COVID-19 and Trying to Find a Silver Lining

Wow, what is happening this year? It’s been a trying start to 2020 to say the least. At this point things are starting to open back up and we’re beginning to crawl out of quarantine. So much feels so different. Going out in public seems like a constant game of ‘everything is lava’ and also don’t touch your face. We miss hanging out with friends. We haven’t hugged our parents in months.

And the weddings. That’s been the toughest part. We work in a happy, celebratory industry. It’s always good news and excitement! At least until March 2020. A suddenly full inbox of postponements and potential cancellations. All of May, all of June. In years past, we’ve had the occasional wedding cancelation or date change. But once a year would be considered frequent for us. A dozen at once is heartbreaking. At our core, we’re problem solvers. We make every effort to navigate a tricky timeline, bad weather, challenging creative ideas. But this was one we couldn’t fix. And for some strange reason we felt guilty! What did we do wrong, why can’t we work this issue, what will the couple think of us?! It feels strange even be writing it, but that feeling of guilt is there, hard to shake. We truly feel for our couples going through this. Having it all planned out, ready to go, and then bam, not this month. We feel for our fellow vendors. Our work buddies who make our Saturdays so much more fun. We miss you guys.

2020, you’ve been exhausting, and terrifying. Both personally and as a business. But at the end of it all, we know that if we can come out of this with our health and the health of our family and friends, we’ll be able to call ourselves blessed. And so today I decided to challenged myself. Sit down and find the silver linings. What was made better through all this? Can you find the good?

1) Long Distance Friends

From the beginning, we kept up our social connections through more frequent phone calls and video dates. The one thing we didn’t expect though was how often we would be chatting with our long distance friends. If you’re like us, you can pretty much pick up right where you left off with friends after months of zero communication. But during this, we started playing board games with our friends from all over. It’s become a weekly staple now and is such a nice change of pace. We’ve really come to look forward to them and hope to continue into the future! By the way, if you haven’t played it, Scythe is a fantastic strategy game. And it’s a local STL company!

2) Learning to Cook More

Before all of this, we didn’t really eat out all that much. Maybe a nice dinner after a wedding on Sunday, or the last minute fast food weeknight. Steph is a fantastic cook, the best. We always joke that when we’re old, if Steph dies before me, she’ll have to write down all the recipes that I constantly request, lol! We’ve been grilling religiously through quarantine! So much that Jimmy has finally figured out how to actually make chicken on the grill! Of course we’d rather BBQ with friends and family but cooking together on Sundays has been a fun and relaxing way to start the week.

3) Spending time outside!

Our golden retriever, Bokeh, is tired and just wants to be left alone at this point. JK, she’s a lover and has actually gotten way too used to us being around 24/7. Oh, so spoiled, like most pets probably are right now lol. That being said, we’ve started running together again! Gotta look forward to the little things each day to break the cabin fever right?

4) How Much We Miss Weddings

We expected this to happen, but having weddings taken away made us realize just how much we love them. I can’t tell you how excited we are to walk into that bridal suite in the morning to meet the wedding party. How excited we are to have those nervous butterflies minutes before the ceremony making sure all our equipment is staged and ready. Being at the reception when the dance floor finally opens up and the party really gets going. Wedding chicken! Ohh just to have wedding chicken again! We miss it all so much and can’t wait to get back to that feeling of celebrating and documenting a wedding day.

With Love - Jimmy + Steph

Captured in Frames // St Louis Wedding Videography

Our Favorite Wedding Moments

We all have that one moment at a wedding that we can’t wait to see. For some, it’s when the couple sees each other for the first time. For others, it’s the first dance. Watch below to see what some of our favorite moments are!

How do we document these moments without having to re-stage them?

Captured in Frames - St Louis Wedding Videography

Love in the Time of COVID-19

Discover & share this Dwayne Johnson GIF with everyone you know. GIPHY is how you search, share, discover, and create GIFs.

Phew! It’s been a roller coaster of a week, hasn’t it!? All this talk on COVID-19 has even the most laid back folks a bit on edge. It’s on the news, all over social media, hell it’s even invading our precious memes. With schools closing, concerts and sporting events postponed or cancelled, it’s natural to worry about how this will affect your wedding. 

For our current couples getting married in 2020, it’s raised questions of what happens if their wedding is postponed. First of all, hats off to those couples. For most of them, this is their first time planning an event of such scale. It can be stressful enough planning any wedding, let alone with a pandemic on the list of things to think about.

Not to worry! We have a plan in place should you decide it’s best to postpone or if one of us falls ill before your wedding. Actually, we’ve had this plan in place for a decade and it has happened before! We’ve had to find emergency replacements the morning of a wedding when Steph or Jimmy have fallen ill. Wedding dates have changed due to an illness in the family, a military deployment, and/or a multitude of other reasons. All situations that raised questions similar to this pandemic and all with positive outcomes! [If you are a current couple who booked us May, June, July, or August you should have received an email from us laying out our advice and plan should this pandemic continue. If you haven’t received that email, get a hold of us via phone or email.]

For those recently engaged or planning weddings later in the year, it’s raised a lot of uncertainty and likely put your planning on pause to some degree. We understand your concerns but want to reassure you that this is a time to keep planning! Ask hard questions when you’re talking with different vendors. Understand their contract!  

Now let’s look at some thoughts on navigating COVID-19 in 2020 and how to prepare for these (and other!) unique situations.

• FIRST AND FOREMOST! Remember that you are with the one you love! This is such a special time in your lives. You are getting married, and that’s something to celebrate! No virus should take that away from you!

• Don’t panic. It’s easy to get overwhelmed and let the panic sink in. Don’t. Look at the issue with logic and pace. Focus on what you can control and let go of what you can’t. Guess what, it might rain at your wedding. We’ll move inside! A loved one may not be able to attend, COVID-19 or not. Live stream them in to watch! At the end of the day, you will still get married! You will still have fun! It will still be a beautiful moment in your life and one hell of a party that night!

• Video + Photo is more important now than ever. Unfortunately, sometimes it takes a moment of clarity like this to understand just how important our memories are. We worry about the health of our loved ones or that they won’t be able to attend our wedding for their own safety. A rockstar video + photo team is your next best option to share this moment in your life with them. They’ll hear your vows, toasts, see the laughter and tears. In the months after your wedding, you’ll be able to sit down with them, have a watch party, and celebrate your day all over again.

• Consider hiring a planner. Wedding planners are a force of nature with a wealth of knowledge that simply can’t be matched. They understand EVERY aspect of wedding planning, from banquet orders to lighting. Their connections and networking are invaluable in planning a wedding, especially when we need to problem-solve and change plans. 

• Keep planning! Now is as good a time as any to plan, if not better! Many of us are going to have more at-home time over the next couple of weeks with offices working remotely and evening events cancelled. Take advantage of that and continue planning, whatever stage in the process you are! Look at your wedding to-do list and keep scheduling calls with vendors to learn about their style, process, and pricing. We understand your uncertainty right now financial or otherwise, but you should NEVER feel pressured to book. But now IS the time to ask hard questions and understand how vendors handle difficult situations. Talk to us! Even if you’re not engaged but just want to start thinking about your future wedding and better understand the industry. We’re here to help! And let’s be honest, the social interaction will benefit both of us!

• TRUST YOUR VENDORS! Not to toot our own horn, but you’ve assembled an Avengers team of incredibly talented and resilient vendors. COVID-19 is a new challenge for us all but don’t forget what us vendors have seen in the past. Mississippi flooding, tornadoes, power outages, heatwaves, panic attacks, your drunk uncle! Have faith in your vendors and trust their counsel. One of our favorite parts of a wedding day is the camaraderie of working with other vendors and helping them out in whatever way we can to go above and beyond for our couples. Our industry is not as competitive as you might think. We’re all in this together, more now than ever! This too will pass and your wedding will be a freakin’ blast! 

Things are kind of crazy in the world right now but as long as you’re still getting married, we’ve got your back! Wash your hands and a digital fist bump to all of you awesome people!

With Love - Jimmy + Steph

Captured in Frames // St Louis Wedding Videography