So, I'm excited to finally be planning our wedding. We've been engaged for five years and we were originally supposed to get married in 2022 but we had a baby and the pandemic that happened nearly simultaneously. We are now actively planning our wedding, we go to sign our contract with the venue this saturday (in three days) and our wedding date is set for November 2025. We have a fairly tight wedding budget. Luckily, we have a very close family member who is gifting us his dj services as a wedding gift and the venue we have chosen has a decor closet so we are anticipating that should help cut some costs. We also have a sister who is a professional wedding photographer who has offered to do our wedding photos for free, as a wedding gift. The issue is this sister is one of my best friends and I want her as a bridesmaid. We LOVE her photography-she does most of our family photos, etc. However, unfortunately human cloning isn't available. Her and I had an idea though, that she could get a nice bridesmaid jumpsuit in the same color as the other bridesmaids, she would still participate in all the normal bridesmaids events (going with me to get my dress, bridal shower, bachelorette party, etc) but she would attend our wedding as the photographer. The only thing I'm curious about has anyone had a "fill in" spot and how did you do this? We jokingly discussed getting a lifesize cutout of her to stand in her spot and the groomsmen my fiance and I talked about pairing her with would carry the lifesize cutout down the aisle with him and place in her spot, etc. But, I wondered if anyone had any other suggestions? If we were to use her photography it would free up wedding expenses for other things like the catering, flowers, cake, etc.
Any advice or suggestions is greatly appreciated.