You guys, I was editing these photos while also talking with a friend and I kept interrupting our conversation to shout things like “THIS PHOTO IS SO DREAMY!” or “AMEENA AND SAHIR ARE JUST SO SWEET TOGETHER!!” or “OK BUT AMEENA IS ACTUALLY A DISNEY PRINCESS!” And it was in the midst of this incredibly interrupted conversation that I realized I should probably just blog these photos.

Six years ago I photographed my first Indian wedding because Nabila + Aly trusted me to document their multi-day wedding weekend even though I had no experience with Indian weddings before that point. Every single time I get the joy and privilege of documenting another beautiful Indian wedding I always, always think of Nabila and Aly and how thankful I am to them for giving my first “in” into this beautiful world. I’m forever grateful to them. I’ve since photographed seven other Indian/fusion weddings over the years and, while they’re some of my most favorite images I’ve taken (not to mention, clients I’ve had the honor of working with), I’m pretty sure I’ve only blogged two or three of the weddings because if I struggle to narrow down images to a blogpost for a single day wedding then multi-day weddings certainly never get narrowed down enough to make it to a blogpost. SO I’m trying something new! I’m going to (attempt to) blog Ameena + Sahir’s exquisite wedding weekend day by day, as I edit it.

This post is from the first of their wedding events — the Mehndi. This was the most low-key of all the events, mostly henna + mingling with all their family and friends who had come into town for their wedding + sharing delicious food. Something I hadn’t ever seen before and particularly enjoyed was the singing game they played at the end of the evening where Sahir’s friends and family competed against Ameena’s friends and family. The bulk of this post (and the inspiration of all the shouting referenced at the beginning of this spiel) is the portraits we took of Ameena + Sahir together. They hadn’t seen each other for about three weeks leading up to this and had been so busy with all the wedding prep so it was so refreshing to pull them away from everything and everyone and just give them a moment together to breathe deep and just be. Together. It’s one of my favorite things to offer to brides and grooms on their wedding day — moments to steal away from the hustle for even just a few minutes and feel deeply. They actually texted me from their honeymoon to tell me that each time Ameena went to take a photo of Sahir on their travels she instructed him to take a deep breath like I had taught them and it made me smile so huge. One of my biggest goals is to use photography as a tool to help clients be present on their wedding day so I was thrilled to hear Ameena and Sahir were still using what I had taught them even as they travelled around the world.

Ok wow, that’s enough typing, Jillian. On to the photos. Enjoy some of my favorites from Ameena + Sahir’s Mehendi night at Noah’s Event Venue.

 I should be back in the coming weeks with my next post to share their Pithi at the Renaissance Dallas with y’all – YAY!