North Idaho Engagement: Derek & Stephanie
Stephanie is someone I've never really known but always knew existed. What I mean by that is her (much) older brother and I went to school together in high school. He's my friend. We played basketball together. I had the privilege of photographing his wedding (shout out to Tony and Stephanie!) and while I always knew he had a much younger sister, when you're in high school and someone has a three year old baby sister you don't really think much of it. But now that three year old sister is getting married and they thought of me to photograph their wedding and I'm pumped for it! But one thing I loved about this engagement shoot was hearing how these two amazing people met.
They met in high school. Derek said he noticed Stephanie right away in his robotics class, and it wasn't because they were sitting next to each other. In fact, that's the only thing Stephanie really remembers, is that Derek was sitting in the front. Now, this may be the first time they saw each other, but it would be several months before they would really talk.
You see, from that first moment Derek had his eye on Stephanie, she was beautiful, with a great smile and she was absolutely someone he wanted to get to know a little better. So one day he found her on Instagram and sent her a message "hey, aren't you the one in my Robotics class?" - this message she liked, but did not reply to. This did not deter him, and a while later he would send her another message "Hey! Don't you go to my gym?" or something like that. The answer was yes, and the conversation would start from there.
Now I say "conversation" but really it was short little snippets on messaging platforms like Instagram or Snapchat. They would see each other at the gym, and talk for maybe 30 seconds, but they both were clearly liking each other. Even to the point where they would try to time their leaving the gym at the same time, just to talk for those 30 seconds (even if that meant leaving in the middle of a set).
Fast forward over a year and Stephanie would eventually message Derek the question "what are we?" to which Derek replied "I don't think this is going to work"
Yeah.
I was surprised by that one too. Turns out, Derek was kind of crushing on two different girls at the time, and the other one was in his grade. So he chose (and chose poorly). This crushed Stephanie, and ultimately proved to be not what Derek wanted either, as he broke up with her about three weeks in.
After that, Derek and Stephanie would start sending their short messages again, to the point where Derek would finally ask Stephanie out to Ice Cream. A first date. On this date they would get Ice Cream, go on a long walk on Tubbs, have a good long conversation about family's, priorities, and many other things that you miss on Snapchat, and even share in their first kiss.
It wasn't long before they were going out again, this time to the fair. Where they would walk over 20 miles, riding rides, looking at animals, watching the rodeo, and ending the day on the beach by North Idaho College.
This was the day they would decide to be officially boyfriend and girlfriend. This was the day that eventually would change their lives, as they were beginning their run of last-firsts. The last person they will have a first kiss with. The last time they will have a first date. And now, these two are getting married, and I'm excited I get to be there for it.
