Patrick reached out to us back 7.5 months ago in January to chat with us about a Family Portrait Session for his parents. His parents had been wed at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart at Notre Dame a whopping 50 years ago in August, so he and his two siblings planned on coming in to South Bend, Indiana to stay on campus at the Morris Inn to celebrate their parents’ momentous 50th Wedding Anniversary! Not only did their parents Mary (‘67 grad) and John (‘66 grad) both attend Notre Dame and get married there in 1969, their son Patrick also went to Notre Dame for University (‘94 grad) as did his brother Kevin (‘97 grad) and Kevin’s wife (‘98 grad) who were also married in the Basilica (‘00 wedding)! To say that this family was one in which the University of Notre Dame words “Tradition” and “Legacy” ring true would be an understatement!
This family came in from far and wide to celebrate their parents’ (& grandparents’) Mary & John’s 50th Wedding Anniversary! Patrick, his husband Richard, & their kids came in from Atlanta, Georgia and brother Kevin, his wife, & their kids came in from New York! They all met up with Mary & John (who came in from Cleveland, Ohio) on Thursday and then sister Elyse, her fiance, & their kids drove in from Cleveland, Ohio on Saturday morning! They planned their Family Portrait Session for Saturday at Notre Dame right before they all headed to the 5 p.m. mass at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart and then had dinner at the Morris Inn on Notre Dame’s campus! Saturdays on campus in summer are a bit crazy since there are most often 4 back-to-back weddings within the Basilica before the 5 p.m. mass, but luckily at their start time of 3:30 p.m. a wedding had finished up at 2 p.m. (with photos outside afterward) and another wedding had started a half hour prior at 3 p.m.
We started their Session at the Golden Dome & Basilica so that when the last wedding let out a half hour later, the bridal party could have their reign of photos by the infamous dome next to the Basilica. It was amazing to get to photograph a whopping 5 family members who graduated from the University of Note Dame and 2 family couples who were even wed at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart!
Equally beautiful was the fact that that everyone was there (literally) because Mary and John met & fell in love at their alma mater Note Dame and then wed 50 years ago on campus at Note Dame’s Basilica in August 1969!
During their Session we captured a few candid photos amidst the formal Family Portraits around campus! We mostly focused on capturing lifelong lasting photographs & memories on campus of this wonderful family before they made their way to Saturday evening mass at the Basilica and dinner at the Morris Inn also on campus.
We hope that you 15 had a great weekend with your immediate family!
Congratulations to Mary & John on your 50th Anniversary! We hope that you all had a beautiful few days at Notre Dame and loved spending time with one another! The legacy you’ve created is beautiful as is your beautiful big family that you’ve created over the past 50 years! We hope that everyone had safe travels back to their home states and that the memories of the wonderful weekend will beautifully live on with these Anniversary Family Portraits!
——- Unrelated: With next week being the end of August, next Wednesday we'll be sharing with you some August wedding anniversaries of some of our past couple clients from the past 10 years! Coming up we also have Malyssa & Dakota’a wedding in Valparaiso as well as Mollie & Bobby’s wedding in South Bend to photograph! We are working on the wedding day schedules and photo plans for these 2 weddings as well as printing photos for our couples’ weddings that already happened this summer, so we have a lot to capture and print before the end of this summer! Check back next Weekly Wednesday for the August wedding anniversaries!!