Wedding in Southern California

Matt & Zhanna

A Message from the Bride

Describe your experience with wedding planning: The biggest piece of advice I'd give a bride-to-be is to try to select vendors with experience at the venue you book - especially your planners.

The pressure to secure a venue and make sure all the vendors we liked were available was very much real.

The most surprises you can avoid on your wedding day, the more seamless the day will be so you can make the best of it!

We started planning a little over a year in advance, securing our venue first, followed by photographer and videographer (Rene Zadori Photography!) then we chose our caterer and our planner.

Describe your experience with finding your wedding gown: I knew I wanted a long sleeved dress, but wanted to give every style a try. I tried on the dress that ended up being "the one" at the first store.

How did you meet? We met by chance at a bar on a random Sunday evening. Matt was out playing billiards, while I was bar hopping with friends making our last stop was where we had our meet cute.

I happened to be sitting in the stool that Matt claimed was his. He sparked up a conversation, then the rest was history.

Describe the moment he proposed: Matt had the proposal planned for months - literally every one of my family and friends knew for over 3 months before the proposal.

It turned into the best day of my life, and it was an easy yes!

We loved everything about our wedding venue, and could not wait to begin designing everything together.

There is so much you can do at Hummingbird Ranch, the options are endless.

What are your favorite moments of your wedding day? The whole day was really the best we could have imagined.

The best part of all was having all of our most important family and friends there in one place to celebrate our love was truly special.

Any advice you have for brides to be? Don't skip out on your pre-wedding/engagement photo session. It's a fun practice of what is to come on the wedding day, without the pressure.

You spend so much of your wedding day taking photos, it's so important to get that opportunity for you to get a sense of how your photographer works and for your photographer to get a preview of you as a couple. Plus you'll learn what your good angles are!

Wedding Reception Design Inspiration: Since it was outdoors, we wanted a garden theme of lots of greenery and different types of blue and pink florals to add color.

We also wanted to incorporate a modern look and did that with the more classic tableware and black chairs as accents.

The With A Flair Events team nailed it with helping this vision come together with our florist and rental companies.

The gloaming sunset gave the whole wedding a romantic ambiance we can’t forget.

The gorgeous, soft color palette we went with was so romantic, and exactly what we envisioned for our reception.

As the sun began to set, we got ready to dance the night away with our best by our side. We will cherish every moment from our wedding day from beginning to end.