Our Day by Design

Happy Anniversary Mum & Dad On this day, 33 years ago, my parents got married. Five and a half years later, I came along and my sister followed almost 3 years after that. Doesn't my mum look beautiful, she was only 20 at the time so very young as well. Seeing as I will be 28 when I get married next year, I cant imagine getting married so young! Check out my dads moustache, very 70's! He looked very smart in his top hat and tails too but he now has a full kilt outfit which he will wear for my wedding. They only had 13 official pictures in their album, as well as a few snapshots. I loved getting the photos out and rummaging through them all. There were no photos inside the church though. My dad also noticed that they never had a photo of all the guests together and said it was something he would have liked to have been able to look at again. Definitely one for our photographers list! L-R: Best man Robert & Dad; My Granny Sophie (mums mum) & my aunt Janice (mums sist...

As you know, my bridesmaid and best friend Lucy is pregnant. She was due yesterday {29th July} and there is no sign of the baby yet! I also have another friend that is pregnant too. Angela was due last Friday {24th July} and she is still waiting for her baby too! Hopefully we will have some news from at least one of them this weekend! Cant wait to meet the new arrivals and I'm sure the mums to be cant wait either! Unfortunately, Angela lives down near London so I probably wont get to see her baby until I go down to see my new niece or nephew in September. Lucy lives nearby so we will be going to visit as soon as we can!

I finally managed to get a picture of Graham and his best man & cousin Andrew back in June when we were having a family barbecue for Grahams birthday. I am only just getting round to adding the picture and posting about it now but I have just updated my original bridal party post. Don't they look kind of alike? Although they are not as similar as they used to be and I still think that Hazel and Andrew look even more alike {their mums are identical twins!}

Back at the end of May {Sat 30th}, we went to have a look at some wedding rings at the jeweller where Graham got my engagement ring. We wanted to get an idea of what we could get and the prices but I'm only getting round to posting about it now! Graham pretty much knows what he wants and just needs to decide which metal to go for. I, on the other hand, haven't got a clue! Diamonds, a pattern, or plain??? I have definitely ruled out a pattern so that leaves the question of diamonds or not. I have started to collect a few examples of the sort of thing I like as the jeweller can make anything we want if they don't have it in stock. If I decide on diamonds {which I have to admit I am definitely leaning towards as who wouldn't love more diamonds and it is my wedding ring!}, I will have them offset to one side so that my engagement ring stone doesn't cover any of them. Valinta Grande Wedding Ring; Fusion Furio Diamond Wedding Ring; Princess Cut Diamond Wedding Ring (Ima...

...another 3.5lbs lost! Current Weight [25.07.09] - 10st 4.5lbs Total Loss = 30lbs Yippee, I have now lost over 2 stone! Just 4.5lbs to get to my next goal!

Although this isn't really related to anything, I came across this a while ago and meant to post it after I introduced my wedding colour since its in the same vein as the colorscope post. Pantone, the standard language for colour communication, have what they call Colorstrology , by Michele Bernhardt, which determines your colour & characteristics by your birthday, a bit like your star sign. So my birthday colour is Celestial (which I quite like) which means I should be Private, Independent & Quick Minded: ALTHOUGH YOU are independent and strong, there is a sensitive side of you that remains hidden. It is that side that needs to be acknowledged and understood because it holds many of your deepest wishes. Try not to hide your feelings especially from those who are trying so desperately to understand you. Many people born on this day have a gift for dance and music. Your personal color helps blend your inner and outer world. Wearing, meditating or surrounding yourself with C...

Due to my total excitement about our water villa in the Maldives , I completely glossed over the other half of our honeymoon, which I am also really excited about. I love discovering new countries and since we always knew that a full two weeks in the Maldives would get a bit boring for us {not to mention way out of our budget}, we are spending the first week doing Kuoni's Ceylon Tour around Sri Lanka. We have customised it slightly so that we are only having seven nights before flying to the Maldives. We are staying the first night at the Mount Lavinia Hotel in Mount Lavinia; followed by two nights at the Cinnamon Lodge in Habarana; two nights at the Chaaya Citadel in Kandy; one night at the Tea Factory in Nuwara Eliya before the final night back at the Mount Lavinia. During the week we will get to visit loads of the major sights in Sri Lanka which is exactly what we wanted since we are only there for a short time and want to make the most of it. We will have plenty opportunit...

...our honeymoon! Woo hoo, I'm so excited and cant wait - in 265 days time {following the wedding then a week of sightseeing in Sri Lanka}, we will be here: Coco Palm Bodu Hithi - Aerial View; Escape Water Villa Exterior; Escape Water Villa Interior (Images from here ; here ; here ) Apart from maybe a trip or two to the spa, I intend to do nothing but sunbathe on the deck and swim {or laze around} in the mini infinity pool, maybe with an occasional dip in the sea.

I came across this post via The Artsy Bride on her post here a while ago. BridalCheek wrote about the different phases of engagement that she and her friends had experienced {I've added my comments} : 1) Pre- Engagement You spend as much, if not more, time looking at wedding magazines and browsing bridal fashion shows {never did this before I was engaged at all, seemed like bad luck or something} , and inordinate amounts of time staring at engagement rings, whether in store windows {I did this with Graham in tow on a couple of occasions, just so he could see what sort of thing I liked of course} or on people’s fingers. But all secretly, and with a “no pressure” attitude {there wasn't much secrecy going on once we reached the 5 year mark!} . 2) Engagement Completely exhilarated, you call everyone you know {I called the parents and my sister straight away & text everyone else I know} , buy an enormous stack of wedding magazines {bought my first one at JFK for our fli...

We started thinking about the honeymoon a little while back but we couldn't do much about it since none of the flight / tour prices were out for April 2010. Originally our plan was to have 4 nights in Dubai staying at the Atlantis , then 4 nights in Sri Lanka before 7 nights in the Maldives. A mixture of beach, sightseeing and relaxing. However when we started looking at rough prices for other times of the year it was all starting to get quite a bit above our budget. To be able to stay at the Atlantis in Dubai would have meant we would have to stay at a much cheaper resort in the Maldives which we didn't really want to consider since its our honeymoon. There wasn't much point going to a cheaper hotel in Dubai as we have both been twice before and since its close enough to go for a short break some other time, we scrapped it off the honeymoon list and concentrated on Sri Lanka & the Maldives. We have looked at a few of the Kuoni tours in Sri Lanka as they seem to be the...

I had a lovely day yesterday with three of my bridesmaids. We started off at Rachel Scott where Helen and Karen-Louise tried on the bridesmaid dress we had seen previously . Since Lucy is heavily pregnant (and due in 10 days!) she couldn't try it on but I was able to try the dress to let her see what it may look like. They all agreed the dress was lovely and although the one we tried was the wrong colour, we were able to have a quick peek at the actual dress in the colour we want as the shop owner had one ready for someone else to pick up. This was really useful as its so hard to properly see from the tiny swatches. I have made an appointment on the 8t h of August to take Hazel to the shop to try the dress on too. Hopefully she will also like it. Ashleigh has already seen it, but like Lucy, since she is also pregnant, she wasn't able to try it on. We aren't going to get the girls measured until the end of October to give Ashleigh & Lucy a bit of time after their babies...

...no official weigh-in; I was looking at dresses with my bridesmaids instead! I didn't even use my home scales today. Now we are off to see Harry Potter!

I've been tagged! I'm very excited to have been tagged for the first time from a fellow British bride to be, the lovely Anna at anna and the ring ! The "rules" for this tag are: 1. Mention and link back to the person who tagged you. 2. List 6 little things that make you happy. 3. Tag 6 other bloggers and let them know they're "it". So I have to list 6 things that make me happy. Since I had the start of a draft post about some of my favourite things, the topic for this tag is somewhat appropriate and will allow me to include most of those things! OK, so here goes with my current list: 1. Stationery : I have always loved stationery (whats not to like about it) and I have been know to drag Graham and other members of my family around different paper shops in numerous cities {think leather bound journals in Italy and patterned paper, envelopes and ribbon from Kate's Paperie in NYC - a fantastic shop filled with any kind of stationery you could possibly ...

While I was doing my own dress searching, we had a look at a few bridesmaids dresses in each shop for ideas and since then I have been looking at others online from Dessy and Watters . I knew I wanted the girls to have long dresses but didn't really have any other must haves at the start. These are some of the ones I have looked at so far (although not in the colours shown for the Watters ones): L-R: After Six Style 6558; Dessy Style 2753; Watters Style 4249; Watters Style 1265 (Images from Dessy ; Dessy ; Watters ; Watters ) The one below is my favourite so far and I think it ties in quite well with my dress. I love the detail on the back and really like the straps too. I have emailed all the girls to let them see it and find out what they think. L-R: Dessy Style 2732 Front; Back (Images from here ) The colour I think we would go for is the concord, as shown above, as its the sort of deep purple colour I was looking for. Ashleigh went to have a look at it in a shop in London ...