing is an understatement. This time around was equally as stress-free (well, as stress-free as it can be with 3 small children lol) and our ceremony was a little more lighthearted (I may have been guilty of saying 'for richer or for richer')
The kids loved the entire experience, and Dario especially adored having Mami's full attention for an impromptu special 'solo photo shoot'.
We were so happy to receive a 'sneak peek' a couple days later of a few of the images that Mami had worked her editing magic on and were thrilled that we had made it onto your Instagram account! We declared ourselves famous and immediately shared them with everyone we knew (we couldn't help ourselves)! We didn't think it was possible to exceed the quality of our original wedding photos, but all the images we received from our vow renewal were absolutely stunning. We are having a really difficult time trying to narrow down which ones to frame and hang in our home--there just isn't enough wall space for them all!
Thank you all for your incredible talents that made our family's special day unforgettable and for capturing what was in our hearts and minds that day, thereby allowing us to have something concrete to share with our loved ones who were unable to be with us that day. I've always said you can't put a price tag on memories and these will be treasured by our family for years to come.
It's amazing what can happen all because two people fell in love...
Mahalo nui loa ame a hui hou kakou,
Donna, John, Dario, Makena & Marco
10 year Vow Renewal at Makena Cove on May 4th, 2015
