Vermont Wedding – The Ponds at Bolton Valley – Lauren and Aaron

Over time, our relationship strengthened and we continued to have great adventures together. :This is the story of Lauren and Aaron’s wedding – The Ponds at Bolton Valley Vermont.

In nearly a decade of shooting weddings, I’ve been lucky enough to meet amazing clients.  I met Aaron and Lauren in 2011 at a wedding we were photographing in the Riviera Maya,  just south of Playa del Carmen Mexico.   Tracy and Pete’s wedding was one of those events that wasn’t to be scripted…

I’ve always been a sucker for beautiful love stories.  Love stories that begin with the biggest challenges and some of the most unbelievable hurdles.   For Tracy and Pete, their wedding got cancelled and they were forced to evacuate due to an incoming hurricane.  The hurricane wasn’t a direct hit and turned out we were all able to get together and have a sunrise wedding one of the most amazing groups of people ever.  That is where I met Aaron and Lauren.  They were a young couple in love with a rough road ahead, filled with challenges that would test them. – Matt Adcock

We asked Lauren to reflect on how everything came together:

“Tracy and Pete’s wedding was our very first vacation out of the country. To top it off, we had to evacuate for a hurricane. A sunset wedding became a sunrise wedding and we had the great opportunity to meet the incredibly talented Del Sol team.”

“I had known Tracy and Pete for a few years at that time and Aaron had only interacted with them once or twice. Tracy loved Aaron’s sincerity at their wedding and told me point blank that I was going to marry this man some day. I, the ever skeptic, knew I loved Aaron, but never expected a forever future with him.”

“As the road through life goes, there are always wrong turns and bumps along the way between the smooth stretches. I met Aaron in October of 2010 through an online dating site just 1 month before I was already slated to move out of our home state of New Jersey. We had an epic first date and I really did not expect anything serious to come of it. Aaron first surprised me by proposing we make an attempt at a long distance relationship. So we drove thousands of miles back and forth from NJ to Massachusetts (MA).”

“We shared countless laughs, deep moments and so much fun together in a very short time dating.”

“And as it so happened, Aaron lost his job in NJ after a year of long distance dating. He then had to find a new job and his second big surprise was that he was looking for jobs close to me! He found one and actually moved up to MA. Even though I was quite comfortable living on my own, Aaron and I moved in together when he moved to MA.

“Aaron quickly became “daddy” to my two fur babies, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza (two rambunctious cats). Our relationship strengthened and we continued to have great adventures together.”

“In 2013, I was diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer. Instead of running for the hills, Aaron proposed that we get legally married so I did not have to worry about insurance, medical treatment, payments and the very real fear of losing a partner during one of the most difficult things that life threw at us.

“I initially said NO!”

“After initially saying no, he convinced me that he was already planning on asking me to marry him, but the diagnosis expedited things.”

“We got married in a secret town hall ceremony to which only our parents knew about. With the wonders of modern technology, his parents and my parents were able to virtually attend (via Skype, etc) because we all lived in different states.”

“Two years out of treatment, my body had been ravaged by surgery, chemo and radiation, but our love and commitment to one another has never faded. Only our immediate family knew we were legally married but we were finally ready to plan our big wedding celebration of love, friends and family!”

“We made two decisions almost immediately, the venue and our photographers. We chose the picturesque Vermont in Autumn and quickly made the decision to contact Del Sol. As we finally made it to our wedding planning stage, every photographer’s portfolio we saw just did not give us the same ‘oh wow’ moment as we had with the Del Sol photos from the Fontaine’s wedding. We reached out to the Del Sol team and told them our love story and were so incredibly excited that they remembered us and were willing and available to take the long trip up north.”

“We revealed to our wedding guests that we were already legally married in our wedding programs.  Ever since our wedding date, we have received some feedback about that.  Some were shocked, but mostly everyone understood our reasoning and saw the practicality and romance of it.  Now the biggest question is, “So, which anniversary do you celebrate?” and we reply “All of them because we have so much to celebrate!”

Matt: Talk to me about why you guys chose The Ponds at Bolton Valley Vermont for your wedding?

“As the only girl in a family with three brothers, I was not the kind of girl who had always dreamt about her wedding details. As I went to college in Boston and had many wonderful experiences in New England, I started to fall in love with the area and the environment around there. All I knew now was that I wanted an Autumn wedding somewhere in New England. Aaron and I both love the outdoors and love trying new things. The venue was catered by a culinary resort so we were both ecstatic to find our natural beauty location and pair it with our favorite foods.”

We asked Lauren and Aaron to share their most memorable moment:

Lauren: “My favorite moment of our wedding day was right after our first look. When Matt and Chris moved the rest of the family off of the dock and told Aaron and I to stand alone, look into each other’s eyes, and share a moment together. Aaron started the conversation, on the verge of tears and said some of the most amazing sentiments that I will never ever forget. The rest of the day was an absolute blur but that moment remains crystal clear.”

“My favorite was standing under the chuppah with Lauren, both of our families standing on either side of us. But they weren’t separated, they were our family.” – Aaron

Aaron: “I was able to look out into the audience to see all the friendly and familiar faces. The sun was setting behind the chuppah and caught the brilliance of color in Lauren’s eyes. I was struck by it and frozen in that wonderful moment.”

Matt: I have been part of so many wedding day stories. I really had a chance to reflect on the importance of seeing families come together.  There was a photo that Aaron and Lauren had on display during the wedding reception that really touched me.   I think it was one of my favorite shots from that era that I’ve seen in my life.

Lauren: In June of 1940, Aaron’s paternal grandparents (Moshe and Miriam) were married in their hometown of the then Nazi-Occupied Beach Resort town of Scheveningen, Netherlands. The photo of his grandmother stepping out of a horse-drawn carriage is beautiful, but holds some dark truths behind it. As a Jewish family, they were forbidden from congregating and from driving motorized vehicles. They used a horse-drawn carriage to get around the motorized vehicle prohibition while having a wedding celebration at all put them at great risk. A year later with a newborn son (Aaron’s uncle), they were forced to escape from their home.

“The photos from that wedding share the resilience and defiance of our ancestors in the name of love, family, and community. They went through great pains to allow us to carry on their legacy. We chose to honor all of the weddings from our past generations because without them, we would not have been there to celebrate our special day.” – Lauren

Vermont Wedding Location: Essex Resort Wedding | The Ponds at Bolton Valley Vermont

Photographers: Matt Adcock and Christopher David

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