[How to] CMW - How to avoid feeling overwhelmed during your wedding planning!

Wedding planning can be such a HUGE deal for brides (and couples, or whoever is doing more of the planning), especially the kinds of wedding I'm involved in (destination weddings, in Thailand) where there can be even more to think about than a regular wedding close to home.

You see, being a young wedding photographer living and working in Thailand, I luckily get to discuss these sorts of things with my brides and industry peers and I've come to realise that wedding planning can actually get really overwhelming, really easily if you're not careful and don't know where to look.   Of course overwhelmed means stressed and stress CAN mean no fun and everyone wants to be the fun, happy and carefree bride!  If you're well organised, can narrow it down, and know what you want your big day to be, I'm sure your wedding day will end up oozing the very air that you dream it will have!

[CMW] My passion...

When I was 15 or 16 or so, I picked up an SLR camera for the first time. It was my sisters'.

All I remember is that it felt good, and I felt passionate about taking photographs. At the time I wasn't any good, of course but I remember this one time when we were out at a party with my dad and a family friend who was into photography gave me some of the first tips which really helped me... "Put your camera into 'M' (or Manual Mode) and don't turn it back"... and I'm so grateful for that because ever since I've had my cameras in 'M' it has pushed me to learn more about photography and improve on my mistakes a lot in the early stages.

[CMW] Hi everyone, I'm Cherry... your wedding or love story photographer in Thailand!

Good afternoon... I decided to join a blogging challenge called the Feel Good Blogging Challenge which will require me to write a post each day for the next 7 days! How exciting!

In this first post I'll be introducing... me! So, here we go!

Hi, I'm Cherry as you might already know :) I'm a photographer based in Thailand on the gorgeous island of Koh Samui (although right now I'm on holiday visiting my family in Australia!), however I LOVE to travel and love it when clients book a destination wedding or love story session anywhere else in Thailand! I live with my boyfriend, Nek (who is in Australia with me right now) and between us both, we own 3 businesses, so it can get a little busy at times ;) I have loved photography since I was young and I wouldn't be happier doing anything else for a living! Wedding days are so much fun and I love spending the time to get to know my clients leading up to their big day so that by the time their wedding day does come around, we're great friends already! 

I started blogging a few months before I had started up my business to get a feel for writing, which is probably about 2 years ago now! I'll let you in on a secret, and that is that I actually used to dislike blogs and was kind of scared to start my own, as I thought they were all just to talk, talk and talk about yourself for others to read... however as soon as I started reading some of the other blogs out there I realised that most blog posts are actually quite informative in which ever topic the writer is writing about, and of course, that blogs are great marketing tools (apparently google loves blog posts!) as well. So I knew having a blog would be a great way to put my work out there for my future clients to see and also for them to get to know me a little as sometimes I mix in some personal blog posts as well about my daily life in Thailand.

[travel] CMW Photography in Australia!! Cairns, Sydney and Melbourne, here we come!

Did you know... CMW Photography is heading to Australia?

I am happy to announce that I'll be offering Love Story Photography sessions in the following locations over these two months!

Cairns - 15th October 

Sydney- 7th November

Melbourne - 17th November

Share blog post with anyone you think might like a Love Story Photography session!

Contact: hello@cherrymayward.com

To past, present, and future clients: you have made my job a dream come true and I can't believe I get to live the life I LOVE in Thailand and be lucky enough to visit my family back in Australia as well! Thank you so much! 

HAPPY TUESDAY!

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[wedding] Sue & Sjaak, Villa Riva, Bang Po Beach, Koh Samui

Sue decided to book me after her friend Rosanne recommended me, so thanks Rosanne! 

When I met Sue before their wedding day, I just fell in love with how friendly, open and chilled out she is... totally my kind of bride!  

With Sjaak (pronounced Jaak) being Dutch, Sue Brittish and them both living in South Africa together you'd wonder how their love story came together... it's a sweet one. They've actually been friends for AGES before they decided to marry one another and merge their lives together :) 

They got (legally) married a few months ago, back in South Africa, and wanted to have more of an informal 'celebration' of their love in front of close friends and family. With some of their closest friends living on Samui, and both Sue and Sjaak loving Thailand,  particularly Samui so much, it made sense to have their wedding celebration here. They rented out Villa Riva for weeks, and had all their guests stay with them in the villa to spend time together before their beautiful wedding day. 

The views from Villa Riva are simply stunning, take a look. 

The girls excitedly got ready together, having their hair and makeup done... :)

[trash the dress] Ashling & Cormac, Chaweng Beach, Koh Samui

The trash the dress option immediately popped out to her, and so she wanter reassurances on how to clean her dress before committing. I sent her a link where a previous bride explained how she cleaned her wedding dress to a sparkling brand new white and Ashling was hooked. I got a yes!

You might remember the gorgeous Ash and her lovely husband (!!) from their beautiful wedding day at Bandara, they were a treat to get to photograph and I had such fun with the bridesmaids and groomsmen!

So we scheduled their trash the dress session for about a week after their wedding day, to be on a lovely spot on Chaweng Beach which Nek and I had been testing out (snorkelling, haha) before hand. This spot, at this time of year has the clearest, cleanest water you ever did see (on Samui), which makes it PERFECT for us to get some lovely shots in the water.

Soo.... without further ado, check out this awesomeness for yourselves!

See what I mean, how beautiful is this spot of beach...?

I suggested to start with we spend some time out of the water first, and I'm so glad we did...

I mean, on the wedding day there's so much hustle and bustle going on, you're always worried about other people, your mum's shoes go missing, your brother-in-law needs to find dad suddenly or whether your niece has eaten her afternoon snack yet... That's why I think it's so important to have a session like this alongside your wedding photography. You two will be much more relaxed and in the moment and really be able to have fun together and just enjoy each other's company... :)

This is one of my favourites!

We had this pup joyfully follow us along during the most part of our session, luckily Nek was with us, helping me carry my bag and camera gear and he helped keep Bob company (that's what we named our little furry friend) and make sure he was out of some of the important pictures.

Damn you Bob, for being too cute! We had to let him in some of the photos... look how adorable he is! He definitely a pro at modelling!

Cor got excited when I said it's time to get in the water and ran off without us haha! Someone was either too hot or was just too eager to get his wife in the water! ;)

Sometimes, I just go silent during our sessions (which scares people into thinking something has gone wrong, on the contrary...), it's usually when I just feel like a moment is too good, too beautiful to spoil with words. Like these...

So, for the other half of our trash the dress session, I decided to give our GoPro a try and get some photos underwater as well. I'm actually really happy with the results, and love these photos!

I've got to admit working with the GoPro take a bit of getting used to but it turned out ok once I got the hang of it! :)

These three, I especially love, so artsy!

YAY!! We did it, all happy and we all survived easily, dress not even dirty, just wet!  Thanks to Nek for taking this happy photo of us :D

Happy SATURDAY and enjoy the weekend, I have a busy one here on beautiful Samui :) 

Let me know what you think in the comments! 

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[honeymoon] Claudia & Danny, The Saraan, Chaweng Noi, Koh Samui

They decided to get some photos on their honeymoon last minute, while they were on Koh Phi Phi just before they came to Samui... and we all agreed it was definitely a good decision to make!

Claudia and Danny were so FUN to photograph, I loved getting to know them a bit during the time we spent together at their hotel and on the beach.

All the way from Canada... they made the most of their honeymoon and traveled to a few different places in Thailand and they loved it.

We started off getting some photos in their sea view villa at their resort by the beach, The Saraan.

They had a private plunge pool between their villa and the sea which looked so inviting... I wanted to jump in haha ;)

Claudia picked some Frangipani from their garden and was smelling it for the first time... now they're both in love with Frangipani :)

On the beach, we had this little boy who followed us for most of the way and was getting in our photos... he wanted us to play soccer with him :)

When Claudia asked me if they should go in the water, I was like.... ummm, YES please!!

So happy to have awesome clients like this!

Hooray! Session completed ;)

Happy Friday!!! I hope you all enjoyed this blog post of Claudia & Danny's honeymoon photos! Let me know in the comments...

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