Michael and Bethany are engaged and ready for Mexico!

Bethany and I met right before I got married, so she was able to go to my “destination” wedding (if you count a little mountain town 4 hours North of Phoenix as a”destination”), and now I get to go to her destination wedding… as her photographer!  Considering that Bethany’s wedding is international, I think it definitely counts as destination!

With as much trouble as Bethany and Mike had with their wedding planning, we couldn’t be happier for them with how it all has worked out!  Radiant was the first vendor they chose but they couldn’t find a location in Phoenix they liked.  Once they did find a place, it went bankrupt and they were starting at square 1 again!  Finally they just said, “Screw it, we’re outta here!” and they decided to do their wedding in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico (near Cancun).

So we’d been talking about their engagement session for awhile before they even officially booked us since they were still waiting on finalizing a location and a date.  By the time the day came to actually do their session, we were very excited and I think it’s safe to say that Bethany was very relieved that she was finally making headway in her wedding planning to do list!

We couldn’t have asked for better people to work with!  Though Bethany and I were friends, we’ve been out of touch for the last couple of years (and then re-united thanks to the magic of Facebook), so when she contacted me about doing their wedding photography, I was thrilled!  It’s been so fun getting to spend time with her again, especially during such an important time in her life!  Mike is super friendly and the kind of guy who makes you feel comfortable the very first time you meet him, so of course we liked him right away and we could not be more happy that Bethany found such a great guy! 🙂

You only have to see one photo of Bethany and Mike to know that they are a photographer’s dream!  I don’t think we could take a bad photo of 2 people who are so good looking even if we wanted to!

The actual session was a blast too!  Mike has 2 boxers that he loves… we knew that because he showed us a picture of them on his phone the first time we met him! 😉

These dogs are definitely a part of the family so we thought it would be fun if he brought them along…I’m not sure if Mike agreed in the end because these guys were full to the brim with excitement and Mike was stressing out trying to get them to be better models for us!

We loved it though, they were hilarious and we couldn’t think of a better way to ease some of the awkwardness that couples inevitably feel in the first 15 min. of their sessions!  Plus, Scottie LOVES boxers, so he was very happy to get a chance to spend some time with these 2 loving animals. Although, as much as he loves our new little chihuahua (how we ended up with a chihuahua is a whole other story in itself), I’m sure being around these awesome dogs did make him a little jealous that he doesn’t have another boxer yet.

We only kept the dogs for the first part of the session and Bethany’s parents were kind enough to come get them and take them home so we’d have a chance to get some shots where Bethany and Mike’s arms aren’t being yanked off!

And I’m happy to report that we did in fact get some “normal” shots (if you can call any photo of these 2 anything other than amazing) of them hanging out together at DC Ranch once the dogs were safely at home.

Thank you guys so much for choosing us for your photography and for being such good sports about bringing the dogs to your session!  We absolutely can’t wait for your Playa Del Carmen wedding!  Seriously, Scottie talks about it and reads about the location online every single day!! Click to see the rest of Bethany and Mike’s Phoenix engagement photo session!