Cynthia + Doug {Engaged} | Chapel Hill Engagement Portraits

When Cynthia’s mom emailed me about photographing an engagement session for her daughter Cynthia and fiance Doug, I knew the name sounded familiar. Then, after some connecting of dots, we realized that Cynthia and I knew each other from being advisors for the Phi Mu chapter at UNC Chapel Hill. I’d only met Cynthia a few times because she came on the advisory council right as I was about to have Lilly… so I hadn’t had too many chances to get to know her. 

But, nevertheless, I was SO excited that Cynthia’s mom emailed me and honored that she would have me shoot her daughter’s engagement portraits! Cynthia and Doug met in grad school at UNC Chapel Hill and it was pretty much love at first sight.

They started dating, and rather quickly they knew… this was it. This was for real. As we walked around Chapel Hill’s campus taking pictures, I asked them how the whole engagement went down. Doug had a whole elaborate plan… they were going to the beach for a vacation, they were going to go out to a nice restaurant, walk on the beach, and it was going to be so romantic.

But then a huge storm came and ruined their plans… so they ended up having to go home and cancel their trip altogether. Well, that didn’t stop Doug. They got home, and when they were alone after an exhausting weekend, Doug got down on one knee and asked Cynthia to be his bride. Sounds pretty romantic to me.

They’re going to be getting married next year in New Jersey near Cynthia’s hometown. 

Anyway, I had such a great time getting to know Cynthia and Doug. They have such a fun spirit and great senses of humor and totally were game for anything I asked them to do… and they happily put up with my crazy antics and hyperactive personality. Ha!

I thought I’d share just a few of my favorite images from the day.

Cynthia and Doug, thank you so much for asking me to be a part of your engagement! Congratulations!

So romantic. This just felt so dreamy.

This is the both of them laughing at something ridiculous I probably said or did…

Lookin’ good, y’all.

LOVE this one.

The engagement ring was Doug’s grandmother’s ring. How awesome is that?! I LOVE when rings become family heirlooms.

So, there was this tree that had a bunch of names carved into it… and we tried to carve their initials into it… but it turned out to be WAY more difficult than I originally envisioned it. So, at least we can say we tried.

SO FUN.

Love these two!

Congratulations, Cynthia and Doug!