Alan and Heidi Elopements specializes in a fun & low-stress experience combining officiating and photography for elopements and intimate weddings.
As a husband and wife team that have been involved with elopements and weddings for over 15 years, they can help with planning every step of your adventure, from where to stay, complete marriage license information, help you find hair and make up, and finding the perfect adventure spot for your elopement or micro wedding.
Imagine being with the person you love in a stunning location having a fun, romantic and intimate elopement or wedding ceremony. You are surrounded by nature, whether it is the gorgeous sunset with your toes in the sand on a California beach or the majestic Big Bear mountains with a green forest of pine trees and a stunning lake backdrop. Perhaps it is the amazing Joshua Tree National Park with its unique boulders, trees and in springtime, a surprise patch of wildflowers. This is a “no stress” adventure with Alan and Heidi as your guides as well as your internationally award-winning, creative photographer and your amazing ordained wedding officiant.
Heidi will feel like your “cool” aunt and will craft a wonderful, unique, custom ceremony that is not long and boring but fun, romantic and fits the two of you. Alan is like having your favorite uncle that is in charge of creating all of the memories of your day with his "epic realism" style. He is there to document your story, to let you be yourselves and to help you remember just how you felt that day!
We will have an awesome ceremony with just the four of us or with some of your close friends and family. In nature, we will respect the beauty and leave it as we found it. Then you both can have a wonderful, romantic, natural and fun photo shoot with Alan. Even if you’re typically camera shy, Alan is there to help calm your nerves, make you laugh and help you have spectacular photography that you will remember forever.
Alan and Heidi work closely as a team, Heidi reads your ceremony to Alan the night before so he knows where all the good stuff is! Heidi makes sure to get out of the “kiss” picture so you don’t have a weird third head in your photo! They work together seamlessly on the most important day of your lives. The most important gift that Alan and Heidi share with you is their secrets to still being madly in love after almost 21 years together. You would be sharing your day with two people that are best friends, hold hands every day, love nature and want to create a unique and wonderful wedding day just for you.
15 Reviews for Alan and Heidi Elopements
Recommended by 100% of couples
28 User photos
Casandra B. · Married on 04/18/2020
Best day ever!
Absolutely amazing. We got our dream wedding day with these two by our sides. Where do we start. Alan and Heidi have been like true family through planning wedding 1, but when we had to postpone when Covid hit, they were there to reassure us all was okay, helped keep us level headed, and assisted us in the reworking of our ceremony, wedding two! Lol. We ended up getting married in Big Bear. Beautiful place, we didn’t want to leave!
Sent on 10/22/2020
Heidi is lovely, I love how she speaks and she really made the tears fly. The hand fasting was a wonderful addition to our day and now we have an awesome keepsake that means many things to us. Alan is an amazing photographer and is always thinking ten steps ahead. He is fun to be around and easy to chat it up with, and we definitely felt comfortable being ourselves. In turn that means natural, fun, spontaneous, creative photos!!! We love everything he suggests and takes suggestions from us and our families too. He even sent us a little sneak peak from the shoot within hours.
Our families loved them to pieces and were in awe that we found such an amazing duo to help us elope.
They are a wonderful couple and work so well together. We are beyond happy with how our day turned out and we will remember it for all our years.
Thank you for everything!
Juanita K. · Married on 05/01/2021
Awesome team!
We found Heidi and Alan here on wedding wire! From the beginning we connected with them. They were very accommodating and helpful when it came to planning our day. We couldn’t have asked for a better officiant & photographer. They went out of their way to help us plan and stay on track. Both are very sweet and sincere. We can’t say enough amazing things about them. They felt like family on our big day not strangers. They knew the perfect beautiful spot in Big Bear that would be intimate and scenic just like we wanted. Heidi did such an beautiful job officiating our ceremony our family thought we knew her! Alan made us feel comfortable and not camera shy! We truly appreciate the both of you! Love the J family!
Sent on 05/26/2021
Jay E. · Married on 04/26/2021
Heidi and Alan are THEE best!
Given the pandemic, my wife and I wanted to have a small elopement in Big Bear--just the two of us and our dog--but we really didn't know how to go about planning it. Heidi and Alan helped us the whole way through. They were attentive, kind, and warm, on top of being a wealth of knowledge with regards to the logistics. They also managed to be super flexible with us as we navigated uncertain weather. Heidi guided us through a ceremony more beautiful than we ever could've imagined. And even though we wound up changing our location from outdoors to indoors, Alan got dozens of amazing shots that we can share with our family and friends and cherish forever. SO grateful for Uncle Alan and Aunt Heidi!
Sent on 05/30/2021
Team of Alan and Heidi Elopements
Alan Merrigan
Owner and Professional Wedding Photographer
Alan has been photographing weddings throughout Southern California and the US for more than 15 years. He is creative, easy-going, and he’ll feel like a part of your family almost instantly. One of the biggest advantages of having him with you on your wedding day is his ability to be ready before the photo happens, to see the emotions form and capture the happiness of the day – from many different viewpoints.
He’ll be your guide to an amazing experience using beautiful lighting and the scenery to showcase your love. Warm, bright “golden hour” lighting is his favorite and blends perfectly with his light & open style. Alan will let you be you, and let the real moments happen with just a little sprinkling of creativity and direction to make a good picture great!
Heidi Merrigan
Owner and Wedding Officiant/Celebrant
Heidi will feel like your “cool” aunt and will craft a wonderful, unique, custom ceremony that is not long and boring but fun, romantic and fits the two of you. Heidi was born here in Southern California, she has lived all over the country growing up, and worked in Australia for a while. Fun fact – she has never met an animal she didn’t instantly love! She has been in theatre since she was 14 and has done voiceovers for radio and TV, in addition to being a professional writer. Heidi's wedding ceremonies range from romantic, spiritual, interfaith ceremonies, non-religious to mildly religious, vow renewals, and more. You can see more about her at LoveStoryVows.com. She won't do a long and boring ceremony, she will create a ceremony you both love!
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