The hunt for the perfect kitten heel continues. I admit I haven’t done the sensible thing of heading off to Selfridges, or Bluewater, or Lakeside, or Harrods etc to have a proper hunt for shoes and I will tell you why… I hate shopping. I find shopping stressful, and whenever my dear friend Lynsey suggests a day in London shopping I come over in a cold sweat. I do practically everything online, if it doesn’t fit, I send it back.

Simples!

Also I know if I make a point of going out to find the perfect shoe, I won’t find the perfect shoe. I’ll get the hump and head for a glass of wine and come home feeling woozy and exhausted! Or I will find three pairs of perfect shoes and spend the whole day dithering, unable to make a decision, and head for a glass of wine and come home feeling woozy and.. yeah you get it.

It’s torment trying on all these gorgeous high heels – because I just wouldn’t ever wear them. Ok I admit I wear heels when I am doing the housework sometimes… is that odd? I’m not sure if I should have admitted to that actually – but there is something most uplifting to wearing your gorgeous platforms and blasting out Queen very loudly whilst doing the dusting and vacuming. I sound like a gay man don’t I…?!

So I went to NYC with Mr O, and fell in love with these…..

The lowest heel I could find by Mr Christian Louboutin…. but a hefty price tag. And the gold would really look good with my dress. For the amount of money they cost, I could get a return flight to Australia to visit my best friend.
 
So although I envy a bride who can wear a pair of CL’s on her big day, I think I will pass and follow the advice of some lovely comments on my previous shoe blog, a few of you suggested I try Bespoke Big Day and after looking through for all of..hmmmm five minutes? I found the perfect pair!

*images courtesy of Bespoke Big Day

I got in touch with Rachel, and had a chat about my requirements. It’s so hard for some of us to find the perfect shoe, they’re all either too high, or flat and really not nice, not nice at all! She started up her own company through her own experience of the hunt for gorgeous bridal shoes.

Amen to that!

They’re the perfect height, peep toe (of course), and I am having them in a colour, a bright colour at that. The price tag does reflect the fact you’re having bespoke shoes made, but I must admit after looking at other bespoke shoe websites I found they were the best deal, and the service is really personal and friendly. They only take about 8 weeks to be made and shipped… I am so excited to see them it’s going to take all the strength I have not to wear them whilst hoovering!

Love
Jenny x

I’m finding with planning a wedding, that if something really doesn’t make your heart leap, than it’s not worth it. I’ve had feelings like this about a few things (as you well know) and about my dress too, but that’s a whole other story.

I have been on the look out for rather pukka wedding invitations since the minute we got engaged, mainly because I love a bit of stationery, and because I feared that attempting to make my own invitations they would end up looking naff, despite the fact that I am creative it was a risk I wasn’t willing to take. I just don’t have enough faith in myself!

I went to all the right places, hello lucky! being one of them – and I love their stuff but I just didn’t see something that really screamed ‘Jen & Matt’ style. I didn’t really see anything, anywhere.

I can’t remember what prompted me to get in touch with Kristy Rice at Momental Designs, because I had already written off the idea of having such glorious hand made invitations due to cost implications. I think you get so far down the road before you find what you want, that you think to yourself  ‘Whats the harm in getting in touch…’. And after following RMW’s Rebecca’s wedding report, and drooling over her Hydrangea stationery I felt inspired.

So I contacted Kristy Rice – a lovely woman who when I described the sort of wedding we’re having, and the flowers we’re using, leaped at the chance of designing us a bespoke invitation.

Crikey – a bespoke invitation! How la-di-da of us! 

Here’s an idea of the sort of thing she does…..The process is an easy one to kick off, I am generally easily pleased and open minded, and have total trust in Kristy and her team to design something that really and truly reflects Matt and I as a couple, and more importantly set the scene of our pending wedding. It’s true when you read in all the wedding magazines that wedding stationery really does set the tone of your day, and gives your guests a glimpse of what to expect. And this is what we want to achieve….

So we’ve gone from not really giving a monkeys about Wedding Invitations, to designing our own which is quite exciting for me because I love to paint (watercolours mostly), and really respect and admire those who manage to make a good job of it! I emailed her loads of photographs I had taken of the flowers we want to use, and pics I had pulled off the net for inspiration and have given her total artistic license to do as she pleases. I have been really impressed with the way Kristy and her assistant Kelley have responded to my suggestions, and have their blog on my daily blog list as I am always inspired.

We’ve had our first sample to view, and it is just amazing. We’re choosing card stock at the moment and colours, and I hope that when our close family and friends receive their invitation pack it will be something they keep hold of as a momento…. of Momental Designs.

The design is under wraps for the time being though… don’t want to ruin the surprise! You’ll just have to check back for my wedding report to see all the glorious details!

* All images courtesy of Kirsty at Momental Designs

Love

Jen x

We’d had about a fortnight to consider our venue options.

The next instalment on The Colonnade was rapidly approaching, so a decision had to be made soon, and of course Coltsfoot had had interest on their venue from other couples – I swear these people just push you and bully you into making decisions!
I took pen to paper and made lists of good points/bad points, and did some more budget bothering.
We’d had the ‘Oh Jen, why do you rush into everything‘ conversation dozens of times. If I hadn’t rushed into booking the first venue then we wouldn’t be in this situation, sometimes I am such a gimp! But it’s so much money to spend, we have to be sure.

Good points

Fab location
Fab bedroom/apartments for guests
Great Menu
Can provide our own drink – much cheapness!
Doesn’t have nasty green carpet
Freedom to do as we want for our big day and the whole venue would be ours!

Not so good points

Venue slightly too small, could seat our 70 guests at a push and hardly any room for partying in the evening
45 min drive from our church ceremony
Not available on our date of 4th September, so would have to change date with church – bit inconvenient.
Would lose hefty deposit from MoG.
Isn’t working out any cheaper… actually will cost a few grand more .

Hmmmm.

We decided to go away for a week, and to not mention the ‘W’ word once and just be us for a while.
We sunned ourselves in Egypt, did a bit of diving, read tons of books, totally relaxed and when we returned a decision would be made.

We arrived home and still couldn’t make a decision. What the flippin heck was wrong with us??!!
Mr O suggested we make an appointment with Manor of Groves to discuss our concerns – what a genius not sure why I didn’t think of that myself! I swear planning a wedding makes you ever so slightly dim. Well it clearly does me anyway!
Armed with my wedding scrapbook and a list of questions we arrived to be told the lady we were seeing had not turned up for work that day due to illness.

Fan-tabulous.

If I could have yelled extremely loud swear words, I would have done. But I was rendered speechless and slightly concerned about Mr O, who had (reluctantly) given up his ticket to go and see Arsenal play for this ruddy meeting! (Bless him!)
It was OK though, there was another Wedding Coordinator who could speak with us. Thank Feck.
We were both pretty much ready to blow a gasket over all this. I was so close to calling the whole thing off, so much bloody agro!

Feeling quite defensive and emotional about the whole thing, I asked all my questions and with each response a weight lifted. We could have anything we wanted to have, decorate how we want to decorate, we don’t have to have a top table (which is a relief), we weren’t tied into having a regimented and generic wedding, they would support anything we decided to do (within reason!) and actually seeing the venue again with my own eyes made me fall back in love with the place. And the green carpet issue isn’t a problem, we’re going to work with it and I feel confident that of all things the guests will be focusing on, the carpet probably isn’t one of them!

*Images from http://pkphotovideo.com

All things considered I think we made the right decision, and Mr O happily wrote out a cheque for the next instalment!

It’s going to look beautiful, and although I harp on about not feeling like a bride, I can’t deny I feel quite excited about having our wedding there. I’m starting to feel a bit more bridal now too…. The ice queen is melting a bit! Though when it comes to Tiara’s and white shoes I’m still running the other direction! You know what they say though, ‘Softly softly catchy monkey’.

So the moral of the story here, is it’s good to talk. Any concerns you have with any of your wedding vendors, just pick up the phone and talk about it. Most companies worthy of their name will bend over backwards for you, and if they don’t? Well they’re not worth your money!

I can’t wait to share my Wedding day with you all, oh God there’s that lump in my throat again….
Lots of Love

Jen x

When it came to picking a venue for our wedding reception, we had no clue where to start. I knew what I didn’t want though, and that was anything over priced and pretentious!

My Mother in Law to be kindly stepped in and helped me out big time, she took me to a few places to have a look round, some we were impressed with, others not so much. Then we found our Venue – The Colonnade at The Manor of Groves in High Wych. I had such great feel for the place and the space was quite vast, bearing in mind that although we are having a small and intimate wedding dinner, we want a mahoosive party in the evening so space is top of the list! As you can see it is a beautiful place, quite Edwardian. The food menu they offer is really varied, and the drinks packages are flexible. They literally would take care of everything for us. Guests received a discounted rate, and they would provide a private breakfast for us all the following morning, fantastic!

I took the Fiancé along to check it out, he wasn’t overly enamoured at first. I think he had imagined something different for our wedding, in his mind he had conjured up a quirky farmhouse sort of wedding ideal, with spit roasts and such like. I initially had this sort of wedding in mind too, a really relaxed affair, something that was really just how we wanted it. But quirky farmhouses are few and far between around here, especially within our budget. And we had the issue of sorting out caterers, crockery, linen, tables, chairs etc. I just felt this would add on more stress!

Being realistic about it, The Manor of Groves is a convenient option. It is a fifteen minute drive from our Church, and easy for our guests to find. I didn’t want a venue in which the guests spent an hour travelling to from the Church. So after a few calls from the venue saying they had interest from other couples, I took it upon myself to pay the deposit to confirm our date. I rushed into it completely, it was a giant leap of faith really because although we thought it was a great venue, the only reason it was so great was because of convenience. Yes the alarm bells started ringing. Hammering in fact.

After (yet another) wedding related meltdown, I took a drive to where my Mum’s memorial tree is to get some headspace and do some thinking aloud. On the drive there I cut through a village we used to live in when I was a teen, and saw a road sign for a restaurant called ‘Coltsfoot’. I remembered an old boss years ago telling me what a great venue it is, so when I got home I looked it up on the net and gave them a call… the ladies name was also Jenny, and I told her about my venue meltdown, and that the village has such a special place in my heart because it’s where I grew up, and because it reminds me of my Mum. The poor woman basically got my life story! I had to go and look at it, but were they available on our wedding date? Nope. They were the week after though……

We viewed it on a really sunny day, and my heart flipped over in my chest when we pulled up outside. Coltsfoot Country Retreat in all it’s glory. I remembered from CAOS’s wedding report that she had also had Venue issues, and I knew that I had to trust my instincts. It’s so important to be in love with your Venue!

I loved it. It was totally what I had envisioned for our reception, and they would cater for us allowing spit roasts, bbq’s, bacon butties, ice cream vans and whatnot. We could have anything we ruddy well wanted! I actually hopped with glee. I had a lump in my throat about it (yes dramatic I know).

So here we had ourselves a bit of a dilemma. Plus points were perfect venue, perfect area, just perfect everything, and minus points were losing a hefty deposit on The Colonnade, and a 45 min drive from the church. Hmmm.

What the heck were we going to do….??

Love

Jen xxx

I’m on fire at the moment, with regards to planning that is! All the important things are booked, ideas are all on paper, dress is being made as we speak, it’s going well and the clock is ticking away. Only 7 months to go til the big day, and we’ve been engaged for almost a year!

I’ve started to think about my hen weekend in Brighton. Or ‘getting married party’ as I seem to keep calling it, I don’t mean to call it that it’s just I still can’t get my head around the fact that I am a hen! I don’t feel like a hen, I don’t want ‘L’ plates or naff tiaras or anything generically hen-like, I feel itchy just thinking about penis straws and dare’s! I sound like such a misery guts don’t I?! I can assure you I’m not. I don’t need ‘L’ plates and willy straws to make a complete show of myself I manage that just fine on my own thank you very much!

I’ve also started to think about getting a band booked for the mahoosive evening reception we’re planning. With only 7 months to go I’d better pull my finger out!

I’m at the stage of planning where things are just ticking over nicely. Budget is in check. The Budget Spreadsheet is in check (and looking really colourful) I am starting to feel as though this is the calm before the storm but I’m enjoying it as it is. I have done so much ‘budget bothering’ lately and recommend other brides haggle their backsides off, if you don’t ask you don’t get! We’ve still not chosen invitations, however we have been given a good price by www.loveweddingprint.co.uk but are still on the lookout for something a little ‘different’. I fell in love with these invitation tea towels from www.weddingteatowels.co.uk very eco friendly, and certainly different!

I have contemplated making invitations myself but am wary of taking on too much. I have loads of D-i-y bits and bobs from Hobbycraft, and am a lover of the Reeves watercolour paints, so may attempt a mock up this weekend. I also have a sample invitation on it’s way from www.zazzle.co.uk which I designed myself, this site is a little like Vistaprint but I found Zazzle has more variety (it’s a little like Primark you have to wade through the crap to find the hidden gems!) I do however keep having to remind myself not to spend money like it’s water!

Our lovely Church has put dates in our diary for meetings, to fill in questionnaires about our relationship and what not. We have to prove we are ready for marriage and that we agree on lifes biggest issues! It’s quite scary, but in a good way. Our Reverend is a really lovely man, with a big family. And although Mr O and I aren’t avid church goers they have really made us feel welcome, and as the time draws nearer I think (I hope) we will go along to Sunday morning services, so that it all feels a little more familiar and homely to us when we get married there.

The nightmares have begun though. Anyone who’s been through a wedding of their own will know what I mean. I can only imagine they’re going to get worse too! The last one I had was me in a dress from Woolworths, marrying a boy I used to play kiss chase with at primary school. He was still 7 and I 29….

Bit wrong?!

Love

Jenny xx

How do couples get through this whole planning period with their nerves intact? I’d had a heads up from some close friends after they married, letting me know that despite how laid back I am, it WILL be stressful. How I scoffed at such a thought. Me, stressed over marrying Mr O? I doubt that very much!

Well Mrs Bradbury you were right. I was wrong.

And there’s still 8 months to go.

I swore to myself I would just tread water and make it seem as though everything was going really smoothly, when really I felt as though the weights around my ankles were getting heavier.. and heavier… and was this really what it was supposed to be like? Wasn’t everything supposed to be so much easier?

You get so far into the planning that after a while the train of all things wedding gains momentum and has a life of it’s own. Even though (and I swear this is true) I have hardly been what you would call ‘Bridezilla’ about things. I’ve been to one wedding fair, two bridal shops, and I’ve knocked the wedding magazines on the head completely. I managed to convince myself that Church weddings were for girls with Parents to give her away, that the wedding breakfast was for Parents to give speeches and tell lovely stories, I felt a bit overwhelmed by the fact that although I was overjoyed at marrying the man I love, I didn’t have my Mum or Dad there to share the day with me. The lack of father I could cope with, why grieve for someone who was never there? Anyway, I had been inundated with offers of people wanting to give me away! But still, having to accept that Mum wouldn’t be there choked me. I didn’t and couldn’t see myself as a Bride, walking down a church aisle. This wedding would be the first time in a long time my family had all got together under pleasant circumstances, and I just felt the pressure of it all was getting too much. However, could I see myself on my favourite beach in Koh Phangan?

Heck of course I could!

Image courtesy of ‘Thai the knot‘

So with all these wobbles in mind, we looked into tying the knot abroad. I mentioned this to my lovely big brother (who is kindly giving me away) with trepidation, he works hard for his wife and two daughters – we rarely see each other so would they be up for coming away and joining us? Yes, they were! Stone the crows. I couldn’t believe it! So I got loads of info and spoke to Lisa at The Thailand Wedding Company and also went direct to a gorgeous boutique resort on my favourite beach in Phangan, and discovered we could have the wedding of our dreams for about £2k. After weighing up the costs it was a no brainer. We’d save ourselves a ton of money, and a fair bit of stress.
My heart leaped whenever I thought about it, it felt right.

Image courtesy of ‘Thai the knot‘

But when we looked a little deeper into the logistics of guests etc, we discovered that too many people would be excluded. Important family members wouldn’t be able to come, and this choked Mr O. We had to get some sort of plan together, we had to agree on a wedding day that was for us. Me and Him. Without putting anybodies noses out of joint.

Turns out that I want the church wedding afterall. I’ve gone completely full circle on myself! Why should I shy away from the fact that I feel vulnerable? We all have insecurities and wobbles about things, and my not having my Mum and Dad there isn’t something I am in control of. Nor is it something I should feel ashamed of, I had to have a quiet word with myself. I’m not the first bride to get married without the loving support of parents. And what really matters is what is right here, right now, in the present. I am marrying my best friend, my sister and my brother are right there with me. And I have their love and support no matter what I decide on. No pressure what so ever. They just go along with whatever crazy idea I have next, and they never question it. And I feel lucky to have them. So everything is good again in the planning process.

My advice to anyone having similar issues, or family issues – I’ve heard so many stories of the pressures placed on couples by their families – just do what you want to do. Do what feels right. Life is too short!

Love

Jenny x