Days to go: 30

Yes that’s right peo­ple. Only 30 days to go! In exactly one month we’ll be get­ting mar­ried! Time really is fly­ing now. And what bet­ter time to show you the full engage­ment shoot we indulged in last weekend!

I must first take this time to tell you about our LEGEND of a pho­tog­ra­pher — Phil Bar­ber. He cap­tured our per­son­al­i­ties in these pho­tos absolutely per­fectly and frankly, I really don’t know how he did it so well. I had visions in my head of how these pho­tos would look for months and Phil has sur­passed all expec­ta­tions and given us some­thing we are so very proud of because of how it reflects us and the time we spent together that day. We’ll remem­ber that morn­ing for so many dif­fer­ent rea­sons — it was like I fell in love with Richard all over again. If an engage­ment shoot does any­thing, it forces you to take time out of all the wed­ding plan­ning and your hec­tic life styles and just spend some time together and enjoy each other’s com­pany. It also gives you the valu­able chance to dis­cuss the style of your wed­ding pho­tos with your pho­tog­ra­pher. I can’t tell you how excited I am about how our wed­ding pho­tos are going to turn out!

We were both quite ner­vous about the whole thing. I didn’t think I would be but I was! We really wanted to use this time to get used to hav­ing our photo taken — there are hardly any good pho­tos of us in exis­tence because usu­ally as soon as a cam­era is pointed at us, I make a weird face and Richard starts vibrat­ing with ner­vous­ness! Even though we started out a lit­tle wob­bly, safe to say I think we both over­came our fears and ended up with some beau­ti­ful photographs!

We decided to meet Phil in Castle­field in the cen­tre of Man­ches­ter, near the Museum of Sci­ence and Indus­try — mainly because we knew it would be quiet early on a Sat­ur­day morn­ing and we wouldn’t have to con­tend with being too self con­scious in pub­lic! Also I love the con­trast of the indus­trial arches against the old iron­work next to the canal. And there were geese! I joked that Richard should try and pick up a goose and pose with it. (Actu­ally I wasn’t jok­ing.) There were so many beau­ti­ful loca­tions to take advan­tage of. It was a very blus­tery day which totally ruined my hair but blah blah, who cares!

I intended to pur­chase an umbrella the day before only because I thought it would rain. I couldn’t believe my luck when I found that cute lit­tle heart umbrella and I knew it would be per­fect to include in the shoot. When I decided to get it out there were some moans and groans from Richard, but I know he enjoyed it really. We also decided to bring his gui­tar along to give him some­thing to do (and we’re allowed because we’re both musi­cians, says Phil) as we knew he wouldn’t be too com­fort­able with pos­ing. How­ever, he absolutely loved pos­ing with it!

Talk­ing of props, I’m seri­ously con­sid­er­ing using some on the wed­ding day. Time to build up a prop box methinks! If any­one out there has any ran­dom props they’d like to donate for my wed­ding day (I can return them!) you know what to do!

I’ll say it again, these pho­tos are JUST SO US! We had a fan­tas­tic expe­ri­ence and are just thrilled. We also took some pho­tos that I’m not allowed to show you yet because they are even more spe­cial — but these shall be revealed in due course!

I urge you to go and visit Phil’s blog and tell him how amaz­ing he is. Also, if you’re read­ing this post because you’re look­ing for a wed­ding pho­tog­ra­pher who does engage­ment shoots — book Phil! He works with his wife Lou on the day of the wed­ding so you get two pho­tog­ra­phers — which is always bet­ter than one when the pho­tos are this good! Also, fol­low Phil Bar­ber on Twit­ter! And me for that mat­ter. I need more fol­low­ers.

And Salma’s final thought for the day:

Doesn’t Richard look ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS?!