Wayne & Terri-Anne's wedding

So lovely to spend the day with my family helping to celebrate my nephew Wayne's wedding to his lovely fiancée Terri-Anne. It was such a beautiful day and they were both so happy - we have been waiting a long time for this day! There was a lovely moment at the reception when their eight year old daughter made a speech saying how much she loved her mummy and daddy and she got quite tearful, bless her - made us all cry. Jessica thoroughly enjoyed being able to play with all her cousins and getting lots of cuddles from everyone!

Dawn & James' wedding

It seems to be another good year for weddings and so we were off to the third wedding so far this year – my niece Dawn was getting married in a lovely hotel in the New Forest. I love family weddings – it is always good to be able to catch up with my siblings, nieces and nephews. The weather was beautiful and Dawn and James both looked so happy. I even managed to get up and do a bit of jiving with Michael in the evening which wasn’t too bad for being seven months’ pregnant! All in all, a lovely day.

Chris & Emma's wedding

Had a lovely time celebrating our friends Chris and Emma’s wedding along with some of our close friends from university. It was a lovely day, the wedding venue was a beautiful stately home, Chris and Emma were both obviously so happy and the rain held off at all the key moments when everyone was outside and the sun came out a few times so that was good. It was also nice to have a happy event to help take our minds off our worries about Sprout and we also felt more able to talk about her which helped as well.

Royal wedding

Having said for the last few weeks that I was bored of hearing about the royal wedding, it was quite a surprise to wake up this morning and actually wish I had gone into central London to soak up the atmosphere of it all. Michael was certainly surprised by my complete change of opinion – but with all the excitement on the TV and radio, it just made me think about how happy I was on my own wedding morning and suddenly there I was feeling excited and happy for the royal couple and wanting to watch it all on TV.

Bryan & Nicki's wedding

We are in Dublin for our friends Bryan and Nicki’s wedding and it has been a lovely day – the sun came out and it was reasonably warm (for February anyway!) which was fabulous – it is always nice to have good weather for a wedding. As always, it is such a joy to be able to share in our friends’ happiness and celebrate with them. The wedding reception was definitely one of the best out of all the weddings I have been to – very lively and from the minute the band started, there were lots of people on the dance floor.

Pre-wedding drinks with friends

Had a lovely evening out for pre-wedding drinks with two friends of mine who are getting married next week. Since getting married myself, I find I get more excited in the run-up to friends’ weddings (there have been quite a few of these in the last couple of years) – I think it is because I remember just how excited I was in those last few days before my own wedding and I’m just so happy for my friends when they are about to get married. I’m looking forward to being there at their wedding in just under a week’s time!

Sixth wedding of the year

It’s been another busy year for weddings –we’ve now been to six in total this year. Today’s wedding was the final one for 2010 (unless we get a very last minute invite to another one between now and New Year!) – Michael’s university friends Emma and James finally got married – they’ve been together even longer than we have! It was a lovely day – both Emma and James were clearly very happy to be finally tying the knot and Michael and I thoroughly enjoyed the ceilidh in the evening – it was a new dance experience for us and we had great fun.

Phil & Becky's wedding

The fifth wedding of the year was Phil and Becky’s wedding held at a pretty 11th century church in Warwickshire with the reception at Ragley Hall. It was one of the poshest weddings I’ve been to, but not so posh that I felt out of place! Phil is one of my old university friends – myself, Clare, Tany and Phil were known as “Phil and his three wives” for a while as we were almost inseparable during the summer of 2000. He’s now settled down to just the one wife and I hope that he and Becky will be very happy.

Alex & Sarah's wedding - part 2

The theme for their wedding was “tea and cake” so the flowers were all arranged in tea-pots or on cake stands with roses in cup-cake cases and instead of favours, there were mini tea caddies filled with tea specially created for their wedding. There were lots of cupcakes, some of which were made to look like cups of tea, instead of a big wedding cake (although they did have a small cake to cut), the tables were all named after different types of tea and each menu had a teaspoon themed with various places of significance to Alex & Sarah.

Alex & Sarah's wedding - part 1

It’s another full-on year of weddings – the fourth one of the year so far was our friend Alex’s wedding. Despite him and Sarah having been together for 11 years, we only managed to meet her for the first time at our own wedding last year (there had been a running joke about Alex’s imaginary girlfriend for some time before this!). The wedding was held at a stately home in Wiltshire; one of Sarah’s favourite places to visit and Alex arranged to have one of the bridges covered with roses when he proposed to her there just over a year ago.

Phil & Kath's wedding

Had a lovely time at Phil & Kath’s wedding yesterday (two friends of ours from university days). Most of the day was spent outdoors (fortunately the rain mostly held off) in beautiful gardens near an old mill building – afternoon tea and speeches were held outdoors and then we had a hog roast in the evening. Kath was definitely one of the smiliest and happiest brides I have ever seen. She and Phil did some mo’jive for their first dance, accompanied by a jive band. There were quite a few mo’jivers at the wedding so the dance floor was kept full.

Chris & Jo's wedding

We arrived back home from our driving holiday through Britain by mid-afternoon and so managed to grab a few hours to relax (admittedly spent unpacking and preparing for next week’s show rather than relaxing) before heading into London for the evening to attend Chris and Jo’s wedding reception. We had a lovely evening, although we did only know one other couple there (friends of Michael’s from his PhD). Still it was good to see them again – we hadn’t seen them since our own wedding last year so hadn’t really had a chance to catch up properly for quite a while.

Dan & Bev's wedding

Spent most of yesterday at Dan & Bev’s wedding. Dan used to work in the chemistry lab with Michael and duet with me on karaoke nights back in my university days. He is known as No-Shoes-Dan amongst my friends because he rarely wears shoes and walks barefoot even outside in winter. He did actually wear shoes with his morning suit (a fact that didn’t go unnoticed and unmentioned!) although had discarded them by the time he hit the dance floor in the evening. It was a lovely day and we enjoyed meeting new people and catching up with old friends.

Captured moments

The final copies of our wedding DVD have arrived – all the requested editing has been done and I’m very happy with the end result. Having a DVD done of our wedding was something I wasn’t sure I wanted at first – and then my twin sister talked me into it as she had been so pleased with her own DVD. I’m so glad now that I did have it done – it’s become one of the most precious reminders of our wedding day – and of my dad. His speech has become one of the most watched sections of the DVD for me.

Wedding DVD - take 2

The second proof copy of our wedding DVD arrived in the post this morning. The original DVD was fine but Michael had done a sound recording in the church which had a more balanced sound on the hymns (and reduced the impact of one particularly out-of-tune singer) so wanted the soundtrack replaced on the hymns. The soundtrack is now perfect but there’s a new error on the reception montage sequence – a brief second of black screen with “please insert clip”. Looks like another edit will be needed before we can finally give the thumbs up and get the final copies.

Lindsay & Dave's wedding

It was almost like having two weddings in a day. A register office ceremony, followed by lunch; then a church blessing and the reception. I felt like a Disney princess in my pretty bridesmaid dress (possibly the nicest bridesmaid dress I have ever had apart from the ones my mum made!). Lindsay and Dave looked blissfully happy, the sun shone and it was just beautiful. There were a few extra nice touches – the build-a-bear workshop for the children at the reception and the bride’s first dance with her dad before she danced for the first time with her new husband.

Wedding mornings

My friend Lindsay is getting married today and I will be one of her bridesmaids which I’m feeling very excited about. The last time I was a bridesmaid was two months before my own wedding and in all the excitement of getting ready, I couldn’t help thinking that soon it would be me getting married. Today I am once again remembering my own wedding morning, the excitement and joy of it all. It looks set to be a beautiful day and I hope Lindsay and Dave’s day will be every bit as wonderful for them as ours was for us.

Eroding consumer satisfaction

On the whole, the suppliers I used for my wedding were really good, really helped and generally bent over backwards in the run-up to the wedding. Unfortunately, a couple of them were unable to provide goods or services that had previously been agreed and was told they would refund me the cost of these. More than two months after the wedding, I am still chasing them. Their service was excellent otherwise, but despite appearing to be very happy to agree a refund when asked, their evasiveness now on providing it has completely eroded my positive opinions of their customer service.

Wedding DVD family screening

It’s always nice to take a trip back home and spend some time with my family. Today was one of the days that my dad spends at the day centre, so I had a lovely afternoon, just spending time with my mum. Once my dad was back home from the day centre, we spent the evening reliving happy memories from my wedding day as I had brought the wedding DVD home for my family to watch. My two nieces really enjoyed seeing themselves on the DVD and pointing out themselves and everyone they knew each time they appeared on screen.

Joel & Vik's wedding (part 2)

In the evening, there was a competition for the best speech - anyone could make a speech; the only rule being that it had to be less than 3 minutes long and the prizes went to the bride’s brother and the best man. The wedding cake was a collection of individual cupcakes brought in by the guests with a prize for the most creative. During the reception, we wrote our good wishes for Joel & Vik on pieces of paper which were then attached to balloons and as night fell, the balloons were released, sending our good wishes with them.