Getting Hitched

Naming fish...

2006-05-31T22:01:00.000+01:00

Several weeks ago, we were being even more rubbish at the weekly pubquiz than normal, so we started making a list of all the fish we could think of. In the last 30 hours, we have done our very best to eat as many of the fish on the list as we could. So far we have eaten...

(Tuesday evening)
prawns
crevettes
sea bass
plaice
hake
lemon sole
crayfish
(Wednesday, and we cooked most of these ourselves too)
mussels (x2 dishes)
cockles (x2 dishes)
clams (x2 dishes)
prawns (again)
lobster
mackeral
squid
hake (again, and I got to fillet it - it's a beast and a half)
lemon sole (again, and a real fiddly little sucker to fillet)
tiger prawns

....and of course the notorious pasty (I'm sure it's a type of fish if you look hard enough)

No shortages of Omega3 oils here! And as if that's not enough, we're off fishing tomorrow on a boat to catch some more... maybe even a pollock (but not Jackson).

Photos

2006-05-31T21:01:00.000+01:00

Katie did a fantastic job as our last-minute stand-in photographer, even though her hat wasn't quite Nikon compliant. She took over 600 pictures, and the best ones are here (you'll have to flick past pictures of cake making first!). They're hopefully in chronological order, although I can't remember some of them happening!

The flickr group pool is at flickr.com/groups/getting-hitched/. People have started to put their pictures there, and fine they are too. If you're not sure how to do it, follow these easy steps:

1) Sign up for a www.flickr.com account. It's free and spam free. Upload your photos of the wedding (and other things too, if you want!)

2) Once you are signed in to flickr, go to the getting hitched group homepage (here). Join the group (there should be a link for this somewhere on the right-hand side of the page)

3) When you are a member of the group, you need to add your photos to the group pool. Sounds complicated but it's easy really, honest. At the top of the flickr page, click on "organise". All of your pictures should appear in a line at the bottom of the screen.

4) At the top of the screen there are some tabs. Click on "your groups". This should (hopefully) show the groups you belong to.

5) Click on the picture(s) you want to add to the getting hitched group, then just drag the picture over the top of the group name.

6) That's it.

Alternatively, if this technology business defeats you, stick your pictures on a CD and mail them to us and we'll do the faffing for you.

Almost There

2006-05-27T11:30:00.000+01:00

It's 11:30, we have lots of sausages, there's 4 and a half hours to go and I've been doing the most amazing curry farts ever.

The night before the morning of...

2006-05-27T00:28:00.000+01:00

Julia (sage advisor and person wot has had to do wedding things before) said that we should put a time limit on our faffing tonight. She is one mighty wise woman. By 9.00pm we had pretty much finished sorting Pears School (reception venue) and I went into faffy-tired mode, which involved picking up boxes and moving them from place to place but not actually achieving anything. Luckily my Guides had come down to help for a couple of hours and they had done everything important by then.

To ensure that we finished on time, we booked a table for 10 at the local curry house. After all, when meeting lots of new relatives (who have never had the misfortune of meeting you), it is ideal to smell of garlic and coriander and to have tumeric-stained fingers. Luckily, I now meet all of these criteria.

Time now for bed. Zzzzzzz.....

Cake making - stage three

2006-05-25T14:12:00.001+01:00

Stage 1.
Remember where you stashed the cakes when you made them several weeks ago. In the case of one cake it was easy: it never made it off the kitchen table. The others we located in the Camping Cupboard, the flat's resident tardis and store of all things random.

Stage 2.
Clear a space in the kitchen. This involves moving boxes and boxes of wine, and reshuffling paperwork to take up less space. Wipe table (see - hygenic as ever)

Stage 3:
Unwrap the cakes...

and lay them on the board-covered-in-metallic-paper

Stage 4:
Line the cakes up so that they are roughly the same height. Try to get them central on the board, then give up. Decide not to trim them so that they fit snugly, because then someone gets the special present of marzipan-polyfilla. Yummmmmy!

Stage 5:
Cover the cake in apricot jam. Why apricot? I know it's traditional, but why? Or is this just of the great unanswerable questions of our time?

Stage 6:
Roll out your marzipan and get kneading. And rolling. And kneading. And rolling. And... until your knuckles give out.

Stage 7:
Place the marzipan on top of the jam-covered cake. How hard can it be? Repeat, ad infinitum.

Stage 8:
Fill all of the gaps between the marzipan with more marzipan. I love marzipan, me - I just hope our guests do too!

Stage 9:
Wipe all excess jam, icing sugar and other assorted gunk from the cake board. Stand back and give a big sigh of relief. Tick "marzipan cake" off the To Do list.

Productive day

2006-05-24T23:35:00.000+01:00

The cake is unwrapped and marzipanned (is that a word?!) and the photos uploaded. Installment three in the Cake Epic will come tomorrow when I have had time to string the pictures together with words.

Yikes!

2006-05-23T15:30:00.000+01:00

As the days tick past, and we're well into single figures now, the To Do list is getting increasingly longer... I think it's currently standing at 5 pages long. This evening is the wedding rehearsal, so we know where to stand, what to say, and how slowly to walk down the aisle. It's suddenly very close. We have, however, finalised the Order of Service sheet and I am pleased to announce that our hymns are Tell Out My Soul, When A Knight Won His Spurs, and At The Name Of Jesus. You'd best get practising!

In other news, the wine arrived yesterday (all seven boxes of it) and we spent the weekend buying last-minute things, including the entire stock of Pimms from a local supermarket. The checkout lady's face was a picture as we put 22 bottles through her till! We also discovered our first (and hopefully last!) wedding disaster, but I'll leave that for Rob to write about (seeing as it was his disaster). Other than that, it's all exciting and I can't wait for Saturday! Hurrah!!

Henning

2006-05-21T16:58:00.000+01:00

I've always viewed the stereotypical hen party - flashing L-plates, inflated condoms and screaming women who are old enough to know better - with a good pinch of disdain. What with the lack of time and the long list of other commitments, I was quite happy to give the hen night a miss and to hold a chicken party at some point in the summer, after dealing with the wedding, South Africa and moving house. My carefully laid plans were, however, upset by sixty or so teenage girls and their housemistress, who were all looking for a good excuse to let their hair down.

Last night was the appointed night. Although they did make me wear a flashing L-plate, they stuck it on my back, so my sensibilties weren't too offended; after all, out of sight, out of mind. I only really noticed it when I sat down on it. There was lots of food, cocktails, a chocolate fountain, and the sixth form girls had even arranged some strippers.* There were silly games, giant jenga, a limbo competition, and I impressed them with my performance in Fluffy Bunnies. All in all, it was a good night, if being at a party where the majority of people are under the legal drinking age can be classed as "good", and I dread to think what the photos are like!

* I spent most of this part of the evening with hands over my eyes going, "Nooooooooo!!". After all, I've got to teach most of strippers on Monday morning.

Stagging... or should that be Staggering

2006-05-14T11:31:00.000+01:00

Ten Pin bowling dressed as Batman.
A list of questions (What is Mad’s bra size? What colour are her eyes?)
A list of forfeits (Find the oldest person here and offer to buy them a drink. Find somebody with a hat and ask to try it on.)
A curry
The After Dark (The best club in Reading and possibly the country)

It could only be the stag night.

The brother did a fantastic job of making sure that everybody was in the right place at the right time, with suitable drinking stops on the way and (in a non-competitive way) the Court brothers did reign supreme during the bowling. Although that may have been because Anthony is actually good at bowling and I was wearing a Batman cape, which improved my game by at least twenty points.
The two main objectives of the evening were met, everybody enjoyed themselves and nobody woke up missing an eyebrow.
There was a couple of disposable cameras floating about all day, but whether the photographs end up on the internet may depend on whether they are sent to me or Mad.

How to make a wedding cake - Mad'n'Rob stylee

2006-04-17T14:44:00.000+01:00

1) Choose your recipe - we're using Queen Delia's Creole Christmas cake but with added booze. We made a few at Christmas and they passed the taste-test-challenge.

2) Calculate the quantities of ingredients needed. We were going to do 15 times the given quanity, but decided that may be a bit excessive; we're now using 10 times the amount Queen Delia uses.

3) Soak the fruit in booze, spices and sugar; then leave in a fridge for five days.

Find one monster pan...

...add lots of booze...

...some spices...

...and lots of fruit.

Simmer on a very gentle heat for 15 minutes, or until you can no longer be bothered to wait for the liquid to get to simmering point because the flame is so gentle.

4) Five days later (and ideally more), invade the kitchen in the school's boarding house to use their industrial mixer. It's a whopper of a piece of kitchen machinery, but would still only fit half the cake mix at a time. Curses. We ended up making two batches of mixture.

For each batch, take some eggs and butter...

...add some dry ingredients...

...and the soaked fruit.

Use the whopper mixer and get very excited about the possibility of owning our own Kenwood Chef. Discuss the etiquette involved in buying our own wedding presents - would it be wrong to get our Kenwood now, or should we wait until we're actually married? After all, there are still many weeks left for Rob to come to his senses and dump me.

While the gunk is mixing, double line the tins. I love baking parchment. It's one of my most favourite baking things. (Until we own a Kenwood Chef, of course)

Each batch would have to fill two caketins, so we scientifically measured it out (in a way that would have real scientists spinning in their graves) using the "one for you, one for me" principle. This technique requires you to scoop the mix from bowl...

...and into tin one. Then repeat, scooping the mix into tin two. Repeat ad infinitum. Then lick spatula (once all scooping, poking, proding and smoothing is done - basic food hygiene is important and not to be sniffed at)

After both batches of mixture are made up, line the tins on the oven and marvel at the difference in colour between the two batches. It might be something to do with one batch getting a longer mixing, or having slightly more fruit, or having the fruit added in two goes instead of ten goes, or.... there's a whole realm of cake-experiemental-baking just waiting to be discovered.

5) After three hours cooking, cover the cakes with a double thickness of baking parchment while snorting the smell of cooking fruitcake. Check every 20 minutes after that until the first one cooks. Remove it from oven. Feel smug.

6) Once all cakes out of oven, leave them in their tins for 45 minutes then turn onto wire trays to finish cooling. Tick "make wedding cake" off to-do list.

Cake making - stage two

2006-04-17T14:41:00.000+01:00

After leaving the fruit to soak (it should have had a week, but we've run out of time) we've been cake-baking this morning. We made two batches of mixture (only because the mixer isn't quite THAT big) and they're cooking away as I write. We're intending to do a photoguide to wedding cake making on here, but for now the pictures (of stages 1 and 2) are here.

Cake making - stage one

2006-04-12T11:00:00.000+01:00

A photographic set of instructions for making a wedding cake starts here and continues through the set. I think I'm now drunk on the vapours. Wahoo!!

Things you learn...

2006-04-04T23:01:00.000+01:00

...on bridezilla.com (the collective name given to all wedding planning websites where there are online forums and discussion boards). It astounds me how little I know about weddings. Did you know that it's possible to hire chocolate fountains for your reception? After discussion with Rob, we're looking to hire a tikka masala fountain. Or perhaps a chili dipping sauce fountain. Or maybe just a gravy fountain, with a range of chips, pies and sausages to hold in the cascades of gravy. Yum yum.

The Food

2006-04-04T21:33:00.000+01:00

On Sunday we had the sausage sizzle. We bought 12 types of sausage from the local butchers, invited round six connoisseurs of porky pleasure and had an evening of sausage tasting and comparing notes. It was a blind tasting so Mad was the only person who knew which sausage was which; making the process even more exciting (sometimes the tension was unbearable). The sausages were all oven cooked and each type was bought out whole to allow for marks for appearance and then portioned out to each person for tasting, note making and general discussing. Marks were awarded for taste (out of 15), texture (out of 10) and appearance (out of 5) with each category weighted to reflect the importance of that category.

It was all hard work but somebody had to do it. After counting up scores,the wonders of spreadsheets proved that a firm winner has been found. We have discovered the best baked banger in south Derbyshire and will start to haggle with the butcher to try to get a discount for buying sausages by the pig load.

Tempus Fugit (and all that jazz)

2006-04-02T11:23:00.000+01:00

There are - according to a countdown on bridezilla.com - 55 days to go until we get hitched. On one hand, this is a bad thing, as I'm as impatient as an impatient woman. On the other hand, it's a good thing as there's still a few things to do. On another hand, most of it's sorted out and there certainly isn't enough to occupy fifty-five days' worth of weddingy activity. Ah. That makes three hands. It's a good job that my wedding dress has more than the normal number of sleeves.

Talking of the ~~white tent~~ dress, I got what some refer to as "THE CALL" to say that it had arrived at the shop. Luckily, my school holidays happen to have corresponded nicely with this event, so I headed off on Tuesday to assess the damage caused by my excessive eating and drinking. I took Ian, who is a colleague and a man with a good sense of style, as I have so much fashon sense that I think it's fine to wear odd socks and have been known to sport a thermal long-sleeve top under a t-shirt. Luckily, he approved of the choice, swooned over the footwear, and did the excited dance when looking at the tiaras: the omens bode well. Being a stumpy short-arse, I'd orered the dress in "stumpy short-arse length" (which basically knocks three inches off the hem length) and this, combined with the miraculous pull-it-all-in lace-up back, means that it needs no alterations at all. Rock and roll!!

Ian, my mum and the woman in the wedding-dress shop then got talking about jewellery and accessories - I was too busy swishing around the shop in my dress to pay much attention - and so it was decided for me that we should go necklace shopping that very afternoon. After healthy sandwiches and no jam doughnuts (curse my mother's attempts to keep me thin) we set off to Bewdley to find a small shop that did costume jewellrey, as recommended by the dress-shop woman. I'm still not convinced that we found the actual shop she was talking about, but we did track down two necklaces. After all, if I can have three arms I can certainly have two necks. The "wedding outfit" checklist seems to be completed. Phew - that's one less thing to faff about.

Another area that I've been contemplating is flowers. Way back in February I tried arranging flowers for the tables and somehow managed to succeed; my thoughts have since turned to my bunch (I refuse to use the word "bouquet" because that implies style, poncing and faffing - I just want something to hold so I have something to fiddle with during the service). I had walked over to Willington, a local village, and popped into the florists there on the off-chance. This florist does beautiful arrangements and bouquets and I thought that she would laugh scornfully at my feeble request for some gerberas in red, yellow and orange. However, ten minutes later, the woman there had agreed to make a suitable bunch, and charged me the grand total of fifteen squid. Bargain! I know that some people spend hundreds if not thousands on flowers, but I'm quite chuffed with what she's going to do. "Flower" checklist - nearly done.

This afternoon the team of chefs are visiting to look over the cooking facilities here at school. We went to our two local butchers' shops yesterday and now have 14 types of sausage in the fridge, waiting to be eaten at tonight's sausage testing. We've spent some time discussing condiments, sauces and gravy. All we need to do now is to run everything past the cooking powers that be, get their agreement and approval, and I can head off to the cash-and-carry to buy the stuff. "Wedding meal" checklist well under way to completion.

Rob's database wizardry seems to be standing the strain, and we've had many RSVPs back already. There are a few replies to chase, and some more invites to send out (ok, ok, we've fallen slightly behind on this one, no need to nag!), but it's mostly there. I wouldn't say that the "administration" checklist is complete, but it's looking far more organised that three weeks ago. We've had a fine selection of responses, many containing fishy quips, so the cream of the crop may well appear here at some point. Until then, I'm off to lurk through bridezilla.com to laugh at the neurotic women stressing about napkins.

Getting down to the important bits

2006-03-13T21:52:00.000+01:00

What contains 75 eggs, almost 4 kgs of butter, just over 14 kgs of fruit and 6 litres of spirits?

The Wedding cake.

Making our own cake has resulted in a suprising amount of maths. How much cake will each peron eat? What is a respectable portion size? How many units will there be in each slice? Do we go by surface area alone, or try to take the depth into account? The calculator has been used twice so far and I'm sure that it will be used quite a few more times before the cake is made.

We have only just finished the Christmas cake, which kept very well, so any wedding cake that might be left over will be good for a long while yet.

* I wonder if we could make it last until next Christmas?*

Dresses

2006-02-19T15:24:00.000+01:00

Seeing as mine hasn't arrived at the shop yet, I've been scooting around for alternatives. I think there's a fair selection here. Any preferences...?!

Edited to include the *right* link. Damn you, copy-n-paste function!

Crossing things off lists

2006-02-15T12:57:00.000+01:00

This half-term holiday has been quite productive, at least in the wedding stakes. There have been a number of things crossed off the 'to do' list and several things moved from the 'must think about this at some time' to the 'sorted' list. We've been really lucky that people from all over have offered support, skills and expertise; and that those who offered in the early days of wedding planning are prepared to honour their offers now. ("Honour their offers"?! Sounds a bit dodgy to me!)

Although it's all very calm here, it's not been so smooth elsewhere. I (stupidly) bought some more wedding porn (a.k.a. Brides magazine) on Monday, and was suitably riled by the wedding fascists' views: reading this stuff is bad for my blood pressure. I also received some downright snotty treatment in a wedding shop in Nottingham - I'd heard on the grapevine that some shops have very bad customer service, but had not experienced it until this week. It amazes me that shops selling vastly over-priced items (have you seen some of the prices they think they can charge just because it's a wedding necklace not a normal one? Ridiculous) can be so offensive. I certainly won't be going back there again. Pah.

Sorry. Rant over. No more, I promise.

In other news: I bought some napkins at the Swedish Emporium, and very brightly coloured they are too. I also tried out flower arranging, which - for a non-artistic numpty such as myself - was not too bad at all. I just worry that the flower-arranging-ness will eat away at my intrinsic non-girlie-ness and I'll be doing crochet by the end of the month. Waah!

RSVPs, holidays, cakes... oh yes, and cakes

2006-02-10T16:26:00.000+01:00

I've been really impressed by the number of replies that have already meandered back to us, and luckily Rob's wedding database automatically keeps a tally of how many people are coming. At least we know that it won't just be the two of us munching our way through a massive pile of bangers and mash, though! (Although that's a challenge I'd be prepared to tackle head-on!)

Next week is my half term holiday, so I've got a couple of days allocated to weddingy-things... like checking that I'm capable of flower-arranging (flowers + vase + ribbon = how hard can it be?!) and buying napkins. I think the latter calls for a trip to a nearby Swedish Emporium, so no doubt I'll end up leaving with a bedside cabinet, a shoe rack, a coat hook and a set of bed linen as well as the napkins!

I've also been thinking about the wedding cake. Actually, I've been thinking about cakes in general, but our wedding cake is a good way to focus the thoughts. We're intending to serve the cake (with pouring cream) as pudding, once I've finished eating all of the sausages. There is a fantastically boozy fruitcake recipe that we normally use for our Christmas cakes: I have no qualms about pressing this into action once again. However, should there also be an alternative for those who don't want fruit/booze? The plan is to ice it all into one whopper flat cake, so having different ends isn't a problem. What do you think...?

Address hunting...

2006-02-07T23:24:00.000+01:00

Tonight has been another evening of wedding invite writing, although most of it has been spent texting people to ask for their addresses. Another bundle of envelopes is done, with just six or so addresses to find out (for now... the evening invites are still to come!). Sometimes I wish that I was organised enough to have an up-to-date address book, but I know that I'd just lose it: it's a good job that Rob's created a database of everyone's contact details. Hurrah for having an organised other half!

Eeeek!

2006-01-27T16:22:00.000+01:00

120 days to go. Blimey.

Buying things

2006-01-22T17:35:00.000+01:00

The collection of wedding gubbins is steadily growing, with the latest additions being some expensive material (suit-shaped) and some shiny metal (ring-shaped). We've had to find a safe place for storing the latter of these, so let's hope that I can remember where I've stashed it when it gets to May time!

We've also had confirmation that we'll get the special wedding licence, so that's another thing crossed off the list. Part of me was worried that The Powers That Be would refuse permission to use the school chapel and we'd have to resort to a registry office quickie before having a pretend ceremony on the day. Luckily, that's not necessary. Phew.

In other news, we started writing out invitations, using address lists carefully provided by both mothers. Consequently it's been really easy to do the family invites (despite one or two hiccups over the spelling of various relations' names!) but we are now into the dangerous territory of invites for friends. I have NO IDEA where most of my friends live, so there are many hours of phone calls ahead if we're to get these invites out before June. Thank goodness for offical society address lists.

Official paperwork

2006-01-15T20:27:00.000+01:00

Our decision to get married in the school chapel was dependent on the school chaplain's willingness to marry us. Unfortunately, we've been suffering something of an interregnum between the departure of the old chaplain and the arrival of the new, so there was no offical confirmation that we could actually get hitched on the day we'd booked. Whoops. Apparently there is no official wedding licence for the chapel, so we're having to apply for an Archbishop's Licence, which is dependent on the chaplain's support during the application process. Luckily, Adam (the new chaplain) arrived during the Christmas holidays, and he's more than happy to officiate; the paperwork was posted off today, and all looks promising. According to other colleagues, who have already undergone this process, the licence is a huge certificate, featuring the signature and seal of the big cheese archbish himself... quite a momento to have!

Rev Adam is in his thirties and has previously worked in parishes as well as being a school chaplain in Liverpool. He has officially been here at school for six days, and already has the entire staff eating out of his hand because he is so lovely. He spoke at school chapel this morning, and even the kids listened and laughed during the sermon (even the headmaster's daughter stopped reading her book to listen to what he had to say!). It was a bit of a gamble deciding to be married by a bloke we'd never met, but I'm so glad we took the risk: it should be a lovely service.

We sat in the pub last night talking to some of my colleagues about weddings. It seems that they had quite stressful experiences with their nuptuals, so I'm wondering where we're going wrong/right* but it all seems to be well in hand at the moment. Mind you, if I can organise a Guide camp for 200 people, I ought to be able to organise one day's worth of wedding without too much effort...!

* Delete as applicable

Put On Your Dancing shoes

2005-12-08T23:18:00.000+01:00

We may have got some very nice people to organise the jumping around. Time to practice the do-see-do (sp?) and get some comfortable smart shoes. Don't say that you weren't warned.

Wheeeee....

2005-11-28T19:39:00.000+01:00

...is the sound of wedding plans being made (with a little help from Mr Google and Mrs Broadband). Admittedly we're still short of a cook or two, but other things are falling neatly into place: flowers; decorations; cake; wedding licence; honeymoon; there's even a longlist of hymns (which currently includes When A Knight Won His Spurs, because that contains ogres, dragons, knights and castles - all key ingredients of a good wedding) At this rate, we could be all organised by Christmas, which would give us time to relax and enjoy life for a bit, which sounds just dandy.

Things are moving... slowly!

2005-11-24T17:25:00.000+01:00

The pieces of the wedding jigsaw are falling slowly into place. We've got a man to marry us, a place to get married, somewhere to have a party, and I've chosen a suitably long t-shirt (complete with the legend "The Bride") to wear. So far, so good. The finer details - such as who's going to cook our chosen menu, and who's going to play some cheery choons at the party - still elude us. Our original choice of woman-who-cooks is sadly unable to cook for us, and I've had a fruitless task trying to make contact with the band-of-choice. Luckily, my dad procurred the number of an alternative band, so that's looking more positive; the cooking, however, remains a challenge. Anyone willing to cook bangers and mash for us?!

We've made about 75 invites so far, and so they should be out fairly soon: it's been really difficult trying to work out who to invite and who to leave out, and every time I go back to the list I have to add more people. It's a good job that it's a large hall and that the school chapel can hold 600 people!

Dress shopping was an experience I have no great desire to repeat, ever. I was lucky to find victims to drag along to each of the three excursions that I made into the world of frills, lace and acres of white satin. Kate, a colleague, came to the first shop with me. She got married last summer, so remembered to ask all the questions that I hadn't even thought of. The second foray, in Cheltenham, was made with Wendy, the Queen of all Bridesmaids, and Amy, who has somewhat idiosyncratic fashion tastes. Luckily, they had some good advice and opinions between them, and it made the final trip, with my mum, far easier, as I had a good idea what I was looking for.

Based on my experiences, I would like to offer three bits of advice (one from each of my shopping trips) should you ever be the a person trying to buy a wedding dress:

1. Wear big pants, not a thong. The poor lady is having enough problems dealing with your refusal to try on high, pointy shoes and a veil, and doesn't want to watch your bottom wobbling as you teeter around the changing room trying to dive into the dress she's holding.

2. Remember to shave both armpits. I only did one by accident. I didn't realise until dress number 6, by which point I had lifted my arms above my head several times to get in and out of dresses. Damn my absentmindedness!

3. Don't eat curry the night before trying on dresses, and certainly don't drop curry in your lap to leave a very dodgy yellow/brown stain just below your groin. Not following this advice led to me standing in my parents' kitchen in my pants, frantically drying my jeans with a hairdryer. An attractive look, and one my parents' neighbour couldn't believe when he walked past the window.

Despite the mishaps, I have a dress. The only problem is that I tried on so many that I can't remember what it looks like. It's a good job I like surprises!

Cake of Epic Proportions

2005-10-30T18:37:00.000+01:00

As the wedding plans progress, we have decided to buy wedding insurance. It is something that I never knew existed, but looking into it, appears to be pretty sensible. There are a few companies on the net that are selling it and one of the common things covered is the wedding cake. It seems that it is a standard part of any policy to insure the cake to a value of £2,500. I may be showing my naivety, but £2,500 on a cake? My car cost less that that. Do people actually spend that much money on their wedding cake? Maybe that’s the damages you can claim if the cake falls on somebody.

All the insurers also cover the cost of stress counselling, although I suspect I’d only need that if we was going to spend £2,500 on a cake.

It's nearly confirmed!

2005-10-10T19:13:00.000+01:00

This morning, in school, the Head announced that he will be writing to parents this week with details of the revised Speech Day arrangements and has put a draft of his letter up on the board. It looks as though the change of date is going ahead, so we can get married on the day we wanted after all. Hurrah! Therefore, ladies and gentlemen, one and all, please keep

Saturday 27th May 2006

free, but don't book anything until we've got the FINAL official confirmation! Invites will be posted out as soon as possible, which means that I've got many scores of hearts to cut out from felt... I just wonder if I can get my school kiddies or Guides to make the invites for us...!

Dresses

2005-09-24T08:12:00.000+01:00

Amy has compiled a fantastic folder of advice for those with poncy-dress-phobia: it arrived on Thursday but I didn't have time to read it carefully until last night - I hadn't realised that is was all so complicated! After all, how many variations on a theme can you get?!

Tim's advice, although more brief, was also useful:

I think you should get married in a long t-shirt that says `wedding dress` on the front.

None of this poncy stuff that you can't spill your beer down :)

There is, I admit, a certain attraction in this approach. I've got half term coming up - I think I know what I'll be doing in it!

Frustration

2005-09-23T15:26:00.000+01:00

We're hoping to get married at school, albeit during the holiday. The chapel is plenty big enough for all of our friends and family (and then some!) and the main school hall would be ideal for a meal and then some ~~Belgian National Six Piece Tambourine Quartet~~ drunken barn dance action. The only problem is that both buildings are booked on the day that we've been eying up, which is currently school's Speech Day. However, consultations have been taking place within school to change Speech Day, including moving it to another date, which then leaves our chosen venues free on the date we want them: hurrah!

Although it all seems to be falling neatly into place, the final Speech Day decision is not being made by the Head until next month and the waiting is proving a little nerve-janglingly frustrating. We want to start booking things (a woman to cook the bangers and mash; the ~~Belgian National Six Piece Tambourine Quartet~~ band; the school chaplain) but it's no good unless we know WHEN we're getting hitched. Once that date's confirmed, we've got everything else sorted - menu, decor, flowers, invites, guest list, drinks, order of events - but at the moment it just seems a real faff because it's not moving forward and we're starting to talk of registry-office-quickies as a way of getting things kick-started. Pah.

In other news: I have tried on some dresses.

Getting crafty

2005-09-15T22:34:00.000+01:00

Given the low level of my crafty abilities, the thought of making our wedding invitations is a bit intimidating. Luckily, I remembered back to a Guide training many years ago, adapted the idea, and came up with these three options. Rob and I aren't sure which to choose as the final design. We consulted with the girls in the House, but they had mixed views too, so we're opening the decision up to you - after all, Wendy wants the excitement of wedding planning, and I'm NOT good at decisions, so why not use the skills of our readership?! Let us know via the comments which style you prefer:

A) Hessian

B) Gauze

C) Tapestry-stuff

Progress

2005-09-13T15:51:00.000+01:00

We've pretty much planned our wedding, although we're still not certain what date it'll be. There are three possible contenders and, although the final decision is dependent on factors beyond our control, it will definitely be in the first half of next year. Once the date's confirmed, we just need to persuade the right people to do what we'd like them to, and the job's done. Pah! What's so complicated about wedding planning?! Mind you, the more I play on the net and read magazines (stolen from my wedding-obsessed pupil) the more complicated it becomes, although I suspect it will take a LOT more before I start obsessing about table favours. I'm more concerned about choosing some nice beer for the reception afterwards.

Venues

2005-09-11T22:44:00.000+01:00

This wedding malarky is more complicated than I thought. I can understand why people get very stressed about the whole business, especially given the advice on some of the wedding-planning websites out there. I'd never even thought about the need for a receiving line before, let alone a videography package; according to some random bint, both are essential. Pish. I think we'll be sorting this wedding according to our three maxims: no faff; no poncing; have fun.

We've been to visit a few venues, which isn't as posh as it sounds, given that everything is within a few minutes' walk of the house. I'm hoping to meet the bookings lady tomorrow, so we should have a date within days! Blimey. Watch this space for more information.

The start

2005-09-08T23:22:00.000+01:00

Yesterday evening, I got in from school to the news that Rob had bought me a present. He pushed me in the direction of the kitchen and produced a polystyrene box from the fridge. After a brief moment or two (in which I did tea in the House) I then opened the box to discover two large fillets of fish. I know that we buy silly presents for each other, but the fish seemed quite practical - at least it was a present that I could eat. The conversation went something like this:

Me: A fish. How lovely.
Rob: I know. It's a Ling.
Me: Oooh. A Ling. That's very exciting.
Rob: It's a special Ling.
Me: Really?
Rob: I thought it might be an engagement Ling.
Me: An engagement Ling?! [at this point I start to cry and forget to say yes]

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is honestly how it happened. He's nothing if not romantic.