Well, it’s now been about 6 weeks since our wedding.

I’ve been meaning to write for ages, and think I may have been putting it off as it is another chapter closed.

No wedding wellies

What can I say?  It was fantastic!  We were charmed by the weather and I think it would have been a very different wedding if it had been raining as much as it has been recently.  As it was, the wedding wellies were not needed.  The campfires were lit every night, and when the caterer got stuck in an awful traffic jam and was 4 hours late, nobody cared and just went swimming or hung out instead.

Morning madness

The morning we left for Devon was quite stressful, as although we had packed most stuff the night before while the kids were asleep, I had to cut the flowers from my garden, then prepare them and fit them in the car… In fact the wellies were used, to keep the alliums upright on the journey!

The traffic was heavy on the way down, and we managed to arrive at the venue about 40 minutes before the first guests – could have done with a little bit longer to settle in.

It continued to be hectic after that for a straight 48 hours! The first thing we saw on our arrival was our wedding tipi surrounded by buttercups – fabulous.  We tried to unpack as the kids raced around the camping field, but kept having to stop to welcome more people arriving.

Here come the guests

Most of our guests arrived on the Friday night and all immediately fell in love with the place.  There were walks in the woods, kids on the swings, a barbecue and fire.  And a very loud horse which neighed all through the night.

Our friend started doing the flowers, and some more fiddled with the speakers and lights and so on, but mainly people hung out and caught up with people they’d not seen for ages.

Luckily for us, our kids were sleeping a little way away with their cousins, which meant we got an extra hour or so in bed – that was a real life saver, as the whole day was extremely busy.

After a cup of coffee (made on our tipi fire!) I suddenly looked at my watch and leapt up.  I was quite stressed for an hour or so, as it seemed that there was so much to do, but once all our friends roused themselves and got to work it was brilliant.  Everyone was buzzing like bees!

The kids were kept entertained by the play area and general freedom to run around, but they all really enjoyed the craft session to make some wands for the procession up to the woods.

Flower power

You may remember from my earlier posts, that the flowers have played quite a big part in my preparations – well they were absolutely fabulous!  My friend, Caroline was amazing and we had flowers everywhere, some brought by family, others by post, and some greenery from the woods.  They truly did look spectacular.  She loved doing them, and several friends helped out too.

And the wedding?

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So, the wedding itself.  I didn’t cry  (at least not till right at the end when giving my speech) but instead smiled and smiled and smiled.  It’s hard to capture it in words, so I thought I’d just put in a few photos…

Katie:

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Congratulations Sam! It sounds like a fantastic day was had by all.

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So, now feeling better and the sun is shining.  Dare I say it, the weather forecast is good (I have been checking about twice a day for the last fortnight, in which time it has been up and down quite a lot).

Lots of last minute things to do.  One of those things is write my speech!  I’m going to give it a go tonight after the kids are in bed and the wine has been opened.

Home-grown flowers

The flowers are the other main thing; you may remember I wrote many months ago that we were trying to grow our own.  Well, a lot of the things I planted have been and gone e.g. the tulips (always a long shot) and camassias.  The alliums are trying to hold on; will the roses and irises be out in time?

But, things have sprung up in my garden that I had forgotten about, such as forget-me-nots and centaurea montana and so I am still hopeful of having a bouquet that I have grown myself.  My friend, who is doing the flowers, has also found Flowers By Clowance – Cornish grown flowers, who do next day delivery, so we are supplementing what we have with some stocks and sweet williams from them.

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Veggie BBQ

Our veggie barbecue the night before the wedding has been causing some consternation amongst some of the guests, who can’t quite contemplate no meat, but hey, I’m sure they’ll live.  We have ended up taking inspiration from our daughter’s school, and allocated various things to people to bring, to feed 6-8 people.  We were worried we might otherwise be inundated with Linda McCartney’s sausages!!

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The rings

The rings have arrived and we are totally in love with them.  I have also ordered a present for our flower-arranger from Les at Hairy Growler too – he is making a flower brooch out of a spoon bowl.

Final touches

I spent about 3 weeks trying to track down some non-brown, slightly prettier recycled serviettes.  I did find some, but you had to order about 3000.  So, we are going for brown.  In they end I thought “Hey, they are just serviettes after all”.

My other recent ethical dilemma has been brown – this time about fake tan!  I don’t wear make-up, but  I was a bit concerned my strapless dress wouldn’t go with the rather nice t-shirt mark I have acquired.  Various friends have been extolling the benefits of fake tans, spray on tans etc, but as much as I researched I couldn’t find anything that wasn’t packed full of chemicals.

Luckily, the weather has changed and I am spending as much time as possible in a strapless sundress.  I have also bought some “body lustre” from B Never Too Busy To Be Beautiful (a sister company of Lush), which has a nice gold sparkle.

Food glorious food

We have found some lovely non-alcoholic bubbly for our pregnant friends – it is sparkling blueberry or raspberry.  (From our local health food shop – the owner told us it is also delicious with vodka…). Our friend who is making the cake is now concerned that cheesecake may not be the best thing in hot weather, so who knows what we might have.  We trust her to make something delicious that we can share with our family and friends.

A nice day for white wellies

Right,  now off to paint my wellies, although, fingers-crossed we won’t need them.  I’m so excited and am now trying to get it into my head that it will all fall into place.

My mantra for the last few days has been “I am a professional co-ordinator” – in my working life and life with 2 small children – and have been whispering this into Graham’s ear in the hope he won’t wake in the night panicking!  So far it’s not been 100% successful…

Will try and write again soon wih some pics!

Sam

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The last few weeks have been very busy, mainly spending money! 

We have had to pay the balance on the venue booking (at the beautiful Middle Coombe Farm), pay out for hiring equipment, and to the caterer.

Recycled rings

More excitingly, we have now got our rings underway.  Les at Hairy Growler jewellery is making our rings – mine out of old silver spoons and Graham’s out of an old silver coin.  We met him at the weekend in Cambridge to sort out the details and walked away absolutely over the moon.  They are totally recycled, one-offs and are going to cost £90 in total.  Les is going to take photos along the way so we will have a record of them being made.

Homemade jewellery

My daughter and I have been on the hunt for a tiara to match her dress, and have decided to make our own.  I’m also planning on making her a matching necklace.  So, we have looked at a couple of websites – jillybeads and tiaramaking.com

and found lots of great beads and accessories.

Child friendly wedding

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You may have spotted from my posts that we have a couple of children already, and one of the reasons we are getting married is for a family celebration; we are not religious, so neither of the kids is christened, but I really think that rituals are important. 

We are having our civil, registered ceremony first, and then having a family celebration under a big oak tree in the woods.  So, how to make the weekend child-friendly yet still as green as possible?

There are 14 kids aged 5 and under…Luckily for us, our venue is fab – our kids are very outdoorsy, and there are fields and woods to play in.  There is also a trampoline and sandpit etc.  It was important to us that people didn’t have to stay offsite, as we have been to weddings before and had to worry about the kids getting tired, leaving early and so on. 

Most of our friends are happy to camp (even with small babies), so that’s worked out well. We are also planning a fireside story telling session, and a morning after disco (so the kids can run off some energy and the parents can sit out their hangovers).

Party bags

My other main task has been thinking how to keep them occupied.  We are having some craft making in the morning – making wands with bells on for a parade up to the tree.  I have also been putting together party bags.  This has been harder to source, as most party bags are full of plastic tat – but the bags I’ve found are paper, and we have some great colouring in binoculars, and little craft sets.  The kids will have these while we eat, so that there is some possibility that the parents will be able to eat in peace.

Food is fairly easy – the caterer is doing pizza, and we have some colourful cups and plates.  We are aiming to eat at 5, as later becomes a nightmare with small kids. I have to get some juice and think about what they are going to drink/snack on at various points in the proceedings.

Finally, because we cannot afford a creche we are having a child curfew of 8.30! Hopefully, we’ll have worn them out by then.

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I’ve been trying to get around to writing about my outfit and those of the rest of the “wedding party” (Partner, 2.5 yr old son and 5.5 year old daughter)…

£10 wedding dress

Yes, that’s right I have bought my wedding dress for £10.  From Ebay.

Now, the last time I wrote I was getting a bit desperate as I couldn’t find anything I liked which I could afford.  If money was no object I would definitely have liked one of the gorgeous dresses by Tara Lynn, but I could never justify spending that sort of money on something that would never be worn again.

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I think I’ve probably always imagined I’d be married in the big meringue, but when it comes down to it, it’ll get put in the loft in a box, once I’ve scraped the mud off (we are getting married on a farm).

Once I’d made that decision, I enlisted some friends to come with me while I tried on cocktail type dresses, just so I could get an idea of what might suit me – my life doesn’t usually involve cocktail parties and so I had no clue.

It was quite surprising to me what did suit (strapless, full skirt types) and once I’d worked that out I kept looking on Ebay, and generally trawled the internet.  I tried on a few nice dresses in Monsoon, and thought I might end up with one of those, but nothing really grabbed me. I was getting a bit despondent.

Anyway, one day I found a “Make me an offer” dress on Ebay.  Description “Vintage rockabilly dress”.  Photo – not great.  I decided to bid £10 and put it in the dressing up box if it wasn’t any good.  But AMAZINGLY not only does it fit like a dream, but it’s quite “weddingy”.  It’s the most uneco mix of polyester and nylon, and is a bizarre colour, but I love it!  I’m afraid that’s all I can say for now, just in case the fiance sees this.

So, after saving loads of money I’ve now spent a vast amount on a necklace and earrings!  I went to the Eco Chic Wedding & Home Show (which was fab!), and what kept playing on my mind was the jewellery by Rosie Weisencrantz.  I tried on about 10 different necklaces, but finally picked one with a butterfly pendant in the middle.

It wasn’t actually that expensive (£150 for both). “Rosie” is lovely and makes her jewellery using pieces of vintage stuff she picks up.  She even gave me a silver sixpence for my shoe!  It’s the sort of thing I can imagine wearing on special occasions, and then handing down to my daughter, Ruby, if she gets married.

Now what the hell sort of shoes am I going to wear….? I’m going to customise a pair of wellies, as part of our ceremony is in the woods, but I definitely need a pair of dancing shoes. No idea what at the mo.

The others

The day my dress came in the post I was feeling really chuffed already (or should I say SMUG…!), as I had just bought Ruby a dress from TKMAXX.  A beautiful lilac bargain, which she absolutely loves – just perfect for a 5 year old girl, with a big floaty skirt, and sparkly butterflies on it. She is chief bridesmaid of course and will have a little posy too.  All the other little girls will be “bridesmaids” too, but wearing whatever they like.

You may have gathered by now, we are not big on “themes”.

My partner says he is going to wear a frock coat (although he has also told me he might wear his cycling lycra…!!!!).  As far as I know though, he has made no moves to get this organised and I am resisting the very strong urge to do it for him.

I had also tasked him with sorting out Heath, our son, as almost the first thing he said when I proposed was “Great – Heath can wear a suit”!  His view is that we have to dress him up as we haven’t got a dog!

Anyway, the more I think about it, the more I think a suit is quite a silly idea for a child who likes rolling in the mud and insists on wearing his bright yellow, thin bee raincoat even if it’s -20 outside.  So, I am taking matters into my own hands…

Sam

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It was so exciting although the rest of the family got a bit bored by us poring over various websites to get ideas.

The plan so far is to use flowers that various members of the family have grown, but I’ve a feeling these will have to be supplemented by some bought in ones.  I spend as much of life outdoors as possible, which generally means my garden so this is a really important part of the planning for me.

Flower power?

As hard as I tried it proved difficult to find things that will be in flower at the end of May – it’s kind of in between Spring and Summer as far as flowers go…  Anyway, we’ll keep our fingers crossed with what we’ve got (late tulips, camassias, alliums, foxgloves if you’re interested).

Our venue will let us use any greenery from the woods, so that’s great.  We are visiting the local town in a few weeks, and are planning on checking out the florists, to see how helpful they are.  I had a look into other ethical flower suppliers, but the costs just added up (Graham said “Do we actually need flowers?”  I said “!!!!!!” I’m beginning to think he doesn’t know me so well after all…).

So, it may be that we end up with a lot of greenery, which is fine with me – I want things as natural as possible, and the place itself was smothered with wild flowers when we visited last year.

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Fair of heart

While we were visiting we took a little walk down to a marina development near them and stumbled across a Fairtrade gift shop.  Valentine’s Day!  How great!  It was full of hearts – some wicker ones and some tin ones, which I snapped up.  We seem to have found ourselves a “theme” without really meaning too.  Decorations are about as far as it will go though.

I have also found the fantastic Eco My Party where I have bought some paper heart garlands and wicker stars.  Check it out!

A DIY wedding

While at my friend’s house, we had a rummage in her workshop (she is an upholsterer) and she gave me some fantastic material offcuts. Another very talented friend is going to make me some bunting, and now I don’t have to buy the material!  It was such a great day!

We did originally think we would make it ourselves, making it very roughly with a staple gun to attach the triangles, but my friend decided she would make it for our wedding present.  (My daughter will  love it in her room afterwards)

Sorry about the proliferation of exclamation marks in this post – I think you can tell how much I am enjoying the DIY. In fact, while walking into work this morning I thought “Hmmm, maybe I should become an ethical wedding planner” – let’s see how I feel when it’s all over.  At the moment my brain is in overdrive and I may have blown a gasket before the big day.

Unfortunately, neither of my lovely friends have offered to make the dress, but I’ll leave that story until another day.

Sam
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I have been checking out the website for about a year now, and with 4 months to go (gulp) I am going to try and let you all know how I’ve been getting on with planning our wedding. I’m pleased to say there’s lots to write, but that does mean I may not get it all down today…

Well, this week we’ve sent our invitations out.  I know there have been ongoing debates in the forum about invitations download Brothers of the Head

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, and we decided to try to do it all online. I was a bit unsure, especially as it’s so nice to get post which isn’t a bill, but we knew that ultimately, they would all end up in the recycling box.

A friend from the USA invited us to their wedding last year and had a website, which I thought was great.  There seems to be tons of places where you can get a free site, but I chose webs.com.  It was incredibly easy!  I couldn’t quite believe it. 

In fact the most difficult part has been working out what to write.  It’s also been a really nice thing for Graham and me to do in the evenings. You can add links to your venue, maps, photos, music (the only bit that doesn’t seem to have worked).

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One of my friends said “So, are you doing fancy online invitations too?”  – aaagghh! I’d originally had in mind that we would just email people with a link to the website, but it seems you can do pretty online invitations too! 

The Moguls film Again, there are loads of sites, but I picked Pingg (mainly because of the designs).  They send them all out for you and you can also choose for them to send printed invitation postcards, or texts, for a small charge. We could also have had our website with them too, but I found that out too late. We’re pretty lucky in that 99% of our guests have internet access.

So all in all, our invitations have cost about £7 -2 printed cards and a fee to have an ad-free website. Hooray!

I hadn’t realised how emotional it would be to hit send and know the invitations had gone.  Suddenly made it all seem very real.  Everyone we’ve spoken to so far has loved the invitiations and website – it has made a couple of them cry.  I’m really pleased we took the time to make it so personal. 

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I’m trying to resist checking my emails at every hour (Pingg emails you when someone RSVPs – it really is a great service).  I am a little concerned some may have ended up in people’s junk filters, so I guess I may need to chase some up at some point.

Over the last few days I have come to realise that the least eco-friendly part of our wedding will be how much time I have spent on this bloody computer, researching options.  Still, seems to be paying off.

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OK, that’s it for today.

Sam
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