Our Less Than $50 Styled Bridal Session | Foley, AL Wedding Photographer

For awhile I shot a couple of weddings a month and had a robust portfolio. Then I took a break and didn't do weddings or sessions at all except for personal projects. I used this personal projects to slow down and really work on the direction I wanted to grow my skills. The last year I have started taking on work focusing on boudoir and then back into children and family photography. The time has come however that I am ready to start accepting wedding clients again however my work and style has changed so much that I feel like I need to rebuild my portfolio. So I did it in the truest Leslie fashion possible. I planned and DIYed a small styled session and asked the gorgeous Morgan to model for me! Did you guys know that you can book Morgan as your MUAH artist for your sessions? Awesome right? She also does Microblading and eyelash extensions and is crazy talented. Ok back to how I designed this super affordable styled session.

First I ordered this $20 dress on Ebay. I ordered in in a large because it was coming from China... and good thing I did because as you see... it is definitely not a large. Keep scrolling to learn about the bouquet.

For the bouquet I headed to Winn Dixie to see what flowers were available. I did not have a vision for this before hand because you just kinda have to get what you can get when you go so I didn't want to be disappointed. Lucky for me they had these beautiful romantic pink spray roses. I didn't want the bouquet to be too formal, I wanted it to have that wispy vibe. So for the greenery I went around my yard clipping pieces off my plants. There is a little river birch, weeping willow and some other shrub in there that I can not remember the name. I think it worked! I also made a little matching floral comb. I did not know what I was doing exactly and it definitely was not perfect but it turned out pretty.

We had originally planned on a sunrise shoot but the forecast was calling for rain. So we said sunset because it had changed to clear up by then. Then today came and we woke up this morning and it was sunny and it was calling for rain around evening time. So around 11 I was like hey I can do this whenever you can and she tells me she is getting ready now! So we just went for it. It was so gorgeous. It rained right before I left the house and then we had plenty of time until the next shower. Sometimes things just work out.

The next set in this series were a lot of fun. We stopped by the Copper Kettle Tea Bar to take some pictures and get some delicious iced tea. I got the Pomegranate Ginger Pear... so good. It was so fun to see everyone's reactions and to explain that Morgan as beautiful as she was was not in fact getting married today, because she is already happily married! There were a lot of neat places inside and out to snap a few pictures. The swing and bike were just great.

The bridal fun continued on the pedestrian bridge. A gentleman shouted from his car "DON'T DO IT!" By this time our luck was starting to run out with the rain and the clouds were really rolling in. We quickly snapped a few more and wrapped it up, otherwise we would have probably spent the afternoon walking all over downtown Foley.

I had plenty of flowers left over from the bouquet and I feel like every bridal story should have cake. Sooo after the session I went to Walmart and got a boxed cake mix. I can not bake cakes from scratch. I tried to ice it the best I could as quickly as I could as it was getting later in the day and I wanted to make sure I had the day light to take pictures. So I knew my icing job was not the best, I let the flower disguise it. My niece helped me bake and decorate it so today really was a good day full of laughter with friends and family and lots of great photography.

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