Things I Regret from My Engagement Photos

I am coming up on my 5th year anniversary with my guy, and I started looking back at some photos from the past few years. I always cringe a little when I look at my engagement photos because I GOOFED a few things up from making me completely love them. Our photographer was fantastic (we ended up hiring her for our wedding and couldn’t be happier), the weather was great, the scenery was incredible. Some of these are completely silly and you may never even dream of doing, but here are the things I regret from my engagement photos:

I did not plan my outfits in a well thought out way

I truthfully think (with the exception of one skirt) I went through my closet the night before and picked some random things that were all totally different. “Ooo, this one is dramatic. Oh – here is a casual jeans outfit. Here is a dress I’ve never worn before, let’s give it a go.” Then my fiance asked what to wear and we kinda just winged it? I wish I would have put more thought into similar color pallets or style beforehand.

I did not wash my hair the day of (and worked out)

I have very THIN hair. If there is any hope to curl it, it must be a little dirty. So of course I taught my spin class, came home and loaded up on dry shampoo and curled my hair. Problem is, my roots were DARK and the rest of my hair was lighter and due to the grease it was just not cute. Way to go, Nicole.

I let someone else do my makeup without seeing their work

I went back and forth on someone else doing my makeup right up about until 2 hours before the photos. I flip-flopped from “I don’t want to splurge on this” to “you get married once, DO IT.” I think I googled ‘makeup artists near me’ and went to the first person available without looking into their work. The result: my eyebrows looked like miniature little hungry caterpillars and I had fake eyelashes that made me tear up for the next 3 hours.

The dreaded spray tan

Don’t. Do. It. It is SO not worth being even a slight tinge orange.

I did not have a shot list or ideas of “must-have” pictures

With Pinterest and Instagram it seems crazy to think that I couldn’t have spent 15 minutes one day tagging a few photos that I would love to get inspiration from for my pictures. I have since created a board for my wedding day to communicate to my photographer ones I would love to try to capture!

At the end of the day, I ended up with some gorgeous photos of me and my person and found our perfect photographer personality match for our wedding. Nothing takes away the special person and moments in my pictures, but if I could do it again I would totally fix my 5 goofs up above to feel and look my best. I hope some of these help – cheers fellow bride!

xoxo

Nicole