Full DIY backyard wedding in Pelican Rapids, Minnesota.

Jodi and Zach

We received an email from Jodi a few months before her wedding - she was asking if we would be up for flying to middle of nowhere, Minnesota for their wedding (yes, we are always up for going to the middle of nowhere, anywhere), but what we didn’t know was that this wasn’t just a wedding we were showing up to shoot, it was a wedding that we were included in. It took about 2 minutes for us to connect and we didn’t just find a flow, we instantly became friends. That’s the thing about Jodi & Zach - they open their hearts and welcome you into their space. You can tell they open this space in their hearts for everyone in their lives by how connected their community was. As you’ll read from Jodi later, you’ll see how everyone came together for them - it was an amazing thing to experience. Their friends and family greeted us as if they had known us forever. It’s weddings like this, where the clients are so open and loving that you are allowed the opportunity to document from the perspective of a close friend or family member because it’s not forced & the access was given to us the second they greeted us... with wide open arms.

Here is what the bride had to say…

“Zach and I wanted to get married in the Scottish Highlands and we wanted it to be intimate. We wanted it to be a vacation for everyone in a place that would be unplugged, where we could all break bread together, and experience something uncomfortable and beautiful together.

But we have people in our lives who we LOVE who we know either couldn’t make the trip - ailing grandparents, friends who like us are more in the starving artist than flush with cash category - or by inviting we would soon run out of space in the one house we rented for everyone. That’s the hard part of eloping. So we decided what the heck, let’s party again! And let’s invite everyone!

Now if you know Zach and I you know we have MATRIARCHS as mothers - strong women with strong opinions - who we love dearly. So when we said, it’s probably going to be freezing or raining, we want it to be outside, and we want to do it potluck style because for the last 2 years we’ve been hosting semi regular potluck dinners for friends, they said WAIT WHAT. But we did it anyway. We borrowed a friends’ parents’ farm for a day (thank you Flachs!), we bought some string lights and hung them from the trees, we asked a friend to play music, and another to officiate, and others to bring food (my friend from Minneapolis brought bagels!), and another to start a fire, and well we did it. I did flowers. Zach’s friend Bryan dug up potatoes from the farm and baked about 100 of them, and we collected beer from our friends at Drekker. My friend Randi helped me with setting up some simple furniture. Our friends from Unglued brought giant ass speakers. The only thing we forgot were heat lamps (sorry friends!).

That day, as we were putting up “turn here” signs, our dog Glen ran out into the road and got hit by a car. He miraculously ended up only getting a single scratch, the vet was amazed, but I had a minor panic attack. I thought about canceling the whole thing then and there but Glen seemed fine, our friends took care of him, cleaned his scratch, put him on a comfy sleeping bag, and we met up with Sean and Melanie who we forgot were photographers while we were busy becoming friends.

These two people are the realest. Their lives may look glamorous and perfect, but they have been through it, and have come out the other side making art and jokes and being oh so very refreshingly human. Being photographed as a photographer is such a meta experience because you have a knowledge of what would look good, but you’re also just a nervous human in front of a camera, and then we just got caught up in the fun of it all, and loosened up. A huge thank you goes to these two people for making it fun.

We did repeat vows (not the ones we had written for each other in Scotland), vows we wrote together one day, because that’s what marriage is about, and no matter what kind of celebration your marriage is, we think it should be remembered with vows. Vows that inevitably you’ll break in one way or another, but without which you’d be unmoored. And vows are such a good way to remind others and yourself what makes you human. And what as a human you are truly capable of - love so deep it wrecks the darkness.

And we ate, drank, danced, and sat by the fire as everyone left. Just relishing in it all. That despite it being so freaking cold, people still came to the middle of nowhere Minnesota to be there with us.”

Enjoy the photos…