Actually, I’ve bought quite a few things for the wedding from ebay, including my bridesmaids’ dresses.

And when it came to my wedding dress, I really liked the idea of a second-hand dress – either from a charity shop, from ebay, from a classified ad site like preloved.co.uk

The Cookout film , or if I was really lucky, Freecycle. But as time ticked on I didn’t find anything suitable and I found something I loved in the sale in my local bridal shop.

I was discussing this with a friend of mine recently, and she was horrified by the idea of buying second-hand wedding goods, particularly a wedding dress. Her argument was: what if the person you were buying it from had got divorced? Surely the dress would then be unlucky?

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Superstition aside, there’s a lot to be said for buying wedding items second-hand, and selling them on or giving them to a charity shop afterwards. Table decorations, veils, dresses, tiaras, and even white umbrellas, are all readily available.

Kate 

In a bid to reduce the amount of resources consumed for our wedding, I’ve been busy making an invitation website, rather than traditional invites. The website will include details about the day, information on local accommodation, and an online form for people to RSVP.

I also wanted to provide a map of key locations such as the church, reception venue, nearest train station and local accommodation, and I’ve found a useful website to help me do this, which I wanted to share with you.

Wedding Mapper lets you create a personalised online wedding map, on which you can pinpoint any locations that you think would be useful to your guests, such as the ceremony and reception venues, hotels, restaurants and bus and train stations. As the site uses Google maps, guests can see where everything is using either the satellite picture, normal road map or a hybrid of the two, which they can move around and zoom in on as normal. Guests can also use the map to get directions between two marked locations, such as from the church to the reception, or from their home to their accommodation.

The site has a sample map so you can get an idea what your map might look like. The basic service is free and it’s easy to use – especially if you’re familiar with using Google maps already.

I hope others find this as useful as I have!
Kate

Sam and I got engaged in June 07 – he proposed on holiday on a small island on the Croatian coast (we’d travelled there in a fairly ethical style – by train via Paris and Venice and then by ferry). When we got home we started planning straight away.

We spent the first couple of weeks scouring Google for suitable wedding venues. We wanted somewhere with a bit of character, that wasn’t too expensive, and that had good environmental policies. Oh, and as we’re both vegetarian, we needed somewhere that either provided good vegetarian catering, or somewhere we could use external caterers. That’s not too much to ask, is it?

Well, we didn’t come up with much. And I have to say it was a bit of a shock to see how much most venues charge for wedding receptions. We were starting to despair when my parents, who are in the midst of setting up a winery in the Cumbrian Pennines, suggested we hold the reception in their barn. They are renovating the barn

themselves – using many green ideas such as sheep’s wool insulation and a woodburner to provide the heating.

They are hoping to open the winery next summer, so the barn should be ready in plenty of time for our wedding in June – fingers crossed!

So that was one problem solved. Now for the catering…

Vegetarian caterers in Cumbria are hard to come by.  Internet searches turned up nothing suitable – we wanted something that was going to show our meat-eater guests how delicious and creative vegetarian food can be, rather than provide the usual vegetarian lasagne or mushroom stroganoff.

Again, my Mum came up with the solution. Through word of mouth, she found a local caterer who, although not vegetarian, was excited about creating a showcase vegetarian buffet. After trying the courgette and mint roulade we knew we’d found our caterer!

We’re six months into our planning now, with six months to go. Still to sort out: music, bride and bridesmaid’s dresses, groom’s suit, honeymoon, flowers, invites, transport, photography and wedding rings. So, not much then…!

Until next time,
Kate

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