Eva & Luis: The Wedding Day

On Saturday, January 9, 2010 I had the absolute pleasure of photographing my wonderful friends' wedding. Eva and Luis are a beautiful couple and their special day was just as amazing as they are. I think there is something absolutely great about mixing cultures and marrying a person with different customs and traditions (I'm in one of those marriages myself, so I know first hand). Eva is a Russian girl and Luis is an American-Colombian guy, and they decided to throw in a little from both cultures which made it a fun, exciting and beautiful wedding!
I arrived there at 9am and we started capturing the day right away. Eva was at a hair salon where Genevieve, a wonderful hair stylist, little by little made our Bride's hair look amazing.

Then it was almost time when the groom was supposed to arrive, so we hurried home to get ready. Her beautiful dress was waiting...

Getting ready and waiting for the groom

One of Russian traditions is to decorate cars with ribbons, flowers and balloons for the wedding. The fun begins when you take this decorated car to the freeway and all the flowers start flying off and into the cars behind you :)

The beautiful bride is ready

Did he make it? Yes!

The groom and his best man arrived with a bunch of goodies that they will need to get the bride.

Now let me tell you some more about one of the traditions of the Russian Wedding. "The ransom of the bride" is a huge part of the wedding. Bride's family and friends hide her somewhere in the house. Before the groom can get to her he has to go through a lot of challenges, answer questions about his bride, and if he fails at any questions - he has to pay the friends and family either with money, or with candy, alcohol or anything he has on him. The groomsman is a huge support, he is the one who carries all the goodies and the one who has to give money to get the bride in case the groom runs out of it! Luis did pretty well in his challenges, now it was time for his family to help out.

The apple had a bunch of toothpicks in it, and all groom's family members and friends had to pass it around and pull toothpicks out one by one. They were looking for a short one which would end the game, but until they found it, with every long toothpick they pulled out of the apple they had to say something nice about the groom. I'm sure he liked this game :)

One of the other challenges was to walk up the stairs and with every step he had to tell us one of the sweet words he would call his future wife. It was very sweet and I liked that one of the words he used was "Evgeniya" - which is her real name, and not a lot of people can pronounce it :)

He finally found her! In the bedroom closet :)

Then it was time for snacks before heading to the ceremony

Eva talking to her Dad on Skype before making this huge step in her life

Here we are - Edwards Mansion in Redlands - just a few short minutes before they become Mr and Mrs Zapata!

It was a beautiful place to get married!

A little touch-up on make-up before she walks down the aisle

Gorgeous bride is ready :)

Groom's and Bride's moms

Luis waiting for his beautiful bride

Alina - cute little flower girl

Here comes the Bride!

The Kiss

Meet Mr and Mrs Zapata!

Celebrate!

While the guests were enjoying themselves I stole the bride and groom to take some photos. Here are some of my favorites...

And they were off to keep celebrating at the Magic Lamp restaurant in Rancho Cucamonga!

The setting at the restaurant was beautiful

First dance as husband and wife

Eva has amazing and talented friends - Valeria is one of them. She is a belly dancer and the President of Valeria Entertainment and has her own school of dance in New York. She put on a whole show for Eva, Luis and all the guests as a special gift for the newlyweds!

Time to cut that beautiful cake!

They were very nice and did not smear the cake over each others faces :) I was really hoping they would though...

The girls didn't seem too eager to get married any time soon...

The guys, however, were a lot more enthusiastic about it!

It was a long and beautiful day. The happy couple was pretty tired by the end of it. But it was absolutely worth it! It was definitely one of the most beautiful and fun weddings I have ever been to! Congratulations to you guys and I wish you many many years of happy life together!