Well, the Valentine’s season proved to be busy for us after shooting a couple of weddings this last week.  We shared two fabulous wedding days, with two great couples.  In the midst of all this work and love we wanted stop and congratulate all of you who got engaged too!  Valentine’s is such a fun and romantic time to say “YES” and say “I do” and since we were already a part of a few ” I do’s” we thought we would come up with a little fun for our newly engaged with our Valentine’s Engagement Contest.

We want to thank you for taking the time to participate and telling us your stories.   Congratulations to all of you on your engagements!  We have picked our winner, we would like to send a Big Congrats out to Dana-Beth + Richard who have won our Free Engagement Session by Sipper Photography.

The couples story is below, as I read their story it brought tears to my eyes.  I felt suspense, surprise, love and joy for them!  Most of you know that I am a total sap, a sucker for this love thing!  We loved the story, a helicopter, fireworks… how fun and romantic!  Kudos goes out to Richard for planning such a fabulous night and though you had your time constraints, you kept your cool!  Oh, and Dana-Beth, you asking for the flash light was classic!  A total girl thing!  We loved your story, thank you for sharing it with us!

Our Valentine’s Helicopter Engagement Story!


Too much time…
Our evening began like everyone else, with dinner! We went to our favorite restaurant Roman Cucina, in Sunset Beach. We brought a bottle of wine with us to have at the bar anticipating there would be a long wait, like the previous year on Valentine’s Day, there had been an hour and a half wait. However, this year was a little different… We walked right in and were able to sit down. I was happy because I was hungry, my boyfriend on other hand suddenly had to figure out how to stall for two hours because he had the evening on a timed schedule that I didn’t know about! He asked the waiter to bring out our appetizer and then put our dinner order in to try and drag out dinner, I didn’t think anything of it. We finished our wine with dinner and he said, “now lets go get dessert”!

Not enough time…
We then went to another favorite restaurant of ours, Sparks, in Huntington Beach, for dessert. We never have a wait and always walk right in, even one year when we went there for Valentine’s Day. This year was just a little different… There was a huge wait! My boyfriend was once again getting nervous, but now because there may not be enough time! We went to the bar area and after just a few minutes were able to squeeze into two chairs, get our delicious dessert and glass of port wine. We stayed just long enough to enjoy our dessert and port. On our way home my boyfriend announced that he needed to stop by the house for a moment, but we still had one more place to go. I couldn’t imagine where we were going it was almost 8:30, time for bed soon! The big partiers we are we tend to be in bed by nine.

Perfect Timing…
We left our home in Huntington Beach and within 20 minutes arrived at LA Helicopters at the Long Beach Airport! We boarded our helicopter with pilot Eddie and I was so excited, I have been wanting to go in one for so long, my boyfriend even had brought a long a bottle of champagne for the ride. I still didn’t think anything of it, other than what a perfect romantic Valentine’s gift! We were flying over the Orange County area when we arrived in the Anaheim area and as the helicopter began to hover and the bottle of Champagne was opened the Disneyland fireworks started to go off! I immediately had the biggest smile on my face that they had perfectly planned out with my boyfriend the helicopter route so we could watch the fireworks, he knows they are my favorite thing to watch! While hovering over them for about a minute my boyfriend, said, “Dana-Beth… Dana-Beth…Honey….HONEY”, it took him a minute to get my attention I was in awe of the fireworks! I looked at him and he took out the ring and proposed! I said, “YES!” we kissed, followed by me asking the pilots, “do you guys have a flashlight?”, everyone laughed, I wanted to see the ring and it was very dark up there! After the grand finale of fireworks the pilot flew us to downtown Los Angeles where we flew around LA’s tallest buildings! We landed safely back and ended the night with a drink at the restaurant where we first met! The evening was a dream to come true start to finish! I could not have dreamt of a more perfect Valentine’s.

In Love,
Dana-Beth & Richard

Cheers to Richard + Dana-Beth!  We can’t wait to shoot your engagement session and celebrate this fabulous time with you both!