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

In the UK as well as many other places (all but Las Vegas) it is necessary to register the upcoming marriage at the Register Office. Cat booked an appointment a few weeks back and we went yesterday.

After ensuring we were who we said we were, we had to individually answer a series of questions without helping each other. This is more difficult than it sounds. Also, you have to let the registrar ask the full question without interrupting them. All these legal requirements seems a bit over to top to me, but I guess as long as we end up married, we’ll jump through the hoops!

£60 lighter, we walked out and need to collect our certificates in a couple of weeks. Anyone passing by the MK Register Office in the next 15 days can see our notice posted up!

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!

With all the depression news and after becoming more aware of how much wedding stuff costs, budgeting became an important part of our lives. I was the main budgeter but after a few arguments on how much money we really have I decided to pass the burden to Russ. IT geek as he is, he found a software that keeps everything in order. I was happy to realise that all my previous hand-made budgeting was correct and I may have found a new career .

Anyway, the news are worrying. We are going to struggle to pay for the wedding. We already reduced the guest list to a minimum, trying to not alter our idea of the wedding we want. We are now reducing everything else but still I may not be able to get The One dress :-(  We will still have a fantastic wedding though, I’m sure! It’s all part of the fun  and budgeting is still one of my favorite activities (and now Russ’s as well) and nothing like a good challenge to keep things interesting.

Let’s hope things improve, keep your fingers crossed

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!

Picking our venue was only half the battle. Once we’d decided where to hold our wedding, the next step was to let them know, so they could send us out a contract. We got in touch, and after lots of questions, emails bounced forwards and backwards, we got a copy of the contract in the post.

Apart from Cat’s name being completely wrong (mine was perfect which was unusual), there were still a few other things not on the contract that worried me (no drinks package, no sign of a discount for having a Sunday wedding etc).

More to-ing and fro-ing ensued, but I’m glad to say we’ve managed to get a contract we are happy to put our names on. We just need to know who exactly to pay, and where to send it to. Please, we want to give you money!!

My next tasks are phoning the registrar in Derby to make sure we have someone to perform the ceremony, as well as call the Milton Keynes office so we can give notice of marriage. Also I have to find wedding insurance. So it’s getting busier, and it will only get worse from here!

Last weekend Cat and I travelled up to Derby to try and find a venue to host our wedding. We plan to have the ceremony, breakfast and evening reception all under one roof, but there are a limited number of places registered to hold marriages.

So armed with a list of a dozen or so, we filtered out about 5 or 6 we really liked the look of (they looked nice and were reasonably priced!) and phoned up to book appointments to go and see them. In no particular order they were:

Derbyshire County Cricket Club - The England vs South Africa cricket teams were playing so it was a hive of activity. My dad would happily have stayed! The venue was very nice, and fairly modern. We’d have been happy there. The prices were quite low too.

The Stuart Hotel - A shambles. The guy showing us round couldn’t care less, and by the time the girl our appointment should have been with turned up, we were already mentally out of the door.

Derby Conference Centre - An ex-British Rail building, it is quite nice on the outside, but inside it was still too much like a conference centre to be a strong candidate for a wedding venue.

Coopers Arms - Very nice, I’ve been to a wedding there before. Just a bit too expensive, but a nice old house feel to it.

Pride Park - One of Cat’s favourites, more so that us so called Derby fans! Mark who showed us round was a star and couldn’t have been more helpful. We got a free tour of the stadium, I got to go out to the pitch, and we saw the changing rooms too. Would have been great to get married with the view of the pitch in front of us!

The International Hotel - The cheapest of them all, and you can see why. If money had been very tight, it would have been ok, but as it stands, we saw better for not a fortune more. Needs quite a bit of updating.

Mickleover Court Hotel - Perfect. Absolutely stunning hotel. Fantastic quality feel to it. And strangely, very reasonably priced. A winner all round. It had everything. Great looks, swimming pool and gym, free room for the bride and groom, and a lovely manor to take photos just around the corner. We knew immediately that this was the one, and it would have taken something incredible to dislodge it from our hearts!

We are just in the final stages of booking the venue and registrar for the day. Of all the venues we saw, money aside, the Mickleover Court Hotel really was the one that stood out for us. You can see more of it here - Menzies Mickleover Court Hotel. A perfect venue for the perfect marriage!!

So on an English wedding, the bride is supposed to have bridesmaids to help her with everything necessary. So instead of a godmother and godfather as in Portugal, I could choose several bridesmaids.

Unlike Russ, who set up a romantic scene to ask Johnno to be his best man, I just informed them selected few:’By the way you are going to be my bridesmaid, just thought I should inform you.’ No chance for a ‘No’

So they are (in alphabetic order):

Jemma: Although we’ve only met 2 years ago, she has been my best friend in this country, someone reliable, and my shoulder to cry on and my company for the crazy girly moments. She is even more organised than me

Sophie: Russ’s sister. Unfortunately I don’t know Sophie as much as the previous but I hope that can change. She was 16 when I met her and she immediately impressed me with her maturity, intelligence and,most of all, kindness. As she grows and I get to know her better, she keeps surprising me as she is turning into a fantastic young woman. And she is funny too. I say that she has Russ’s sense of humor but she is actually funny

Vanda: What can I say about Vanda? I’ve known her for more than a decade and we’ve been through so much from university to holidays, to so many moments together. She has been there for my bad and also for my good times. For all occasion she is a friend I cherish beyond words. I just wish she was here with me

I don’t think I could ask for better bridesmaids then these 3 young ladies. And I know I can count on them just as they can count on me (L)