What’s the most touching thing you’ve ever seen? That’s an easy one.  The most touching thing I’ve ever seen was a baby bunny about to be hit by a furniture truck, but a baby pushed it out of the way at almost the last second. And then a puppy pushed the baby out of the way. Just before the truck could hit the puppy, it blew a tire and spun off of the road and hit a mime.  It was absolutely the most touching and beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Wait. How can that be so when a mime was hit, you ask?  Haha. Seriously. It was a mime.  Mimes are gross.

Okay. Maybe that never actually happened. And you probably don’t think it would be so much touching, as it would be frightening.  So, maybe we aren’t entirely on the same sheet of music when it comes to bunnies, danger, and mimes. Well, maybe we are.  But, the other day, I was shopping for gifts and trying to think of some great gift ideas.  Not just things that cost money. Those aren’t great gifts. It feels good to give someone you love something that has real value of an emotional kind (although the Lexus commercials on TV seem to think making a $40k purchase without consulting your spouse is touching).  But I was thinking about really specials gifts and the precious moments giving them creates.

Well, thinking of precious moments like that got me thinking about other peoples’ precious moments.  As a wedding photographer, you have the privilege of witnessing so many special moments people share.  And since it was so close to Christmas, I started thinking about awesome gifts people have given to each other at weddings.  So, I thought about a lot of cool gifts brides and grooms have given each other. And this being a blog for our photography business, I thought maybe, as a gift to you, I might take the time to share a few of those.  Here are a couple precious gifts from weddings we’ve shared.

The Book

This year, we were honored to attend and provide coverage for Caitlin and Quincy’s wedding. They had a lot of emotion and happy tears throughout the day (we are big fans of blubbering around here).  Caitlin’s gift to Quincy was special and touched him deeply. She gave him a painting of the view from a window of what I believed to be their house in Florida (Quincy was emotional when he opened it, so I didn’t pry too hard, since I like to document and not play Sherlock Holmes).  So, wherever they go the rest of their lives, whatever significance that window and view had for them, they will always be able to remember it.  I liked that gift, but it isn’t the one I am writing about. Or wait. I think I did just write about it.  Well, I guess it’s better that way, since it was a cool gift.

Quincy’s gift to Caitlin was unique as well.  He gave her a book, which contained a very sweet letter to her.  The rest of the book was blank.  The idea is that they are supposed to write the story of their life in the book, as it happens, so when they are old, they can look back and read ‘the greatest love story ever told’.  Ambitious? Yeah, and that’s good.  It was a pretty powerful and sweet gift.  Fellas, it had all the ladies emotional.  I’m just sayin’.  Writing the greatest love story ever told is a pretty cool gift!

The Song

Lynsey and Caleb’s wedding is displayed in a sample album in our studio.  So, obviously, we really liked them and their wedding was great.  They had a lot of great moments.  During consultations, while showing our sample album, I like to point out to grooms that Caleb wrote Lynsey a song and sang it to her at the reception. Yeah, that’s right. The bar for gifts is way up there now.  That’s something that might seem embarrassing to some people, maybe. But, looking back, it would have to be one the sweetest things ever. Without being a very impressionable groupie, it’s hard to get a song written about your relationship, much less sang to you. Especially in this economy. So, Caleb writing and singing a song to Lynsey was one of the coolest gifts we’ve seen.

The Letters

The last cool gift I want to talk about hasn’t actually fully happened yet.  We photographed Ashley and John’s wedding earlier this year. So, that much happened already. They are a great couple and they had a fantastic wedding.  It was during the wedding that they set up this cool gift.  During their ceremony, they sealed a box which contained a bottle of wine and a letter that each had written to the other. On their fifth anniversary, they are supposed to open the box, drink the wine, and read the letters.  I haven’t finished my time machine (it’s still in the planning stages, unless my future self *hint hint* wants to drop me a few details), so I can’t say how special that moment was/will be.  But, I think the idea is awesome and I’m certain day they open that box will be very special.  I love my wife and wine and letters, so I wish we had done this at our own wedding!

We’ve had lots of other cool gifts exchanged at weddings and it was hard to pick just a few for this post.  Planning a wedding is a lot of work and stress, and many couples have jobs or school on top of that, so I know it can be very difficult to find the time to come up  with and deliver a great gift idea.  And that’s why it’s okay to cheat and steal the ideas from blogs! I’m mostly kidding. 😉 Enjoy the Holidays!

– Shane

wedding gifts, bride gifts, groom gifts

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