Male and Female Black and Yellow Garden Spider or Writing Spider

Description:

3 inches at its longest. The web is on the corner of an alcove of a front door. There is a smaller spider on the web as well (male), but pretty far away from the large spider in the middle (female). The legs have yellow bands, and the abdomen has yellow and orange squarish spots or broken bands all over it. The picture with the reddish background was the much smaller spider on the same web. The smaller one is the male. It was 1/2 inch wide and 1 inch long, and had almost nothing to its body. I could see some banding on the legs of the smaller spider I think.

Notes:

My mother was "saving" this spider web from my father's broom handle. It was right outside their front door, and my mother was unwilling to welcome guests with a large spider bite (potential). I am pleading with him to gently remove and relocate it, instead of killing it. This might be the type of spider, Charlotte is based off of in "Charlotte's Web" by E.B.White (and movie).