Surprise Proposal - Galveston, TX

I always read about

people setting up surprise photo sessions for engagements but I never really thought that I would get an opportunity to do something like that. I don't know if that's imposter syndrome or what, but when I opened Ryan's message (that was in my message requests... somewhere I don't check often because it's a bunch of spam) asking if I was available within the week to help him plan a photo session for "family photos" for "Kayce's birthday gift" but really he wanted to pop the question... absofuckinglutely. I would have quit my job to be there. (Just kidding, management, I love you!)

If anybody was a perfect candidate to do a sunrise session, it was Kayce. She never sleeps. I messaged back and told him I would make a vision board for them to look at together with outfit ideas and I asked if there was a good time to get him on the phone without her being around or it being suspicious and told him we'd go over the fine details then. We had to have the whole, "when I prompt you to do THIS, THIS IS WHEN you get down on your knee" talk.

I picked a smaller, more local beach that cars CANNOT park on going towards Jamaica beach and told Ryan to make sure they were there NO LATER than 6:15. Sunrise was at 6:27. The caps lock is critical to emphasize how important these details were. I got there at 5:45 and waited. I saw a hatchback pull up beside me and they all got out, showed me their outfits in person because I had only seen them on a video, and we went over the game plan of family poses and prompts and the expectation from all parties involved.

Ok Wes, that was GREAT! You're free to go play, now!

The cool thing about being a mom is knowing when you're losing a kid's attention span.

Ryan had a whole outfit he wanted to propose in, and I was providing a sexy beach dress for Kayce too, so we broke for an outfit change.

We got back in front of the camera and played around with some candid stuff in the water where I had them picking each other up, dancing, spinning each other around and just having fun so we could ease into to the proposal without it being too obvious.

Oh wait... Ryan had 2 outfits, too.

So he actually had to change again. And I learned that Kayce is actually kind of blind and can't see very well without her glasses... and notice how she isn't wearing them! (Cue laughter)

At this point I was getting nervous and I knew it was like, that super climactic moment before he asked her to marry him and I had to quickly get him in position and her away from him enough to where the shots were dramatic and like, worth the waking up early and almost getting stuck in the sand. They're a fun couple so we went the Dirty Dancing "time of my life" route. We tried it a couple of times before I said, "hey, that was great, let's do that again but Kayce, come over here so I can get a really great frame of you running to him."

Did we nail it?

Another cool thing about being a mom and a photographer is the fact that your hormones are like, way more insane than if you haven't given birth. So imagine me snot nose crying as this was happening because yes. SHE SAID YES Y'ALL!