The Root Photography Blog

Cassie + John : Reception Part 2

August 1, 2010 by Jensey 10 Comments

Are you sure you’re ready for this? Make sure you’re all caught up!

Soon enough, Castaway Cay day was here! I’d been wanting to visit Castaway Cay since I was a kid and the Disney Channel did a special on it.

I’m convinced Disney threw in some pixie dust to make that water as pretty as possible!

We got up so early to take pictures around the island before the other guests got off the boat. I know these guys were exhausted, but I loved feeling like the only ones on the island. :)

Favorite!

After their little “just married” session, Nathan and I biked around the island. Both my dad and brother are pilots, so I loved all the little aviation touches. Even the bathrooms were themed with airplane doors on the walls and vintage Piper Cub signs. :)

Hello, gorgeous!

I’m not gonna lie… The crab races got a little intense!

Hello!

So, as we were about to get back on the Disney Wonder, we ran into Cassie, who was signing up to go parasailing. Now here’s the thing- I’m sort of a quirky person. I have a lot of fears that most people don’t think twice about. My biggest fear? Killer whales, closely followed by pretty much every other creature that lives underwater. So, I tried to play it cool when Cassie asked if we wanted to join them, casually explaining how I was planning to go take a nap or something, but my inner dialogue going something like “OH PLEASE MOTHER OF GOD DO NOT MAKE ME DO IT I DON’T WANNA I DON’T WANNA!!!!” Lucky for me, there was only one spot left, to which I totally and completely selflessly suggested Nate go instead of me. ;) I love that Nate went, though, because seriously- Aren’t these the cutest honeymoon photos ever? :)

Then it was Nate’s turn to go up with Melissa, one of John’s sisters. :)

So, long story short, after a day of biking around the island with no water, Nate and I both made ourselves sick! My story was much less embarrassing than poor Nate’s, but I love him too much to publicly post what happened on the blog. I will say it’s a good one though, so make sure you ask us about it in person. ;)

NEXT : Cassie and John Reception Part 3!

Cassie + John : Reception Part 1

July 30, 2010 by Jensey 29 Comments

Are you sure you’re ready for this? Make sure you’re all caught up!

Cassie & John : Wedding Part 1

Cassie & John : Wedding Part 2

Instead of a typical reception, Cassie and John treated their guests (and us!) to a Disney Cruise. Why? Because they are awesome. This may surprise you, but even though I’ve spent my life being a Disney geek, I’d never gone on the Disney Cruise Line!

Our adventure started with this building- Note to 1st timers on the Disney Cruise- If you still have your suitcases by the time you get to this point, go find a cast member! No one took our bags, so we stood out lugging all of our gear and what not through the security check point & then all the way to our room! Now we know. :)

Once we got to the boat and started to explore (my favorite part of the whole cruise experience!), we spotted Shelley from Impressions channeling her inner Kate Winslet. :)

We met up in Cassie and John’s suite for the life vest drill. Nope, you won’t see photos of me in my life vest! ;)

As I mentioned above, Shelley from Impressions was also on the cruise with us. She played wedding coordinator on the trip and worked her tail off arranging group events and dropping off things to the guests’ rooms, like these adorable welcome bags! Each bag had Cassie and John’s wedding logo on the outside and held matching beach towels and water bottles inside. :)

Then we hit the top deck to shoot the bon voyage party. It was freezing and windy, but still super exciting. :)

Seriously… How cute is that photo on the left?!

I didn’t know until our first dinner that we would have the same wait staff every night. Lucky for us, we loved our waiter! :)

The next morning, since we were docked in Nassau, Cassie and John invited their guests to play a straw market game! Everyone met in their suite to draw a name of another wedding guest, kinda like secret Santa.

From there, we all headed out to the Straw Market, where everyone had a $2 budget to shop for the person they were assigned. The tricky thing is you can’t find anything there under $2, so everyone had to haggle with the vendors like champs. Or cheat. ;)

I, in the meantime, did some shopping for my little sister. :)

The newlyweds shared their ginormous suite with some of the wedding party. All of the wedding guests got magnets with their names on it for their door, as shown below, and cute message boards. Kinda made it feel like a grown up summer camp (and let me tell you- I loooooved writing on that message board!) :)

Here are some photos from the gift exchange- Someone got John a hot pink bracelet. :)

On our next cruise, I’ll definitely be hitting Atlantis. For no other reason than the fact that one of my all time favorite movies, Holiday in the Sun, was filmed there. Yes, the Mary Kate and Ashley movie. Shut up.

Nathanial, I love you. <3

This was by far my favorite restaurant on the ship, Animator’s Palate.

After dinner, we caught Toy Story the Musical, which of course, I loved.

The sets were amazing! :)

The only thing that bugs me more than child actors are when adults are cast as children. Like this. No thank you, sir.

NEXT : Cassie and John Reception Part 2

Cassie + John : Wedding Part 2

July 28, 2010 by Jensey 9 Comments

Continued from Part One.

Every now and then in our Disney weddings, our couples have a moment in the ceremony when the best man is supposed to hand over the wedding rings, only to find they’re gone. At that moment, Major Domo shows up with the rings in hand to save the day. What I loved about Cassie’s wedding was that she worked with her wedding planner to create a completely new character to show up with the rings- Vera Tidey!

When we left off in the last post with the best man holding the empty ring box, Vera Tidy ran up and saved the day, feather duster and all. :)

She kindly interrupted the wedding, explaining she was a housekeeper at the Grand Floridian and found Cassie and John’s wedding rings under their best man’s bed. :)

She then proceeded to give him a hard time about other things, including having not proposed to his long time girl friend!

You can see Simply Cinematic’s video capture of the whole thing here! :)

Soon Vera left and it was back to business…

Some of the sweetest bridesmaids we’ve ever had (thank GOODNESS, because we spent the next 4 days with them!!)

It was absolutely freezing, but you’d never know it looking at Cassie smiling. :)

Photo time at “my” fountain. ;)

Yet another favorite. LOVE the flower in her hair!

Cassie, you were absolutely stunning! So timeless.

Some wedding crashers stopped by the breakfast afterward:

I wish all of our weddings served breakfast!! Or at least fed us Mickey waffles. ;)

I love when characters at our weddings really bond with the littlest guests! :)

Whenever our couples ask for recommendations on videographers, the first name we send is our buddy Rainer at Simply Cinematic! He shot along with us for Cassie and John’s big day, and you can see their highlight video here:

Cassie & J.B. – Cinematic Movie Trailer from Simply Cinematic.

NEXT: Cassie and John Reception Part 1