We are Christian and Lexi, the husband-and-wife team behind Cloud Nine. As a travel-first team, we don't consider ourselves "based" anywhere, but we are frequently between Florida and Texas (when we aren't on the road!).
We met in 2018, at high school in Rapid City, South Dakota. Christian was a senior and Lexi was a junior when they first started dating. Lexi was a cheerleader while Christian was a football player. I know, how "typical" haha. But, we met through Christian's sister, who was also a cheerleader with Lexi. While it was originally just a plan to go to prom together, we immediately bonded over Lexi's extensive knowledge of NFL players (which impressed christian), a love for hibachi, and watching movies together (especially animated films).
We both graduated from college in 2021, which we attended online; both because of COVID and because we had moved to Dallas together a few months before graduation. Shortly after, we got married back in South Dakota in September of 2021. Funny enough, a majority of our time on our honeymoon was spent talking about how fun it would be to become wedding photographers. Temporarily, we would put that dream on hold while we dove headfirst into the corporate world.
We both quickly realized that our dreams of being involved with photography and filmmaking would not be going away. We purchased our first camera and started working as second-shooters/assistants with other wedding photographer and running family photo sessions with families in our neighborhood. We had originally discussed doing "one or two" weddings in year one to get our feet wet, but that ended up turning into 27. We knew from the very first weddings that this is where our hearts wanted us to be. From there, we never looked back and our wedding count is now in the hundreds!
There is even more to the story, which we will likely talk about with you throughout this journey. But for now, let's start by hearing from you!