Calamigos Ranch Wedding

When Heather of LVL Weddings & Events sent this Malibu wedding our way, we fell in love with every one of the romantic little details, right down to the gorgeous floral arrangements from Art With Nature Floral Design. Photographer Aaron Young was on hand to capture Michelle and Evan’s big day, and be sure to read on for some wise wedding planning advice from Michelle.

From the bride, Michelle: After getting engaged, we basked in the post-engagement glow for a few months and then gave ourselves almost a year to plan our wedding. Our goals were to have an awesome party that was true to us; in our case, that meant a smaller outdoor California-elegant wedding. The first and best decision we made, besides getting married to each other of course, was to hire a really amazing wedding planner. From there, everything was so much easier because we did not have to reinvent the wheel. Instead of spending endless hours on the internet trying to figure out which vendors could do a good job, we got to focus on all the fun parts, knowing that the less fun stuff was getting taken care of too. Plus, our wedding planner kept us on track time-wise and ultimately saved us a lot of money through connections and ideas.

I was also very lucky to have a fiance (now husband!) who enjoyed the wedding planning too, such that it was a joint project we did together. Of course, there were times it got overwhelming, and so we tried to make sure we had date nights where wedding talk was banned to preserve the sanity — I recommend that. The other thing I’m really glad we did was setting up a honeymoon registry which enabled us to splurge guilt-free on an incredible trip after the wedding.

The wedding weekend itself was incredible. We kicked it off with a delicious food-truck rehearsal dinner party where our many out of town guests from as far as Holland got to know each other. And then the actual wedding day was a most amazing day of love and happiness; that feeling of finally being married to the one you’ve waited all those years for plus being surrounded by so many people who all love and care about you and have come to support you in your marriage — it’s truly the best.

See Also

A Tuscan Inspired Wedding with Pastel Hues at California’s Filoli Gardens

Wedding Vendors (Malibu, CA):

Wedding Planner: Heather of LVL Weddings & Events / Wedding Venue: Calamigos Ranch / Wedding Photographer: Aaron Young / / Wedding Flowers: Art With Nature Floral Design / Rentals: Found Vintage Rentals / Bridesmaids’ Dresses: Weddington Way / Hair and Makeup: Susie Chhuor / Bakery: Vanilla Bake Shop / DJ: Vox DJs / Wedding Invitations: Minted / Fingerprint Tree: Bleu de Toi / Wedding Favors: Beau-Coup / Videographer: Plug Video Productions