Faith & Bobby: An Anniversary Tradition

Some couples celebrate their anniversaries with a dinner, a trip, or a quiet night at home. For Faith and Bobby, it has become an annual tradition to put on their wedding clothes and step in front of the camera together.

They first met a decade ago while Faith was in graduate school and Bobby was applying to medical school. Since then, their lives have taken them through more than a few chapters: medical school, intern year, residency, career changes, three PCS moves, two overseas assignments, buying a home, traveling across four continents, and becoming dog parents. Through all of those changes, they have continued to make time for one another and for this tradition.

Each year, they put on their wedding attire and have another set of photographs taken as an anniversary gift to themselves. Their hope is to eventually have a visual timeline of their relationship, showing how they have changed over the years while also capturing all the ways they have somehow stayed the same. This year brought us to Flossenbürg, where the historic castle ruins and surrounding landscape gave us the perfect setting for another chapter in that collection.

Faith and Bobby were drawn to photographs that felt candid, natural, relaxed, and a little adventurous. Rather than focusing on perfectly posed portraits, we spent the evening exploring, walking, laughing, and letting the setting become part of the story. There is something especially meaningful about photographing a couple who has been together through so many different seasons of life. Anniversary sessions like this are not just about celebrating another year. They are a chance to stop for a moment and recognize everything that has happened since the last set of photographs.

Faith described what she hopes to remember years from now as the fun they had, how blessed their life has been, and, in her words, “how unironically cool we are.” I think that might be the best reason to keep taking photographs together.

Ten years after meeting, Faith and Bobby are still choosing to celebrate their relationship, wherever life happens to take them. From medical school and PCS moves to international travel, new homes, and everyday life with their dogs, their story continues to grow. And someday, when they look back through all of these anniversary photographs together, they will have more than a collection of beautiful portraits. They will have a record of who they were at each stage of their life, what they looked like, where they were, and most importantly, how they loved each other along the way.

I am so grateful they trusted me to add another chapter to that timeline.

• 

• 

•