Victorian Belle Wedding | Portland, OR

A bride and groom a their Victorian Belle wedding. Photographed by Portland Wedding Photographer, Brian aMorrison

Emily & Alex’s Story

Alright, so I’ll most likely be telling this mainly from my (Alex’s) perspective but I’ll do my best to add as much of Emily’s point of view as well! Before we get to the juicy details I know you’re waiting for, I’ll have to go back a couple months to provide some context.

I was in the process of moving duty stations from New Jersey to Oregon and decided to take some time off work to spend with my sister in Georgia. I’ve always been very close with my sister but once she left for college and I enlisted in the Air Force, our time together has been slim. Fast forward 1 month after some much needed sibling time and it was time to head to the Pacific Northwest.

I arrive at my gate at the Atlanta airport to find that my flight was delayed nearly an hour. This meant missing my connecting flight in San Francisco. Sure enough, my flight was missed and my 45-minute layover in San Francisco turned into a 9 hour one. I was stranded with my only option being to compete for standby on upcoming flights. During this process I struck up conversation with a fellow traveler named Shanise and we began sharing our stories.

To my surprise, she was planning to move from the northwest to the same town that my sister lives in, in Georgia, in order to be closer to her boyfriend. When Shanise found out I was moving to Oregon with no friends or family waiting to receive me, she made it her mission to introduce me to as many people as possible before moving away. During this time, Shanise invited me out to a 3-day music festival and this is where I met the love of my life.

I arrived at the camp and was introduced to everyone in our group. It actually wasn’t until the third day of the festival while walking back to our camp that Emily and I really had a chance to connect. I had my eyes on her the entire weekend and was hoping for an opportunity to get to know her. This may come off as a bit cliché but I’ll take that risk; she had it all. Emily is hilarious, so intelligent, adventurous, inquisitive, kind-hearted, and hands down the most beautiful woman with the most beautiful blue eyes I have ever met. The list goes on and on but for the sake of not writing a love novel, I’ll leave it at that. We really hit it off right from the start and became instant best friends. The more we talked, the more we found in common and since the beginning there has always been this feeling of familiarity. We felt a connection like never before.

After the festival was over, we parted ways but stayed in touch by talking on the phone nearly 3 hours a day. You may think we’d run out of things to talk about but over a year later and there’s not a second of the day that goes by that I don’t want to be by her side. We lived 2 hours apart in the beginning but we didn’t let that stop us. Our friendship grew, as did our love for each other once we started dating.

As time has passed, we’ve already experienced so many adventures like moving in together, white water rafting, Disney World, getting engaged in the middle of a lavender field, and more. We have so much life left ahead of us and we’re so excited for what’s next. But most of all, whatever may come, we’re just excited to experience it together. Life with her is the greatest adventure of all.