My kind of afternoon

I had a lovely hen do on Saturday organised by Jenny, with lots of my friends there.

It didn't involve excessive alcohol or silly clothes (with the exception of these beautifully stylish glasses...) - instead Jenny took me to Mitchells in Sutton Coldfield. It's essentially a posh shopping centre, with little shops throughout an old farm complex and a lovely café - sorry - bistro.

We started off with a meal in the Farmhouse Bistro, then we went to Cafe Ceramica to do some pottery painting. It was very relaxing and we spent a couple of hours in there choosing what to paint and playing with designs.

After we'd finished the painting we had to leave the pottery to be fired and glazed - Jenny will collect it and distribute it at the wedding - and then we had a mooch around the shops for a bit.

Some of my friends had travelled a way to be at the afternoon, so they had to get back. The rest of us (me, Jenny, sister-in-law and Jenny's sister) went back to Jenny's to eat Chinese takeaway and watch In the Night Garden (! while Jenny's niece and nephew got ready for bed) and then Coyote Ugly.

It was a lovely day and definitely my kind of afternoon.

Mitchells
Weeford Rd, Sutton Coldfield, B75 6NA
w: www.mitchellsshopping.com

Farmhouse Bistro
e: info@farmhousebistro.co.uk
t: 0121 323 3658
w: www.farmhousebistro.co.uk

Cafe Ceramica
e: julie@cafeceramica.com
t: 0121 308 3984
w: www.cafeceramica.com

Getting the fit right

I should have posted this a couple of weeks ago, but I have my dress! Trisha's called up in the middle of October to let me know it had arrived, so I went to collect it and brought it home.

I'm not having it altered at Trisha's though. There's a lady who I've known for years, and who knew my dad when he was a teenager, whose name is Pat. She is incredibly talented at dressmaking and she offered to do all the alterations we needed as a present to us.

When I got my dress home I took it to Pat and tried it on. It fits perfectly at the top, but is rather too long, so she's taking it up for me. I've got another fitting tomorrow evening, and then probably one more before the wedding.

Pat has been sorting out my big bridesmaids as well. They both needed turning up and having the straps sewn in properly, and Jenny's dress needed the back panel that goes underneath the lacing sorting out as well, because it wasn't covering the hole well enough and she was showing off her pants!

Something borrowed...

For my something borrowed I turned to my sister-in-law, because I knew she had a pile of really pretty tiaras and hair pins hiding away in her bathroom from her wedding. When I went round to see her a few days after the engagement I had fund looking through her box and trying on different bits and pieces.

To start with a found a very pretty tiara, but when I was looking at it again a few weeks ago I noticed that half of it was silver and half gold - it looked as if the gold plating had rubbed off. It was still very pretty, but I wasn't sure about wearing it, especially as I'd found another tiara when I was looking around for various wedding bits.

I asked sister-in-law to bring her box of bits with her this weekend when I had my hair trial, and I found some very pretty hair pins that reminded me of snowflakes - just right for a winter wedding! I haven't shared anything else about the wedding outfit, but since this is something borrowed I feel as if I can, because it's already been seen before.

So without revealing any details about my hair, these are the hair pins - my 'something borrowed'.

Finally a decision!

I had a hair trial this weekend and finally decided what I'm going to do with my hair! I'm not giving away any secrets here, because darling beardy man saw my poodle look when I'd taken the style out afterwards, but I'm having curls.

Here are a few pictures for your entertainment, taken by Jenny, who managed to capture a particularly fetching picture (see the third pic).

 

The hairdresser, whose name I think is Jane, was lovely and got exactly what I was trying to explain with the first attempt. We just had to make a few little tweaks to the first style she tried to make it perfect.

We booked in an appointment for the wedding day, and she even offered to come in earlier if I wanted to get it done before the 9am opening time. She was so lovely and made me feel so relaxed, I'm looking forward to going back again on the big day.

Woodberry Hair & Beauty Ltd
196 Reddicap Heath Road, Sutton Coldfield, B75 7ET
t: 0121 311 2891

A bit of history

My dad organised the car to take me to the wedding through a work friend whose family owns a wedding car hire business.

When it came to booking the exact vehicle he discovered that the company still owned the same car my mom travelled to her wedding in, so I'll be travelling to the same church my parents married in, in the same car that they had. It's a very nice thought that it's a bit of family history repeating itself.

The car is called Rupert (I have no idea why!) and is a 1934 vintage blue and white Rolls-Royce 20/25 limousine – "a car of character and distinction which carries up to six passengers also has a sunshine roof." The car hire business has been around even longer, having been set up as a family business in 1927.

AB Taylor Wedding Services
49 Wolverhampton Road South, Birmingham, B32 2AY
t: 0121 434 4340
e: taylorweddings@btconnect.com
w: www.abtaylor.co.uk

Something old...

I'm quite traditional at heart, and ever since I was little I've been thinking about what I'd wear for my 'something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue'.

I'd considered an old piece of jewellery that I'd had for years and loved. I had a pair of pearl earrings at one point that would have been perfect for a wedding, but sadly they went missing when I moved house. I also wondered about an old ring, if whoever I married gave me a family heirloom or if we used my grandmother's engagement ring which I inherited as my ring.

Then I considered underwear. I'm not talking about really old skanky underwear, just something that I hadn't bought new especially for the wedding. I had a friend who got married who wore an old pair of blue pants for her wedding, along with tights borrowed from her sister and a new dress. But while I'm sure I'd be quite happy wearing comfortable few month old pants from my sock drawer, it's not exactly something I can show people if they want to know what I'm doing for my something old.

I hadn't really thought much about it in the few days after the proposal until my Mom mentioned her wedding dress. She still has it, safely in a box in the loft, so I asked if I could see it. It was a very typical wedding dress of the 1970s, with a high neck, long sleeves, and made of beautiful lace. The underskirt (made of crinoline, I believe) had unfortunately yellowed while it had been in storage, but the lace was still beautifully white. As well as the dress, Mom had kept her veil and cap, and they were both still in beautiful condition too. While we were ooh-ing and ah-ing over the dress, Mom produced several pearl necklaces in case I wanted to wear one of those for the wedding.

I said I wouldn't reveal any secrets in case darling beardy man wants to read this blog, so I'll just leave it that I found my something old out of the selection of beautiful things that Mom showed me, and after the wedding I'll post a picture of what my gorgeous something old was.

Something blue...

My beautiful ring arrived on Wednesday, especially made by Charlotte, a friend of lovely beardy man. It's silver with aquamarine (my birthstone), and Charlotte is going to make our wedding rings as well. It's absolutely gorgeous and I absolutely adore it!

Still undecided on my hair...

Buying my dress

The first big purchase of the wedding plans was my dress. Having done quite a bit of research, I knew that most wedding dress shops ask for at least 16 weeks before the wedding to get the dress in and alterations done. Since lovely beardy fiancé only proposed 16 weeks before the wedding, I knew I was cutting it tight and fully expected to be met with looks of disapproval from staff at the shops I went into. That said, I was also fully prepared to walk out of any shop which treated me with disdain because I dared to try to get married on a short time scale and not on their time scale.

The week after we got engaged I had a look around local bridal shops to where I live in Oswestry, Shropshire, and talked to other people, and everyone seemed to have nothing but good things to say about Trisha's. Having heard all these good things, I called them up to make an appointment to pop in to try on some dresses the next Saturday (3rd August), thinking that then I could get some ideas ready for when I went shopping with my bridesmaids the following week (10th August).

I was so excited I couldn't actually wait until the Saturday, and on the Friday I popped over to the shop in my lunch break to have a look around. Trisha herself was in the shop and was more than happy to spend a bit of time talking to me about what I'd be looking for and to show me around the private showrooms where dozens of beautiful dresses were hanging on racks ready to be tried on. Most importantly, when I told her the date of the wedding, she said it wasn't going to be a problem and that it would be perfectly possible to get a dress in that timescale.

On the Saturday I went back with my friend Rachel to give a second opinion on anything I found. Trisha was lovely, and had pulled out a few dresses ready for me to try on after remembering what I'd said the previous day. I was really impressed, and it was one of the ones she suggested that I eventually went for.

When it came to ordering the dress she said that they say it's a 16 week delivery timescale, but then reassured me by saying she wouldn't order in anything unless she was sure it would be in in time for any alterations to be done. She also said that even if it went down to three days before the wedding, they could take care of any last minute changes because they do all the alterations in store.

A few days later I got a call from Trisha again to tell me that the estimated delivery date was going to be 23rd October - a full month before the wedding. She then said I should feel free to pop in or call any time if I had any questions of concerns.

The staff in the shop were lovely, the experience of trying on dresses was really relaxed and fun, I found the perfect dress, and it was well within my budget and actually cheaper than I thought it would be!

Trisha's
57-59 Beatrice Street, Oswestry, Shropshire SY11 1QR
e: trishasbridalwear@hotmail.co.uk
t: 01691 671133
w: trishasbridalwear.co.uk

Choosing a hairstyle

I love beardy fiancé dearly, but as far as my hair goes, he has terrible timing for trying to arrange a wedding!

A few months ago I cut off my 15" long ponytail and donated it to the Little Princess Trust - a charity which makes wigs for children with cancer. After the chop I had my hair styled really short and it's not even grown back out as far as my chin yet.

Now my hair does grow really quickly, so I expect it will be down to my shoulders by the wedding, but as I have really fine hair it does leave me a bit short on options for my hair style. I'm going to wear a veil, so it needs to be something that will fit in with that, but it would be nice if it also created some volume.

Some of the pictures I've been looking at for inspiration are here, with my comments.

 

I really like the waves in this hairstyle and the way the flowers fit in with the curls. It's a very natural look, but unfortunately I don't think it would work for me. My hair doesn't hold waves very well without masses of hairspray in it, and with the veil on top as well - assuming I could persuade it to stay - it would probably flatten any waves that did survive. Very sad, but that's my hair.

This is another quite natural look and I really like the bits soming down around her face. I'm not sure what's going on at the back of her head, but the front looks good, and I like the bit of extra volume she's got just behind her fringe. Definitely something to show my hairdresser when I go for a trial session.

This is the sort of style I'm thinking of, with bits around the face and the hair up at the back, but I think she has rather more hair than me! It's something I'll be experimenting with though, to see if I can do something along these lines - but a bit less messy.

In a similar vein but neater, I really like the way this works with the flowers in it. She obviously has much longer hair than me, but I like the way the hair is made more interesting with a few little embellishments. I'll be looking on eBay to see what sort of clips and decorated bobby pins are out there before I go to the hairdresser to see if I can find something that will go with my dress. It's also something I can give to the bridesmaids to tie all of our looks together.

I think this is my favourite picture that I've found so far. It's a lovely, soft, romantic look that's not too messy but not so neat that you'd notice if a few strands came loose. I can't quite see what's going on at the back, but it seems to have a lovely shape to it.

Another soft, romantic look, this is quite a simple style but I think it would look quite nice with a veil and wouldn't get squished or disarranged too much by it. The only problem with this is that the top is quite flat, and I'm not sure I'll have enough hair to pull it off. It's worth bearing in mind though.

• A lot of these looks came from a wedding hairstyles blog that I found and immediately bookmarked.

How expensive are flowers?!

My sister-in-law offered to help with any bits of research I wanted doing for the wedding - venues, hair stylists, and so on. So I decided to take advantage of her offer and ask her to find out what sort of flowers will be in season (and so comparatively cheap) in November.

I'm really not too fussed about the type of flowers I have in a bouquet. When I was first thinking about the wedding, before we had a date, I was imagining a spring wedding and thinking a wildflower bouquet would be nice. I'm not really into the very formal arrangements, and I wanted something simple but pretty, and fitting in with the colour scheme which is mostly dark green. That, I thought, would make it simple because any flowers would go with the colour scheme!

Sister-in-law came back with a list of flowers which would be in season - (top row) narcissus, bouvardia, (bottom row) agapanthus and september, which I believe is a type of aster.

Because she went to a florist to make enquiries, she thought it would be rude not to get a quote as well. The reply - £75. When she told me I was flabberghasted (which is a fabulous word that's not used often enough). I couldn't believe that a simple bunch of flowers would cost so much. It reinforced something that darling beardy man (aka fiancé) has been saying all along - as soon as you mention the word 'wedding', whoever you're talking to will double the price at least.

So having discovered how shockingly overpriced the flowers are, I'm not seriously considering doing them myself.