Wedding Photos - The Details

We got our wedding photos back last week! There are loads of them, so I have decided to split them up into sections to share onto the blog so it doesn't get too overwhelming! It does mean you'll have to wait until the next post to see any people - for the first part I'll be focusing on the details...

There are so many little touches that go on behind the scenes in wedding planning to make the day special. And indeed, many more details that we could have done. We kept it fairly simple, but I loved how it turned out!


Liam, obviously with his graphic design training, did the stationary. The invites were the first thing he did, but for the wedding day itself there were the Order of Services...

It took so long to choose the songs for the ceremony. In the end we decided on quite classic songs to walk in and out to - Pachelbel's Canon in D for my Dad and I to walk down the aisle to, and Andrea Bocelli's Con Te Partiro for Liam and I to walk out to. We then had more modern music as background for when the guests were arriving, and when we were signing the register. Because our wedding wasn't in a church, we had to get all the songs approved in advance to make sure there were no religious references in them...although we did get about twice the amount of songs approved than we actually needed so we could still make last minute decisions!

 My sister, Sarah, and Liam's Mum, Karen, did the readings, which both went really well. Karen read an extract from Captain Corelli's Mandolin, and Sarah read a reading that she'd found called 'Weddings'. This was particularly appropriate as it was explaining what a wedding was to a child, so good for Izzy, but everyone enjoyed it and the registrar said he'd never heard it before...nice to be a bit different!

Liam also made a table plan which we placed outside the room for the meal/evening reception...

It was my Mum/my family's idea to have the tables named after cakes as I am known amongst my family for making the cakes for most special occasions/random munching! The top table was, of course, 'Wedding Cake'...

One of my Mum's friends spent ages making name cards for everyone, using flowers from her garden. These turned out really well, and went so nicely with the other flowers and the colour theme.

As you can see in the above photos, I made up some purple boxes to keep the children occupied. Inside them, depending on age, were disposable cameras, a colouring book, crayons, a juice carton and stickers. Izzy got a special colouring book as she was the special flower girl/bridesmaid (I don't think my 15 year-old sister bridesmaid would have appreciated one of those books though!!).

Mine and Liam's sisters made a photo board to embarrass us put in the reception room. The one and only time you will see a naked photo of me on this blog!!

This made us laugh, lots of old photos with some funny captions to go with them!

I loved the look of the reception venue. I'd helped a bit on the Friday to set up the tables, put table cloths on, and arrange who was sitting where. But on the Saturday morning lots of my Mum's friends as well as my family went in to work their magic! One of my Mum's former colleagues (who also works at a florists) did the flowers, another of my Mum's friends (who is a close family friend) provided all the chair covers, bows etc as her wedding present to of us, lots of other friends helped and finally, 4 of my Mum's friends were also our 'waiters/waitresses' for the day and made up all the canapes as well. We were so lucky to receive so much generous help! One of the waiters took photos of the room before the day started. I loved looking at these as I didn't ever get to see the room looking like this - the only time I saw it in all it's glory, it was full of people! The room...

Part of the top table...

and some of the venue flowers...

Other details also included the bag I used (which was also my 'something borrowed', thanks Clare!)...

and the ring cushion that Toby was supposed to carry down the aisle (in the end my sister - the bridesmaid - ended up having to carry Toby and the ring cushion down as he got stage fright!!)...

There will be better photos of my bouquet when I post photos of actual people, but for the final 'detail' photo - this is a shot the photographer took of my flowers. For our flowers, we had someone who works in a florists that specialises in local, seasonal flowers. She literally turned up outside our house on the Thursday evening, 2 days before the wedding, with her car boot full of different flowers! So then I chose (well, she suggested) the flowers for our bouquets, and she used the rest to decorate the venue. A really great experience, fun!

I've loved writing this post - it's been so much fun looking back at all the photos and remembering things. As stressful as the planning sometimes was, we had such a lovely day that I (sometimes!) wish we could do it all again!!

Questions: If you are married, what was your favourite part of the wedding day? And if you're not married, do you have plans/images in your head for your 'ideal' wedding? I never really planned my wedding as a child, which I think helped me to go with the flow (a bit!) when it came to planning my actual wedding. I can't actually decide what my favourite part of the day was - I loved all of it! Maybe as I write the rest of these wedding posts my thoughts will become clearer.

I will probably do one wedding post each week as I don't want the blog to become too wedding filled. Plus it's nice to spread them out to make them last longer - I love looking back at all the photos :) Today's post is particularly appropriate as we are actually at a friend's wedding this afternoon/evening. I will no doubt discuss how it all went in the next couple of days but I'm sure it will be a fantastic day! Hope you're all having a great weekend :)