Today I’m happy to welcome Jamie Reinicke of Jamie Reinicke Photography to the blog. Although Jamie is a local, Charlottesville photographer she recently had the opportunity to travel to Playa del Carmen, Mexico to shoot Eena’s & Thomas’ beachy wedding… one of the perks that photographers sometimes get… I’m jealous! As you will see, beautiful bride Eena, wore a traditional white gown for their ceremony (which she went into the ocean in afterwards)… and changed into colorful Indian attire for the reception… so lovely!

Contact information for Jamie Reinicke Photography:
~ website: www.jamierphotography.com
~ blog: http://jamierphotography.blogspot.com
~ phone: 434-825-2052
~ e-mail: jamie.reinicke@gmail.com

“Bearing and nurturing,
Creating but not owning,
Giving without demanding,
Controlling without authority,
this is love.”

~ Tao Te Ching, Chapter 10 (Taoism)

“If our love is only a will to possess, it is not love. If we only think of ourselves, if we know only our own needs and ignore the needs of the other person, we cannot love.”

~ Thich Nhat Hanh (Zen Buddhist)

“Love never claims, it ever gives; love never suffers, never resents; never revenges itself. Where there is love there is life; hatred leads to destruction.”

~ Mahatma Gandhi

“Do not waste time bothering whether you ‘love’ your neighbor; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone you will presently come to love him.”

~ C.S. Lewis

“You may try a hundred things, but love alone will release you from yourself. So never flee from love–not even from love in an earthly guise–for it is a preparation for the supreme Truth.”

~ Yiddish Saying

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”

~ Rumi (Sufi)

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude.
Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends.

~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a

“From every human being there rises a light that reaches straight to heaven, and when two souls that are destined to be together find each other, the streams of light flow together and a single brighter light goes forth from that united being.”

~ Ba’al Shem Tov (Jewish)

“This world is nothing but a school of love; our relationships with our husband or wife, with our children and parents, with our friends and relatives are the university in which we are meant to learn what love and devotion truly are.”

~ Swami Muktananda (Hindu)

“When two love each other, the very angels leave heaven to visit their home and sing for joy.”

~ Brahman proverb (Hindu)

“You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; and just so, you learn to love by loving. All those who think to learn in any other way deceive themselves.”

~ St. Francis de Sales (Christian)

“You yourself, as much as anybody in the universe, deserve your love and affection.”

~ The Buddha

If you would like to contact Pamela about your wedding date you are welcome to e-mail her at: pamelalepold@verizon.net or give her a call at 703-624-2159.

Today is Thanksgiving and I have been trying to decide how to express my gratefulness for so much love and abundance in my life and in the lives of those I am closest to. Feeling unable to come up with the right words I have decided to share with you a wonderful video narrated by one of my very favorite people on earth: Brother David Steindl-Rast. If you are not aware of Brother David I invite you to google him and learn about his life and work… you will be deeply moved by this man’s journey.

For today, however, I invite you to watch this inspiring video and listen to Brother David’s lovely words. Enjoy!

With Love and Gratitude,
Claire

I know this is a little different from my usual post… but hey, it’s my blog so I can do it!! This may seem a little off topic, but after thinking about it I realized that it really isn’t. I perform a lot of wedding ceremonies for couples who come from differing faith, racial and/or cultural backgrounds. These differences can present unique challenges on many levels when planning a wedding. Sometimes, in fact, when these differences are distressing enough to the couple’s families there can be a huge amount of focus on how best to bridge these apparent disparities and make everyone happy… sometimes it can be done, and sometimes it can’t.

So, today I found this amazing little video on a website called God Bless Humanity that, to me, expresses the oneness that lies at the very heart of these outer differences. If you are planning an Interfaith wedding and are encountering these challenges in your own lives I hope that you will take some inspiration from it. And, if you aren’t planning a wedding at all and just happened by I hope that you will do the same. Here’s the video.

Hindu-Catholic Wedding
Last fall I had the opportunity to officiate at a truly incredible Interfaith wedding: the bride, Sabeena, from a Hindu family and the groom, Patrick, from a Catholic family. Just recently I discovered, that although this wedding was in DC their photographers, Anne and Bill Holland, had been “imported” from lil’ ol’ Charlottesville just as I had.

Sabeena and Patrick’s wedding was one of the most colorful and pageant-filled I’ve had the honor to be a part of. The groom arrived on horseback to the banging of drums and shouts of celebration from the family. Their ceremony incorporated words and rituals from both the Hindu and Catholic traditions with explanations in between so everyone could keep up! On the Hindu side the bride and groom exchanged beautiful flower garlands and took 7 steps (saptapadi) around a homa (sacred fire) as they made their promises to one another. On the Christian side the couple performed a Unity Candle ceremony and everyone enjoyed a beautiful scriptural reading.

I would imagine that for a photographer this kind of wedding would present wonderful artistic opportunities and Bill and Anne Holland of Holland Photo Arts took full advantage of the day! Their pictures of Sabeena and Patrick’s wedding are absolutely spectacular… I hope that you enjoy the 3 I am including in this post. If you are looking for an amazing photograpic duo for your wedding give them a call: 434-295-9681