A Family-Only Redwoods Minimony at Old Mill Park

Family Photos in the Grove at Old Mill Park

After the ceremony, the family moved through the park for portraits, couple photos and family groupings, everyone within a short walk of the amphitheater, the redwoods behind every frame. Cascade Creek runs through the grove, and the park is built around a replica of John Thomas Reed's 1830s sawmill, the first in Marin County, which milled the redwood that helped build early San Francisco.

With ten people, the portraits didn't take long. There was time to stand around in the trees between shots, which is how the day was meant to feel.

Dinner in the Trees

Floodwater Mill Valley handled the catering, a local restaurant a short drive from the park, its food suited to a family table of ten. Dessert came from Oliver’s Market, boxed and waiting alongside the cake. There were toasts, a first dance under the old-growth canopy on a December evening, and a cake to cut, all at the scale of the ten people who mattered most.

A December evening in Old Mill Park has its own character. The canopy pulls the dark in close after sundown, the creek keeps its sound through the trees, and the cold air settles quietly around any group standing out in it. With ten guests, there is no back of the room, everyone is near the front, which meant every toast landed on the people it was meant for and every dance had an audience of faces it could reach. It was the kind of small day that doesn't feel scaled down so much as concentrated: family, the redwoods, and a table with room for everyone who came.