September 2012 Brides and Grooms

LouisaMay_3

Hi everyone, sorry I've been away so long. We still haven't settled on a date yet because we still can't tell anyone! However, we have decided on a venue for the reception. We will be having a ceildh at my uncle's barn. Haven't asked his permission yet, but he'll definitely say yes. As we weren't having a sit down meal anyway, we decided it would be far better to do the catering ourselves and that way we could afford to invite everyone we want, and we can provide alcohol - making it cheap for guests. Also, there is a field next to the barn where people can camp if they want, saving on hotel costs. Most of our family are quite skint, so making it as cheap as possible for them to attend is important to us.

So that does mean I've been able to do a bit more planning. We have an actual guest list now - 150, but that we will let each of our parents invite up to 20 family friends each, so the final number will be more like 200.

I've done a list of alcohol we can provide - we will be paying for wine, beer, champagne for the toasts, vodka and soft drinks. If anyone wants anything else then they will have to sort that out themselves. We can hire glasses for free from waitrose, so I'm allowing for around 10% breakages.

For food we will cook chilli and stew, so guests have a choice. Both can be made the day before and just heated up on the night. My family are farmers, so most of the ingredients will be at farmer's market prices. For dessert I'm undecided whether to buy some cakes from makr0, as I don't want to just serve wedding cake. Alternatively, I might do cheese and biscuits for after the ceildh has finished. With it being at the farm people can stay as late as they want.

I'm also looking at doing party bags for the kids (there will be about 20 - 30 under 10s). I think I can do that for around £5 per child, and it will be a nice touch as it is going to be a long day for them.

I think that's all I can do for now, will hopefully be telling people and making final arrangements in the next couple of weeks!

White_Sapphire

Welcome back LouisaMay!

Your plans sound great, and impressively MSE! I'd love to go to a wedding like that - can I come???

You must be dying to tell people about it!

x

LouisaMay_3

Thanks, White_Sapphire, I am absolutely dying to tell people, but I do know it is much more important to get the house sorted with his ex first, so that we have somewhere to live after we get married! Also, my sister had her second child on Monday and I really wouldn't want to steal her thunder. (The baby is gorgeous by the way - a little girl and her big brother, aged 4, is really excited and not at all jealous, which is nice.)

My OH last night decided he doesn't want chilli and stew as they are both "too wintery", but on the plus side he reckons if me and my mum / aunts sort out one option his family will sort out the other. Which does spread the work quite a bit.

We are also debating the need for wedding cars. I quite like the idea of my dad driving me to the church in his car, then my OH driving us from there. They both have decent cars, and I want quite a slimline dress.

I'm really amazed cos I always thought I'd be a total bridezilla wanting absolutely everything perfect, but now I'm actually here all I want is a relaxed atmosphere and all our friends and family together. At this rate I reckon we'll have 200 people for less that £7k, and we're even providing the alcohol! That doesn't include honeymoon tho - which my OH is organising and I literally won't know where we're going until I get to the airport.

natc

Hi LouisaMay,

Your plans do sound like they are coming along very well! And your wedding sounds absolutely perfect I would like to come along too! Hehehehe.

x

Starrystarrynight

I haven't been on the thread for ages and it's now 64 pages long!
As we're getting married overseas, there isn't anywhere near as much for me to organise as many of you ladies, but we've booked an officiant and today OH and I have been to sort out his kilt hire! We were worried for a while that it would be too expensive but it turned out not so bad and I'm thrilled as I know how much wearing Highland dress means to him :-)

joanneinwonderland

Hey ladies

Been missing for a while but just been super busy with work and running etc. life has been a bit mad!! Settling down now thankfully had such a nice chilled weekend.

Caught up with you all everything is marching on!! White Sapphire your dress is looking fabbie!!

Catherine and Debbie love the wooden flowers very very nice.

natc looks like you are having a tough time with your dress sorry to hear that hopefully you've had some luck now? It will be out there. Have you had a look at the high street like Debenhams and Monsoon etc? Perhaps they will have some different styles that will help out.

Can you believe it's around the 6 month mark for us all? Very exciting!!

Our invitation bits are all printed and cut bar our inserts. Got the design ready to go just want to be sure of times etc. before I print them all out. Card was free thanks to my aunty who works at the local paper mill so that is fab. Scared to stick it all together in case they unstick before we send them out?! Is that silly?! Planning to get my bridesmaids round in May to assist with that!! Will persuade them with wine and cake!

My whole outfit is purchased!! Dress arrives in May I can hardly wait!!! Head piece was from Glitzy Secrets and is just beautiful!! Got a wee birdcage veil from Lily Bella just the plain one for £15!! Such a bargain!! Wanted the veil and headpiece separate so I can take the veil off and still have a bit of bling.

Bridesmaid's dresses purchased in Debs sale!! Such bargain's and so sweet. Have ended up with 4 due to not being sure of sizes but they were SO cheap and may get little bags made with the 4th or sell it? To get shoes and maybe pashmina's so planning a shopping trip for shoes soon. Quite fancy cream shoes for them really as that will be nice (and my shoes are not cream/ivory etc )

Yet to purchase a kilt...tartan etc. is picked...just waiting for the boy to get his finger out. Trying v. hard not to nag but.....

Seeing the hotel next month to do a whole run through to see if we have missed anything.

Jars and ribbon bought for our sweet jar centre pieces going to start buying up sweets soon to fill them. Sweet bags and personalised stickers bought from ebay to make the sweetie bag favours too chocolate fountain also booked for between ceremony and meal (Mum has mentioned she thinks it is sweet overload....)

Planning a choccie cake from Marks. Got a quote for getting one made and it was just too much for me to be honest.

Mum is making my bouquets with artificial flowers and we have some bling and brooches to put through them too kind of like the keepsake bouquets but mainly flowers with just a few blingy bits. So far they are looking great we're going to get them finished off in the next couple of months. So so special that my Mum has made them for me not a major flower fan so these are perfect.

Band/photog etc. all booked quite early on so they are fine. Got an engagement shoot in May which was included in the package so get to work with him before the day which is good. I cannot tell you how much we are paying as it's really NOT MSE but for us both the photo's are our splash out so we just went for it. Keep thinking I should feel guilty then I look at his website again and think....nah I love him!!!

Just concentrating on saving up the pennies now!! One thing is for sure I am amazed at how much we can actually save when we put our minds to it!! We've kind of made a wee life plan to keep saving like we have been and we can hopefully pull together a nice deposit to buy our home in the country we've wanted for so long!! Closer to reality for that now which is so nice!!!

Minimoon is a week in lake district in a wee cottage in the middle of nowhere. then 2 nights in Newcastle before heading back up the road!! Cannot wait!! Then we are going to plan a Euro trip for next summer to take in a few cities for main honeymoon. Cannot wait!!!

Hope everyone is good and not too stressed out?! Roz saw you were feeling a bitty teary. it's a lot to do and deal with hopefully you are feeling a bit better. I find just forgetting about the wedding for a wee bit and just spending time with the boy doing something else is enough to make me chill out and remember what it's all about.

Lovies to you all ladies!!! xxxxxxxx

neneromanova

Aaaaaaaaaaaan relax. Finally done my invites. All 48 of them. Doesn't sound a lot, but I had to cut each one up and make them myself. Just soooooo happy they're done now. Can't wait to send them and get the replies back

Got my hair and makeup sorted £70 for both Also found the Tiara that I want and will go with my dress

joanneinwonderland

Aw well done are you pleased with them? Piccie of finished articles?! Are you putting RSVP's with them at all? Ah love home made things!!

Where is your tiara from? So many pretty things...I find it so hard to stop looking once I have bought things!!

xx

Starrystarrynight

Reading through this thread has made me think I might have a go at making corsages/button holes and a posy for myself from artificial flowers. I had planned just to find a local florist when we arrive in the States, but I guess that will eat into funds quite a lot, so might have a go myself. I've done a couple of flower arranging classes so gonna put them to use :-)

Everyone seems to have so much organised and so much going on! We need to decide on a park or beach location and book a hotel for our wedding night and get ourselves to the relevant city hall to get a licence. We'll just drive ourselves to the ceremony and already know of a great restaurant where we'll be taking our party, and I think that's about it. Oh yes, I'm still looking for some flat sandals that will go with my dress and I'm going to see about a fascinator - not sure they will suit me as I have short hair.

Scotsbride

everyone has done loads! looking at reception decor ideas came across a second hand book which says how to make your own confetti so might visit the flower market to get some cheap roses/ hydrangers. it takes about 4-6 weeks. it also says how to make buttonholes and garlon to decorate of i will be subsituting the flower/leaves for the ones which are more MSE and fit into my scheme