We knew we wanted 19.2 caret gold (Portuguese gold is unique in that it comes in 19.2 caret rather than the 18 caret that is seen in the rest of the world) to match her engagement ring.

After trying many shops, we settled on 2 rings from the shop we almost got the engagement ring from. They are actually commitment rings, but I wanted a lightweight band, rather than anything chunky.

Fortunately we managed to order them to arrive before we flew back to England. They are made of white gold, and I think look really good (as long as I don’t get fatter fingers between now and June – I wanted a tight band).

Can’t wait to put them on for real!!

After the last post I meant to write one completely dedicated to the wedding invitations. Unfortunately a lot of things happened and between job hunts, PhDs and exams, we barely have time to sit down.

We decided early on that we would make our own wedding invitations. It would be cheaper and a lot more fun! Even better, Steph (Russ’s sister-in-law) has a scrapbook business so she could give us invaluable advice. She even offered to make them herself, but I’m a ‘bit’ of a control freak and I wanted to have my hands on them.

In any case, she helped us a lot! She took us to a place where we could buy the card and paper a lot cheaper than anywhere else (we would never find it ourselves) and she found these gorgeous little cards to put on the invitation. They were so cheap we couldn’t believe it, and they can even be used for thank you cards!

She also gave us tape and all sorts of stuff I didn’t even know existed to complete the cards (sorry, I have no idea what the technical names are :-$ ), and she taught Russ how to use this gadget to fold and cut and stuff. Because it was still early we didn’t do everything but now we need to finish the invitations in Portuguese so we can give them to people when we go there on the new year. We printed the insides, all we need now is to cut them and glue them, which we expect to do this Christmas

Thanks Steph, for your great help with the invitations. I have a feeling we will still need your help with them, but Russ is the talented one and it was a surprise how interested he was in it :P.

P.S.- we also took Dana’s advice on the chair covers and signed a contract. The contract with the photographer is also signed and I went and took my measurements for the dress. All systems go!

So we have been overloaded with work and this website has not been updated in a long time. Many things have happened since the last post so I’ll just try to summarise it here.

- Bouquets: We bought and received mine and the bridesmaids bouquets. They are silk with the colour scheme I chose (red and white). They look lovely and they were quite cheap as well. And we can keep them for a long time. So adding this to the centre pieces for which we have the material already, the flowers: all done!

- Bridesmaids dresses and jewellery: They have all arrived and the dresses are lovely I also bought the jewellery already, again within the budget, and it looks fantastic. Jemma tried it all on yesterday and she looked stunning

We went to Derby this last weekend to take care of a few things and so I could have a girls night out with Russ’s family. It was really nice! I knew some of them and other met them at the restaurant and they are lovely. The best part is that two of Russ’s cousins (Dana and Kate) are getting married at around the same time we are.

So this weekend:

- Registrar: We delivered all the documentation in hand so it’s all set. All we need is a meeting with them closer to the date to discuss vows and other ceremony stuff.

- Dress: I finally ordered it. And I’ve decided for ‘The One’. I realised that no matter how many dresses I tried, I always had that one in my mind and I would regret not having it.

- Photographers: We spent the weekend meeting photographers so we could choose one that was both affordable and we felt comfortable with. It was exhausting! Some of them were good but too expensive, other were truly horrible . In the end we went for a woman we really felt comfortable with. She’s young, nice, her style is what we like and she is cheap! We are just waiting for the contract to be sent. We’ll write something more about it once things are set.

- Chair covers: Dana told us about a wedding exhibition so we all went there to look for bit that we are still missing like chair covers. We saw a lot of stuff, including a fashion show (none of the dresses really impressed me). One of the companies for chair covers was almost within what we were expecting but then Dana told us about another one even more affordable Thanks!!!

So in the end it was a very fun weekend and it was great to have Russ’s family involved. It was also very tiring… But I glad to say that we have almost everything sorted out! And there’s still months to go! Really enjoying it!

Finally after much searching I found my wedding shoes. It was quite difficult as most at pointy or open at the front. But finally got them and cheaper than expected

My advice?

Look in all the shops that sell any kind of shoes. All of them, even places like Next and John Lewis. You may be surprised with what you find.

Yesterday we also received the part of the stuff we are going to use to make our table centre pieces. It’s a lot more fun doing it ourselves and I thing it’s really going to work.  Russ tried it last night and success!!!

It’s all coming into shape

It has been a nightmare to find a bridesmaid dress that I like. If there was actually one I like it would be the wrong colour, or too expensive. I’ve been through every shop available, online, all of them. Finally I found one! Well within budget, the right colour, the perfect shape. Only it was by catalogue so no idea if it was really what it seemed to be or if the fabric was nice enough.

Well Sophie ordered one to try, we went visit this weekend, and… !!!!!!!!!!!!! It is even better than I thought! The shape and colour are perfect and the fabric is much better than the very expensive ones I saw. So today I ordered the other two and we will see if the sizes are good. If not we can always send them back. So happy! And so jealous! I have to buy one for myself!

So got what I wanted: a beautiful dress that they can wear again, comfortable and within budget. That and the jewellery will be my gifts to the bridesmaids Still searching but have a pretty good idea about what I will get. The shoes, I’ll leave it up to them. Having very sensitive feet I know how much comfort is important so they can choose whatever they like. Make up and hair, well they can talk to each other and see if they want to have them the same or not.

It was a fantastic weekend. I had some appointments to try on wedding dresses and Sophie, Sue (Russ’s mum) and I had so much fun! The conclusion was that The One is still The One! Tried it on again and the feeling was the same. The others don’t even compare.

We then carried on, all of us girls, to town to search for shoes and accessories (while the boys went shopping for groceries and baked some nice pastries). Didn’t find the shoes but found my jewellery :D. It is gorgeous and so cheap as well, special price. I even got two sets to have a choice on the day all below budget. It was a great weekend and we girls had a lot of fun. Should do it again soon!

Mark it in your calendars!

Finally, after the contract was perfect, signed and sent, we provisionally booked the date at the Derby registrar and we booked an appointment to give notice of our wedding at the Milton Keynes registrar.

The cheque for the venue was also sent and the wedding insurance was bought.

It’s all on the way now and if all goes according to the plan, we will get married on Sunday, 28th June 2009 at 3 pm

Still lot’s to do though, and the bugetting has been adapted. Oh dear wedding are expensive!

In all the excitement of getting the blog looking and working great, it’s easy to forget the real reason we made this page! So getting back on track, I wanted to show Cat’s engagement ring, and how we got it.

After buying our commitment rings in Lisbon last year, we decided to buy an engagement ring there too. They seem to have a better choice (English high street stores all seem to sell the same products), and the prices are slightly better as well. We first visited Rua do Ouro (Gold Street) which is obviously the place to start when looking for a gold ring.

We were looking for a solitaire diamond ring, in white gold (which I prefer over yellow gold every time) and have a low set diamond (most rings have a huge mount the stone sits on – probably to make the small diamond seem much bigger). Oh and all this for less than a king’s ransom.

The second shop we looked in had a fantastic ring that seemed to fit all our requirements, it even perfectly fit Cat’s ridiculously small fingers. Sadly it was over our budget. Plus having nothing else to compare it to, we sadly had to move on.

After looking in dozens of other stores, all comparisons came back to that first special ring. We agreed that every one we saw after that was always having to live up to the first one. To make sure we weren’t making it out to be something amazing when it wasn’t, we went back to the shop and looked again. It was still the best ring we’d seen. It was still very expensive.

We gave up for the day. The next day, after plenty of web research about diamonds (carat, cut, clarity and colour) we had a host of questions to ask the shop. Two phone calls later (over 2 days) and there was no contest. Screw bankruptcy, this was the ring we would always want!!

So off we went back to the store (we were up early that morning!) and asked to see it one last time. Cat handed over her plastic, and after a short scary wait wondering if being a foreign card was going to cause a problem, the magic machine stole all our money, and we were one diamond ring richer.

It’s the best ring I’ve seen (can’t get over the habit of looking at rings when we walk through town) and every penny is worth it. It’s so shiny and pretty!!