I knew this year had been an exceptional year, but I didn’t know just how incredible it was until we finished editing this video. All the couples who welcomed us into their hearts and trusted us to capture such an important day in their lives… all I have to say is WOW. We feel so lucky and so blessed that all our couples took a chance on us. We can’t thank you all enough for all your support. Our couples are so sweet and continue to cheer us on as we grow our business.

Loves♥

I know I can’t say it enough but we are so lucky and thankful Jen and Ryan (our first couple as Gator Bride Videography!) took a chance on us and booked us. They put the fire under our butts to research, upgrade our equipment and take wedding videography seriously. Starting Gator Bride Videography is one of the funest (and most stressful) endeavors the Hubs and I have ever taken on. I love that the Hubs and I have found something that we love to do together. I tell you, it’s a blast capturing love with the one you love. :)

Here’s to 2012!

Like Gator Bride Videography on Facebook! Be sure to check out our “behind the lens” album for shots of us in action.

Rob + Heather // Highlight Reel from Gator Bride Videography on Vimeo.

Their wedding was held at Crosswater Hall in Nocatee, FL. Seriously beautiful. We also got to meet the husband and wife team of Wilson Photography (loving all these husband and wife wedding teams!). They were super nice and turned out some beautiful photos of Heather and Rob’s big day.

Gorgeous, right? Another thing I love about checking out the photos of weddings we’ve done is to check and see if we made it into any of them. If we don’t… SUCCESS! We are doing our job at being out of the way, yet capturing every moment. :)

This weekend we are finishing up Brandon and Melissa’s Ocala Wedding highlight reel. Can’t wait to share it with y’all. These two are so freakin’ in love. For reals. It just flows out of their glowing faces. As soon as the hubs finishes up the color correction (didn’t know video had to be color corrected? yeah… takes FOREVER), I’ll have it posted.

This past year has been truly amazing. I absolutely LOVE filming weddings and putting together highlight reels for our clients to share. They are so much fun! I still can’t believe the hubs and I have started our own business. I love it so much! I have to pinch myself to remind myself that “Hey! We are wedding videographers!” So exciting. Thank you all for the support and love through out this past year. It’s incredible. Thank you. :)

Any-who, back to my story… We were getting super excited leading up to Amber and Josh’s wedding. We were soo stoked to be capturing such a sweet couple, who also happen to be Gator fans (win!). I even featured one of their family photo shoots at the UF stadium on the blog. Seriously fabulous shoot… you MUST check it out. I’ll give you a moment to do so…. I’ll just wait right here….

We had so much fun at their wedding. Amber and Josh were so incredibly sweet and even fed us a yummy dinner at their rehearsal. We spent 9 fun hours with this couple and have so much fabulous footage, it was so difficult to edit it down to a mere 5 minutes.

One of my favorite moments in their highlight reel is at the 2:33 mark, when Amber and her daughter, Bailee, are hanging out together. So adorable! At their wedding we also had the chance to try out some new equipment. YAY!! We got to break in our glidecam and indislidermini. They are the ingredients for some serious epic shots. Don’t take my word for it! Check out their highlight reel below.

I love this video. I really do. Is it sad that I watch our client’s highlight reels all the time? Sad.. I know. They just make me so happy!

We also had the chance to work with Matt Whystell and his team at Matt Whystell Photography. Let me tell you… they are AWESOME. Heart them. Seriously heart them and their quirky/fun/peppy/awesome-ness. He’s located in Starke, FL and the mister and I are already scheming reasons to have a shoot done by him. :)

And I’ll end this little post saying that it’s wonderful meeting so many wonderful professionals in the wedding community. Everyone we’ve met have been nothing but kind to us. Even sharing some insight for us into the wedding vendor world, as we are still sorta newbies. We are so thankful.

It’s not like Mr. Knight and I don’t have enough on our plates these days, we just had to add one more video to the mix. This week we received our new indiSLIDERmini in the mail, just in time for our upcoming double wedding weekend (so excited!). We wanted to take some time to become acquainted with our little indiSLIDER and thought filming a little pumpkin carving video would be just the ticket. So, Mr. Knight set me up with my pumpkin and filmed me from a gazillion different angles. Here’s his epic concoction. Enjoy!

I love how our little Gator pumpkin turned out!

It was certainly tough and I was kind of giving myself a hard time for choosing such a ridiculous design to carve into a pumpkin. But, Mr. Knight was fabulous emotional support. He was so funny. He had all these cameras on our back porch to film this. Our neighbors must think we’re crazy (or know that we’re videographers!).

Happy Halloween Gator Lovers!

Aimee and Todd were married at the Marco Beach Ocean Resort, in Marco Island, FL on September 24, 2011.

Their wedding was so beautiful. It was Gator Bride Videography’s first beach wedding and we couldn’t have asked for a better one. The weather was spectacular. All the weather forecasts that pointed to a rainy day were completely wrong! That was such a relief!

Their wedding was held on the beach and the ceremony took place in the Marco Beach Ocean Resort. The venue was absolutely stunning and the crowd as super fun. There was a photo booth, a cupcake wedding cake, and dueling pianos. Speaking of which, the dueling piano team, Catalyst Entertainment Company (Orlando, FL) were out of this world. I don’t think we’ve ever witnessed such a perfect combination of entertainment, professionalism, and interactivity from a wedding DJ/MC/band before. We would highly recommend them to anyone looking to add something special and awesome to their wedding.

Mrs. Gator and I didn’t really know what to expect when we got Marco Island but we were blown away by its character. The island is so beautiful and we love how all these big houses line the main road and are mixed in with the businesses and everything. It seemed like every house on the island was on waterfront property, whether it be on a canal or the ocean itself.

Aimee and Todd, you two were awesome! Y’all are such a sweet couple and we wish you the best of luck in all that life gives!

But, enough of my jibber jabber, check out their highlight reel below!

My favorite part is when Jeff says “Wow” when he sees Amy for the first time. Also, we though it was super cute that Jeff kept saying he wasn’t nervous, when you can clearly see the nervousness in his body language while he was waiting for his Bride to appear. It’s funny how everything just hits you when you’re up at that Alter. I know it did for Mr. Knight and I when we got married. :)

As for an update on Gator Bride Videography, we’ve been booking up like crazy! At the moment, we are only taking 1 Wedding a month (since we have full time jobs), and are just about booked through next Spring. We feel so lucky to have such amazing clients. We can’t wait to capture all their Weddings. Mr. Knight and I also can’t believe how our little company has taken off. We feel so incredibly lucky and blessed. And thank you all for all your support throughout the past year. It’s been wonderful to have such an amazing community of bloggers, friends, readers and family behind us, rooting us on. Heart y’all!

Our next Wedding is in Marco Island (our first destination Wedding!) and we can’t wait. :)

Also, a fun new development, Gator Bride DESIGNS now has a Facebook page! Yay! So head on over and check it out! By far, my favorite part of the new page is the images of Gator Bride DESIGN projects in action! Love it. :)

Gabriel + Marcela // Highlight Reel from Gator Bride Videography on Vimeo.

Vendors:

Sweet Serendipity Photography
The Heritage
Omi’s Elegant Catering
Dream Day Cakes
Gator Bride Videography
If I missed any vendors, please let me know, I’d be happy to add them to the list!

♥

Thank you Gabriel and Marcela for choosing us to capture such an important and memorable day in your lives. We were honored to be there. You both certainly know how to throw a party! Congratulations to the new Mr & Mrs!

If you’re getting married, or know someone who is getting married and don’t have a videographer, be sure to check us out. Also, like us on Facebook to keep tabs on Gator Bride Videography. I love posting images from “behind the lens” and video stills from our past weddings. Our Facebook page is also a great place to see our newest highlight reels and find out about specials/promotions. :)

As for me, I’m off to bed for a very big day tomorrow. I gotta have my beauty sleep. Goodnight  Gators!

Ryan + Jen // Highlight Reel from Gator Bride Videography on Vimeo.

Vendors:
Russell Martin Photography
Celebrations Catering
Genius Entertainment
Gator Bride Videography (hey, that’s us!)

Hey Vendors! If I’m missing any of y’all, please contact me so I can add you to the list!

We had a blast capturing Jen and Ryan’s Wedding day. It was certainly a different feeling to be on the “other side” of a Wedding as a vendor. Russell and Amber of Russell Martin Photography were totally awesome and took us under their wing, giving us advice and were just generally cool people. We left Ryan and Jen’s wedding so amped that we ended up staying up till close to 3 am going through all their footage.

Ryan and Jen, ya’ll are awesome. Thank you so much for allowing us to be a part of such a special day in y’all’s life. We were honored to be there to capture your memories. We hope you have a fabulous honeymoon!

Now, Mr. Knight and I don’t contend to be professionals. We like to say that we aren’t your $10k cinematographers, but we aren’t your Uncle Bob either. We fit nicely somewhere in between the two. If you’re interested in possibly having us capture your Wedding day, you can contact us at gatorbridedesigns[at]gmail.com

Not sure if you can afford us? We pride ourselves on providing affordable, beautiful and creative Wedding videography. No cheesiness here. :) Check out our packages for more information.

What do y’all think of our first Wedding?

I admit. When other bloggers are recapping their weddings and they get to the speeches part, I skip over it. Eek! I can’t believe I typed that out. So embarrassing. But, I’m all about truth up in this bia, so I’ve gotta tell it like it is.

So, I understand if y’all skip over this post, but I promise to include some super cute pictures of Gator Dad (which… most likely only Gator Mom and I will enjoy), and a little video for those who were with us and want to reminisce, and for those who weren’t there and want to see all the love that surrounded our Gator/Knight booty’s on our wedding day. Let’s face it, I would have LOVED to invite all my blog-y buds to our wedding, but Mr. Knight had to cut me off somewhere. ;)

After our first dance, Mr. Knight and I started off by thanking our guests for being apart of this special day in our lives, and that it was ABOUT TIME that Mr. Knight made an honest woman out of me. All these years of cohabitation with no marriage certificate had made my grandmother uncomfortable for long enough.

Fun fact: My grandmother called Mr. Knight my “friend” the 8 years we were dating. As in, “how is your friend?” She didn’t start calling him by his first name till he proposed. Now she calls him my husband. I {heart} old school grandma’s. They are so funny.

Me = honest woman. Thanks hubs!

First up to bat? Sunny MOH! Sunny MOH has known us for years and years. She reminisced about our days in fashion class (high school classes were ridiculous), and how I never stopped talking about Mr. Knight, even though we weren’t dating/talking/seeing each other. I was a crazy stalker, thank goodness Mr. Knight asked me to a movie before I went all psycho on him.

Then we had Little Knight. He gave such a funny and sweet speech. He mentioned how he couldn’t remember his life without me in it (yeah… I was around a lot before Mr. Knight decided to propose), and that since I knew his family’s quirks already, I wouldn’t be scared away. In the end, he made me cry (which I tend to do a lot) by welcoming me officially to the family as the sister he knew he would always have.

Next up was Gator Dad. Gator Dad always knows the right thing to say, and he says it so very well. So, instead of trying to recap his speech, I posted it in video below! Yay for Gator Daddy speech!

Just Mauied :: Father of the Bride Speech from Mrs Gator on Vimeo.

I couldn’t help but get a little teary-eyed. Once again, I’m a sap but I love him and can’t hold it in (plus I look super crazy when I’m trying to hold in tears). ♥ I love how he was impressed with everything Mr. Knight and I can do as a team. It really feels good for all our hard work together to be noticed.It’s really weird, but more and more I’m starting to notice that Mr. Knight is so much like my Dad. I guess there is some truth that some little girls grow up to marry men like their Dad.

I know how difficult it is to speak at someone else’s wedding. I was my best-friend, Seminole Bridesmaid’s, MOH and I remember being incredibly nervous. I knew what I wanted to say. I had typed it out, practiced it multiple times in front of Mr. Knight, but when it came down to that evening I could barely keep myself together as I spoke. I was just filled with so much love for her that I couldn’t contain all my happy tears.

Can’t fake the love between our eyes! Bwahaha. We’re the sisters we never had (she has all brothers, I’m an only child).

I’m pretty sure I cried more at her wedding than at my own wedding! I remember crying for pretty much 20 minutes straight during her ceremony. And I couldn’t even watch her walk down the aisle without breaking down (which I also did at Gator Bridesmaid’s wedding when she walked down the aisle… I’m an equal-opportunity crier). You could have also caught be weeping quietly throughout SunnyMOH’s ceremony.

Anyways…So I know how much work, practice, thought and love went into these speeches and I’m forever thankful. Let me take that back. WE’RE forever thankful. ♥♥♥

What do you think makes the best speeches? Ones that are heartfelt or funny? or both? Have you ever given a speech, what are your tips? I’d love to hear them!

And in case you missed it, this is what’s happened so far:

• We fox trotted through our first dance (and showed y’all our practices + bloopers reel)
• My favorite wedding moment happened
• We had a ceremony confession and finally got married!
• I was late getting my booty to the altar
• Mr. Knight and I were attacked by bubbles
• We had our first look on a bridge
• A special moment with Gator Dad
• We got silly with our iPhones
• The girls and I mastered laughing
• I put on that little white dress
• The boys got full of themselves
• I was hungover while getting our hair did
• We rehearsed with yummy BBQ
• The ladies lunched

All photos by Starks Photography