Bailey & Jakia Demotte - a Chase Lake Elopement


Bailey & Jakia met in 7th grade but they did not start dating until August 2019, the beginning of their senior year. Jakia is in the military so after they graduated he was off to boot camp. Their communication was very limited; but one night on FaceTime Jakia asked Bailey to marry him. She obviously said yes and actually got to pick out her own ring! What a deal.


Planning a wedding while your significant other is unable to answer texts or phone calls about the little details is extremely tough. I truthfully don't know how they were able to pull it off. Their plans went from a bigger wedding, to an elopement, to an intimate wedding, and finally to planning on eloping with just family. However, the military had other plans and changed the date that Jakia would be arriving home. Ugh! Ultimately, we set a few dates because we were unsure what would happen.


Jakia was able to confirm when he would be home about 2 weeks before but they realized that they didn't want to elope because it was unrealistic to find someone who could marry them in just two short weeks. They decided to get married at the courthouse and to do an adventurous elopement style session to celebrate their unity.


Bailey and I worked together with my second shooter to plan an adventurous elopement styled session to celebrate their love story. We were going to use a friend's farm to host their elopement BUT we wanted to have snow. We had a pretty hefty snowfall a week before but by the time Saturday rolled around it melted away. Last minute on Saturday night I texted Bailey and suggested that the next day we go to the Priest Lake Wilderness, which is actually where I took her senior photos, and she was all in. We found a totally untouched backroad and ventured down it to take some woodsy and snowy bridals. The two were all laughs and kisses.


We ended at Chase Lake where Bailey's family met us to take some family photos and pop some champagne. Chase Lake was totally secluded and we were the only ones there. It was perfect.


I highly recommend Chase Lake to anyone who is looking to elope somewhere secluded in the Priest Lake area.