Welcome to Paul Retherford Photography, LLC. I will be blogging my Wedding Photography, Random Photography, Opinions, Fun news, Travels, and more. All of my images are free to use if you keep the watermark on them. If you would like the images without watermark please contact me. Make sure to bookmark my Photography blog and come back often.
I am a full time Wedding Photographer, based in Michigan and traveling around the World, with over 7 years of Professional Wedding Photography experience and hundreds of Weddings completed. My style is very stress free and I love to tell the story of the Wedding day through the bride and groom's eyes. I find that my relaxed attitude and smile brings out the best in my customers.
I adore traveling and I would love to capture your Destination Weddings around the World. Please contact me with any questions about my Photography. You can call me directly at 231.445.1793.
Please follow me on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin and make sure to introduce yourself.
Cheers!
Paul:-)
Our first beautiful daughter Julia Currell Retherford
Our family is elated to welcome our first baby Julia Currell Retherford into the World. I have been busy being a dad and that is why there have been minimal updates on the blog. Expect to see LOTS of this girl since I am capturing images of her daily. Already have a few thousand images of her and there will be lots more.
Julia was born February 26, 2010 at Northern Michigan Hospital in Petoskey, Michigan at 5:17am and weighed 6.5 pounds and 19 inches long. She came two weeks prior to my wives due date but is full term and healthy. I would like to thank Dr. Cockfield for your expert hand in delivery and all of the team of doctors at Northern Michigan Hospital. We saw all of you along the way and each of you added a bit of useful knowledge. You all do amazing work! We would also like to thank the team of nurses, lactation counselors, kitchen staff, janitors, and everyone else that I missed. We really felt at home during our stay and you all did a fantastic job. Keep up the good work and healthy babies!
The whole family is getting used to the new addition. We had the dogs kenneled during the birth and after for a few days. We dropped clothes off to them so they could smell their new sister. When they came home Sampson, our Blue Weimaraner, was very interested in Julia and Asta, our Vizsla, kind of avoided her. They both are getting used to the new sounds and smells in the household. As for Megan and me, we couldn’t be happier right now. Life and new life are precious!
New love is in the air at the Retherfords.
Julia is doing so well and she just had her 2 week appointment. We are so happy to have her in our lives and look forward to raising her to be an exceptional citizen in society. She has been really easy to care for up to this point and we are crossing our fingers that it stays that way.:-) Check out the first seven days image slideshow that I put together below.
Our baby was due on March 15, 2010. We had a baby appointment on Wednesday and we didn’t have any idea what was coming the next morning.
I awoke with Megan at 6:30 am and started my day as normal. Sitting on the couch putting together a packing plan for the baby birth at 7:30am Megan called for me to come upstairs. She says, “I think my water just broke.” If you could have seen the blank stare on my face, not to mention all the things that ran through my head in less than one second. I switched into high-speed packing mode. Megan called the hospital which was 1 hour 20 minutes away.
Not only did I not have my stuff packed but I needed to pack for the dogs too. Megan had her stuff almost ready and the baby things were ready too. By 8:00 am the car was warm, packed, and ready to roll. We were on the road to the kennel calling Carla to be prepared for the crazy doggies. A quick drop off and back on the road to Petoskey ~ Northern Michigan Hospital Emergency.
When we first arrived they had Megan in a wheelchair, she was laughing and nurses were commenting that she must not be too far in labor. In fact, she didn’t start active labor until almost 6pm. It would be a LONG day and night with the baby being born at 5:17 am on February 26, 2010. Julia was 6.5 pounds and 19 inches long. She is beautiful, healthy, and our first adorable child.
Megan is doing great recovering. It looks like we will be heading home today, about 36 hours after the birth.
You can watch the blog and see LOTS of images of Baby Julie or “Jules” for the rest of her life. Get ready to be in front of the lens ALOT baby. We love you more than anything and we can’t wait to raise you and be a part of your life!
Do you sometimes wonder how Professional Photographers get so many awesome images of a bride and groom during a Wedding day? Well, the answer is typically in the fact that the Wedding Photographer is doing images before and after the day of the Wedding. Photographers like to call these sessions all sorts of things like bridal portrait, trash the dress, fash the dress, Pre-Wedding something, post-Wedding something…
You should consider doing a Photography Session before and/or after your Wedding day and here is why. Think about how rushed you are going to be during your Wedding day. Even if you plan hours of Wedding Photography things will typically happen and you will have less time than you thought. Planning a ton of images on your Wedding day puts everyone in a reserved mood. You want to make it easy for you, your family, and guests. This is a celebration, not a photo shoot!
There are many places that you can imagine around your Wedding location that are just rad. Why not take advantage of the areas before or after your Wedding day. Before your Wedding you need to be very careful of your dress but after the day you can be a bit more daring. You don’t have to “trash the dress” but how about “fash the dress” where you go out and just get some fabulous images in your Wedding Dress that you could never have taken the day of your Wedding. I have done lots of “Fash the Dress” sessions and some “Trash the Dress” sessions. The results are extraordinary!
My Wedding do not include many of these pre and post-Wedding sessions. I wish that every Wedding would have these because the images are fabulous! My brides and grooms typically will use these images in an album or make a separate album of these images. The sessions are fun, no stress, and you can really add your own personal style and touch. Most of the images that you see in magazines were not captured on the Wedding Day.
Trash the Dress, Fash the Dress, Pre/Post Session, Bridal Sessions
Whatever you call them just do it and you will be so happy when you look back at what you can achieve from a short fabulous session. You just may see your images gracing the cover of a bridal magazine in your area.
Consider these locations for your Trash the Dress, Fash the Dress ~ Mackinac Island, Inn at Bay Harbor, Traverse City, Petoskey, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Lake Michigan, Lake Huron, Lake Superior, Pictured Rocks, Drummond Island, destinations, Bahamas, Central America, South America, Key West, Fiji, South Pacific, Hawaii, Maui, Kauai, iceland, alaska, Upper Michigan, Northern Michigan, Bay Harbor, Grand Traverse, Resorts, Sandals, Greece, Italy, Spain, Ireland, Bora Bora, Michigan, carnivals, airports, fairs, graffiti, snow, ice, carriage, sled, harbor springs, leland, winery, leelanua, suttons bay, Glen Arbor, Castle Farms, The Homestead, Elberta Life Saving Station, Frankfort, Ludington, Pentwater, Grand Haven, Tawas City, Presque Isle, Lighthouse Point, Cabo, Marquette, Madison, Door County, Chicago, University of Michigan, Michigan State, College campuses, cemeteries(lots of old trees), lighthouse, pets, beach, underwater, boats, sand, farms, fields, and any location where you think you shouldn’t have images.
