My wedding day highlights

Truth bomb... I didn't enjoy wedding planning in the slightest.

It was stressful, it was expensive, it was time consuming, and it often felt as if it wasn't worth all the stress just for one day.

However, even though there were times when I couldn't wait for the day to be over, the day itself was perfect. I managed to relax and to enjoy it, and all that meticulous planning and preparation meant that nothing went wrong on the day. 

As it was our fourth wedding anniversary yesterday and I've been looking through our lovely wedding photos, I thought it would be nice if I blogged about some of the things I particularly enjoyed on our wedding day. Some of them are pretty obvious highlights which I knew I'd enjoy, but others took me completely by surprise on the day.

1. Getting ready

I thought the morning of the wedding would be a massive stressfest and that everything would feel really rushed. And what on earth would I do if my wedding dress suddenly didn't fit any more?! Thankfully, it turned out to be a lovely morning with my mother and my bridesmaids. The lady who did my hair and make up was super friendly and put me at ease, and we were all ready and raring to go by the time the cars turned up to take us to the church. And, most importantly, my wedding dress fitted like a glove!

2. Walking down the aisle 

I was partly dreading this part in the run-up to the wedding just in case I tripped over my dress or bawled my eyes out, but I loved walking down the aisle with my dad and seeing all my friends and family waiting for us. Although a few tears did threaten to spill over when I saw everyone staring and grinning at me, I managed to hold it together and didn't end up with make up all over my face.

3. Car journey from the church to the reception 

This was one of the most relaxing parts of our wedding day, and probably the most Neil and I spoke to each other throughout the entire day. The formal part of the day was over, we had the rest of the day to look forward to, and we didn't have to worry about entertaining our guests for this brief period of time. So we sipped champagne, had a chat with the driver and generally just laughed a lot while we got chauffeured to our reception venue in style.

4. First look at our reception venue 

We held our wedding reception at the Copthorne Hotel and I'd put loads of thought in to the colour scheme, the centrepieces and the decorations. I was worried that it would look like a mishmash of slightly different shades of turquoise on the day or that the hotel wouldn't have followed my very precise instructions, but it all looked perfect and just how I wanted it. (It's worth noting that this particular shade of turquoise still gives me a little flutter of stress whenever I see it.)

5. Food! 

I mentioned at the beginning of this post that some of my highlights were obvious... this is one of those obvious ones. I was absolutely STARVING by the time we sat down for our wedding breakfast meal and I couldn't wait to tuck in to the food we'd chosen for the day. All three courses were really good and I also loved our wedding favours from Fabulous Welshcakes. We put on a buffet for our guests later on in the evening so we definitely didn't skimp on food for our big day. I'd been on a strict diet for months before the wedding so I wanted to make sure there was plenty of food available for me on the day!

6. Speeches 

If I'm being completely honest, I was mostly excited about the speeches because I could just sit back and enjoy them rather than having to take part. My dad's 'father of the bride' speech was amazing and lots of people have said it's the best wedding speech they've ever heard. Neil's speech and his best man's speech were also funny and very touching, and it was lovely to see everyone smiling and laughing at all the appropriate moments. I really wish they'd been recorded so that I could watch them back whenever I feel sad.

7. Dancing 

Neil and I were dreading our first dance. We're not really dancing people, and our choice of first dance music meant that people would be staring at us for the entirety of Tangled's 'I see the light'. True to form, we didn't really enjoy the first dance and were glad when it was over, but I really loved dancing more informally to our poptastic playlist later on in the evening. I lost count of how many times the DJ played McFly and S Club 7, and that's always a sign of a good night.

8. Breakfast the next morning 

I know this wasn't strictly part of our wedding day, but it was really nice to eat breakfast with our family and friends the morning after the wedding. It was a lovely way to wind down and to say thankyou and goodbye to everyone properly before they went their separate ways and got scattered across the UK. It was also nice to sit down for some food before starting the stressful job of packing away and transporting all our wedding paraphernalia!



I really can't believe four years have already gone by since our wedding day. I also can't believe this is the first time I've blogged about my wedding day highlights... better late than never. Look out for a post about our fourth wedding anniversary next week!

Favourite wedding suppliers #4 - Shelley Daniel Wedding and Portrait Photography

Whenever anyone visits our house for the first time, they get given something special to look at as soon as they've taken off their coat and sat down... our beautiful wedding photo book. 

We had some friends around last night which reminded me that I still had one wedding supplier to add to my Favourite Wedding Suppliers series. You can read my previous posts in the series on the following links: Issy Boo Cakes, Cardiff Invitations and Flowers with a Twist. I got married nearly 9 months ago so this post is long overdue! 

A photographer is a vital part of every wedding day as they provide the memories you look back on in years to come. With this in mind, I started doing research on photographers very early on in the wedding planning process. While frantically googling 'reasonable wedding photographers', I came across Shelley Daniel's website. Shelley's prices were very affordable compared to some of the extortionate prices I'd seen on the internet and in wedding fayres, and I also discovered that she lived around the corner from the flat I lived in at the time. I sent Shelley a quick email and she suggested that she should come to my flat to have an initial meeting and discussion.

As soon as I met Shelley and saw her beautiful photo books, I knew I wanted her to be our wedding photographer. She was so friendly and efficient, and I was really impressed that the intricate photo books were all part of the package. It was also immediately obvious that there were no sneaky financial add-ons. Shelley's arrangement meant that she'd be with me from 11am on the morning of the wedding until around 8:30pm (after the first dance). She would also provide a CD with all our photos and a 42 page 30x30cm photo book, all for £750. 

Shelley was so organised right from the beginning of the process. She arranged to meet us a few weeks before the wedding at the church then at the Copthorne Hotel to go through what particular photos we wanted, where the best photographic locations were, how many group shots we wanted and so on. This meeting was also included in the £750 price. Shelley gave me a form to fill in with times, venue addresses, exact photo groups and so on... she really made me feel as if I could relinquish all control over to her. This is exactly what a stressed bride needs just weeks before her wedding! 

On the big day, Shelley came to the house at 11am to take a few photos of me getting ready with my bridesmaids. She also meticulously took photographs of my flowers, wedding shoes and jewellery as a nice keepsake and to form the background for some of the pages in our photo book. 

Shelley then left for the church an hour before the service to take photographs of the groom, the best man, the ushers and the guests as they arrived, as well as making sure she was there to capture the moment when my father and I arrived in our car. 

Shelley stayed with me, my father and the bridesmaids in the church entrance for a few minutes to take some more photographs then disappeared into the church ready for our grand entrance. I have no idea where Shelley was standing when she took all the photographs inside the church... she was definitely very discreet as I didn't actually see her at all. She must have been flitting around all over the place as there are some lovely photos of the service itself. 

After the service, we all went outside for masses of group photos. I'd emailed Shelley a detailed list of which groups I wanted, what everyone's names were and so on, and she took charge from there. There were a LOT of groups so Shelley needed to be very patient as well as authoritative! We had a lovely mix of posed shots and 'chatty' photographs which all looked very natural. 

After finishing all the group shots and taking lots of photos of me and Neil on our own, Shelley then followed us to the Copthorne Hotel ready for the wedding breakfast and evening reception. There were lots more photos at the hotel including some with our wedding car, some on the balcony of the hotel, photos of the guests relaxing before the wedding breakfast, then plenty of photos during the wedding speeches. 

Shelley was so patient during the evening reception... she was an absolute star. The timings slipped quite a bit so the first dance ended up being about an hour later than planned. In spite of the delay, Shelley still stayed to take photographs during the first dance as promised.

Lots of the guests commented on how efficient Shelley was and how hard she worked throughout the day. She somehow managed to be everywhere at once and kept smiling throughout the day. I had total confidence that she was capturing all the moments we wanted to cherish. She also photographed all the little details such as our table plan, table centrepieces and welshcake favours... these were all things that were very important to me but I would never had time to get my phone out and photograph them myself. 

A few weeks after our wedding day, Shelley came around to our house to drop off our photo disk. I was so excited... 701 wedding photos! We proceeded to look eagerly through the photos and chose 100 for our photo book as instructed. I think it's safe to say that Neil got bored of looking through the photos quicker than I did. 

I went to collect the photo book from Shelley a few weeks later and I was so pleased with the final result. The book is of such a high quality and the design of each individual page is just exquisite. I could never have produced something this beautiful myself. We also ordered two smaller photo books for both sets of parents for Christmas as our parents were such an important part of our wedding day. We couldn't even have had such a lovely wedding day without their support. I think the photo book is such a nice and emotive thing to show people rather than handing them a bunch of printed photographs or dragging the laptop out. The photo book tells the story of the day so well and I love going back to look through it time and time again. 

I'm so impressed with the vibrancy of the photos and the way everything has been laid out. The colours all work so well together and I love it that all the family photos, photos of friends, photos of just me and Neil, all our pretty locations and the little accessories that made the day so visually pleasing have been included in such an accessible format. 

Here are a few of my favourite pages from the book... 

I think you'll agree that this is a beautiful keepsake from our special day. I can't thank Shelley enough for all the effort she put in before our big day, on the day itself and afterwards to edit our photos and put the book together. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend her fantastic services. I've linked to Shelley's website at the beginning of the post and you can also view her Facebook page here. 

I still maintain that Shelley's biggest achievement was making me look decent in my wedding photographs as I'm the most unphotogenic person in the world... I think she rose to the challenge very well! 

Favourite wedding suppliers #3 - Flowers with a Twist

This is the third blog post in my 'favourite wedding suppliers' series (you can read the first two posts here and here). I'm really enjoying writing these posts as it's a lovely way of reliving the memories from the big day as well as a great opportunity to give something back to my fantastic suppliers.

I started thinking about my wedding flowers very early on in the planning process. I knew from the beginning that I wanted a very simple round bouquet with neutral colours. The cascading bouquets look really beautiful on other (taller) brides but I decided I was too short to get away with one of those... it would have hidden most of my dress! I set up meetings with three florists in early January to discuss my wedding flowers, and this is when I met the lovely Suzi from Flowers with a Twist.

I knew I wanted to go with Flowers with a Twist as soon as I'd sat down with Suzi for five minutes. She was so knowledgeable about what type and size of bouquet I should go for, as well as which flowers would complement my colour scheme. Turquoise was a slightly awkward colour scheme when it came to planning the flowers, seeing as there are no turquoise flowers in existence! I also learnt that there are several different types of roses... that was definitely new to me.

Although I was set on having ivory roses for all the bouquets and buttonholes by this point as I didn't want to add too many colours to the wedding colour pallet, Suzi suggested that I should differentiate my bouquet from the bridesmaids' bouquets by adding a few subtle touches. After seeing a few examples of what I could add to my own bouquet, I decided to go for ivory roses with little turquoise diamantés in my bouquet and smaller ivory rose bouquets for the bridesmaids. I also ordered ivory rose buttonholes for the groom, best man, groomsmen, and immediate family. Suzi suggested that I ordered a fabric buttonhole for my little three year old nephew to make sure it stayed pristine all day, and that I should get magnetic buttonholes for the ladies so that the pin didn't mark their dresses. I would never have thought of either of those factors!

As you can see, the flowers looked really beautiful on the day. They turned up in immaculate condition on the morning of the wedding, 45 minutes ahead of schedule. I definitely wasn't going to have any complaints about items turning up early! The buttonholes were all clearly marked for each person and presented carefully on different pieces of card, not just all together in a box as I'd expected. The ivory roses looked so stunning next to our colour scheme and were a lovely contrast with the bridesmaids' dresses, and the buttonholes were the perfect match for the men's suits. The roses were all so perfectly intricate and I fell in love with them straight away. 

Suzi at Flowers with a Twist was helpful and attentive right from the beginning of the process and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this company to anyone looking for striking wedding flowers and sound advice on the subject. The whole process was very organised (just as I like it if you hadn't already guessed by now), and the final price was extremely reasonable and very competitive. The flowers were all delivered to my front door without a hitch and they stayed fresh all day. Perfect. 

Oh, and in case you're wondering, I didn't follow the tradition of throwing my beautiful bouquet... I was too selfish and wanted to keep it all to myself! 

Favourite wedding suppliers #2 - Cardiff Invitations

Welcome to the second blog post in my 'favourite wedding suppliers' series! You can read the first post on my wedding cake supplier here.

Stationery was an extremely important part of the wedding for me and it was one of the things I enjoyed planning the most as I have an unhealthy love for stationery, proofreading and colour coordination. Although we made a few stationery items ourselves to keep costs down, I knew I definitely wanted beautifully and professionally designed invitations, Order of Service booklets and a table plan. And so the hunt for stationery suppliers began...

I came across Cardiff Invitations' website just after Christmas, a week before I went to a huge wedding fayre in Cardiff Bay's Millennium Centre. I loved their varied and personalised stationery designs and noticed that they were exhibiting at the wedding fayre, so I got in touch to see if I'd be able to chat with them in more detail about our requirements. The lovely Anna got back in touch very quickly and said she'd be happy to speak to us at the upcoming wedding fayre.

When we found Cardiff Invitations' stand and fought past the droves of brides-to-be to speak to Anna, I knew straight away that I'd be happy to work with her and that she'd do a fantastic job. She was friendly, efficient and obviously cared about the little details. Just like me! I needed to be absolutely sure that my stationery was in good hands and I felt confident about Anna's delivery from the beginning. We had a chat about the kind of style and colours we wanted and promptly ordered an invitation sample which arrived a few days later.

The colour of the ribbon was just right for our colour scheme and I loved the delicate fabric on the invitation sleeves along with the little ribbon tab at the top. After making a few amendments to the text which Anna processed quickly and efficiently, we were ready to make our final order. Anna delivered the invitations straight to my front door... that was an exciting morning!

We started discussing our Order of Service booklets a few months later and the same efficient process continued. Sample in the post within a few days, electronic proofs sent back to me within a few hours and a friendly and accommodating service throughout. I really couldn't wait to see the Order of Service booklets as it was so important to me that these were just right.

I definitely wasn't disappointed... just look how beautiful it is! I knew the Order of Service booklets would look amazing as I'd already had the pleasure of receiving my striking invitations a few months earlier, but I was still blown away when Anna delivered these beauties the week before the wedding. They were everything I'd dreamed of.

Last but not least, we needed a lovely table plan for our wedding breakfast. I really wanted something stylish which would go with our centrepieces, table runners, chair covers and so on which was why I decided to get one professionally made rather than trying to attempt it myself. I had to suppress a little squeal when I saw my beautiful table plan for the first time...

It matched the other stationery items perfectly and looked so elegant at our wedding venue. I actually want to display it on one of the walls in my new house because I love it so much!  

It's fair to say that I fell in love with all my wedding stationery as soon as I saw it. I loved the colour, the delicate details, the coordination between all the items and just everything about them. Anna ensured that the whole process was stress-free, and it speaks volumes that the stationery was one of the very few things I wasn't stressed about at all from start to finish. 

Reasonably priced, personalised colours and design, efficient service, quick delivery... why wouldn't you choose Cardiff Invitations to provide your wedding stationery? I urge you to give them a try! 

Wedding countdown

You might have noticed that my blog updates have become less frequent in the last few weeks. This one word explains everything:

WEDDING

Yes, my wedding is creeping ever closer and I've got a never ending list of things to sort out every night. This means I've had to neglect my blog as it's impossible to fit everything in, but hopefully I'll be able to make up for the lack of posts after we come back from honeymoon and things are a bit more relaxed. 

Anyway, as frantic wedding preparations have been stealing me away from my blog and causing quite a lot of stress this week, I thought I'd write a quick blog post on what I'm looking forward to most about the day. It's important to remember that it's supposed to be an exciting and happy day and that no one else will care about the little details as much as I do! More importantly, no one else will even notice if the little things don't go quite right on the day.

And even more importantly... it's so crucial to try to remember that it's my day (and Neil's)!

1. Getting ready
I'm really looking forward to putting my wedding dress on once my hair and make up have been done and I'm wearing all my lovely jewellery and accessories for the occasion. Obviously I've worn the dress quite a few times now for various fittings, but I can't wait to see what it looks like once everything else has been perfected. I'm so glad I decided to ask someone to do my hair and make up for me rather than doing it all myself as it'll take a lot of the stress away on the actual morning of the wedding. I'm not sure why I even considered doing it myself... I'm not even very good at applying my 'everyday' make up and my hair is constantly in a ponytail! 

2. Walking down the aisle

Although I'm an introvert and the shy part of me is dreading having to stand in front of lots of people on my wedding day, I'm genuinely looking forward to walking down the aisle with my dad and seeing everyone's faces as I come in to the church. There's a strong possibility that I'll cry and spoil all my make up... I well up every time I think about it!  

3. Being driven away in a fancy car 

I don't even know what make or model our wedding car is as I know nothing about cars, but I do know that it's beautiful. We also get champagne on our way to the hotel so I'm excited about this... first drink together as a married couple! This might also be one of our only chances to be alone together and to have a quiet chat all day, so I definitely want to make the most of it. 

4. Having all the people I love in one room

This NEVER happens, so I can't wait to have all my family, my uni friends,school friends, other friends, Neil's family and Neil's friends all in the same room. It'll take me a while to get around everyone but it'll be totally worth it. Surely this is the best thing about every wedding?

5. The food 

I don't think anyone will be surprised to see this item on the list. If you are surprised, you must be very new to my blog. I'm on a strict diet at the moment and will probably practically starve myself the week before the wedding, so naturally I can't wait to be able to eat whatever I want! We've got lots of lovely food planned for guests and I intend to eat more than my fair share.


So these are the five things I'm mostly looking forward to about the big day... does anyone have anything to add that I've forgotten about? Please feel free to give me more things to look forward to!

Wedding planning... highlights so far!

I'm getting married at the end of August (eep!) so I've been busy wedding planning since we got engaged last September. Although it can be a very stressful task at times, I have really enjoyed quite a few aspects of the planning.

I thought I'd share some of my favourite wedding planning tasks and tools with you, and I'll also take this opportunity to give you a little insight into what our plans are for the day so far.


1. Wedding cake samples

I think this must be everyone's favourite wedding planning task. I've had one appointment with a cake maker so far and she provided me with the amazing cake samples below. We asked for lemon, chocolate and fruit cake samples, and we also threw in Neopolitan as an outside option as we were allowed to choose up to four samples. Unsurprisingly, we were busy eating cupcakes all weekend. I can't wait for the next wedding cake appointment... I won't even fit into my dress at this rate!

2. Wedding invitations

Regular readers of my blog will already know that I work in communications and am obsessed with proofreading. These two important factors meant that I was in my element when looking at invitation designs and wording. I possibly spent more time than was necessary on this aspect, but the look and general feel of the invitations was very important to me. The lovely (and very efficient) Anna from Cardiff Invitations has designed our invitations for us, and they'll all be sent out within the next few weeks. I won't write a blog post on them until everyone has received them as I don't want to spoil the surprise. They're beautiful!


3. Choosing my dress, shoes and accessories!

I went wedding dress shopping with my mother at the end of January and managed to find a dress on my first outing. I did try on five dresses, but the one I chose really stood out for me. It's quite similar to the dress I've always pictured in my mind for my wedding day, but there are certain aspects to the dress which I would never even have thought of and which make it very unique. I've also bought a few of my accessories for the day, including this amazing bag for the wedding reception! No sneak previews of anything else I'm afraid, you'll have to wait until after the big day.

4. Browsing wedding ideas on Pinterest

I've already blogged about how much I love Pinterest, and it's been invaluable for my wedding planning sessions. It's been really useful to search for colour schemes, ideas for hair and make up, wedding cakes, table centrepieces, flowers and even ideas for our honeymoon. You can browse my 'Weddings' Pinterest board here. Let me know if there are any other wedding-related boards I should be following!


5. Researching colour schemes

This leads on nicely from the last highlight. We toyed with a few different ideas for colour schemes, but have settled on teal/turquoise with ivory. Teal is quite an awkward colour to get right as there are so many different shades, but I think everything will look really warm and pretty on the day as it's such a rich colour. The ivory will complement the main colour really well, and I like the fact that ivory is traditionally a very 'weddingy' colour. I'll be writing a separate blog post on our colour scheme in the next few weeks... watch this space.


6. Choosing items for our gift list

We've just bought our first house so our Debenhams gift list is full of bathroom and kitchen essentials, photo frames, little things for the lounge and just general items to help us with the process of turning our house into a home. I've loved browsing the Debenhams website for ideas and adding things to the list, as this has also involved choosing colour schemes! Unfortunately, I wasn't allowed to add any clothes or jewellery for myself to the wedding gift list.


7. Keeping my wedding planner up to date

I bought a wedding planner at the first available moment after getting engaged, and it's one of my favourite things in the world. It's already chock-a-block with receipts, confirmations, paper samples, flyers and business cards, and I'm busy recording my every move in all the various sections. A decent wedding planner is an absolute must if you're attempting to plan a wedding!

8. Wedding fayres

We've been to two wedding fayres so far this year. One was in the Millennium Centre in Cardiff Bay and the other was in the Copthorne Hotel, our reception venue. The wedding fayre at the Millennium Centre was extremely busy with a lot of pushy 'bridezilla' types, but I did pick up some very useful contacts there such as my florist and the designer for our invitations. We also got to taste lots of wedding cake samples! The fayre at the Copthorne Hotel was much more pleasant and relaxed. We managed to pin down a few more things while we were there as well as having the opportunity to have another look at our reception venue. Wedding fayres can be extremely scary when all the other brides seem to be getting married about 2 years later than you are, but don't be pressured into thinking that you have to sort everything years in advance!


9. Visiting our wedding church 

We're getting married in a lovely church in Penarth and I've really enjoyed going to the morning service every other Sunday for the last few months. Everyone is very friendly, including the Reverend who'll be conducting the wedding service, and it's nice to be welcomed into such an inviting atmosphere. I also love having a good sing song on a Sunday morning!


10. Planning all the food for the day 

Yes, I love food. This isn't a secret. I've loved planning all the food for the day from choosing our menu options for the wedding breakfast, sorting the wedding favours, thinking about flavours for the wedding cake and choosing our options for the evening buffet. I'm hoping I won't be too nervous to eat on the day as we've got some amazing food lined up!


Have you planned a wedding lately? What were your favourite planning aspects?