#WeddingWednesday - Reader, I married him

Mr & Mrs Brown 

Well reader, I am now officially Mrs Brown! October 3rd was such a special and memorable day. I am back at work today which is not so special and memorable in comparison! So with that in mind I've put together my top tips for brides & grooms for the immediate days after your wedding day:

Wear something really special the day after 

your wedding

The thought of pulling on jeans and a t-shirt the day after my wedding nearly brought me to tears. You've just worn what was potentially the most awesome outfit of your life and you are bookending it with jeans? No. Way. I wore my trusty H&M Trend Jumpsuit with my Jimmy Choo wedding shoes. Yes I was tired, yes I was emotional, yes my face wasn't nearly as awesome as when Natalie Willingham waved her bridal make-up wand over it the day before but my jumpsuit made me feel really glam and was a gentle step down rather than a gigantic lurch away from my wedding dress. Rich wore a vintage wool blazer and an awesome Zara shirt. Yep - natty dressers united! Team Brown!

Carry tissues at all times

The beach at Sheringham - there may or may not have been some joyful weeping standing on this beach

At risk of sounding like a right Nana this one has proved particularly useful. My emotions have been so close to the surface for the past month that my propensity for joyful weeping is at critical mass. I didn't weep on my wedding day until our first dance when Rich gallantly kissed away the torrent of tears coursing down my face. There's a really awkward photo of us at the end of our first dance where my face is stricken with panic - the thought running through my head was

"crap - I think I've ruined my make-up." 

We went to Norfolk for our mini-moon where I had many a moment of pure bliss including standing on the high street in Sheringham: the sun was shining, the sky was blue, I could see the sea, I had just bought a beautiful gift for my friend's new baby, Rich and I were hand-in-hand and BOOM: joyful weeping.  My weeping consists of those hot tears that just spill out of your eyes. I don't really make a sound but it can be quite unnerving for passers by so either use said tissues to mop up your tears or cover your face entirely, either way it's a bridal win.

Savour the magic and fairy dust 

The back of our wedding invites created by the wonderfully talented Becky Lord

Getting married, the lead up, rehearsal, ceremony and after-party is like being in a special bubble where you are buffeted by happiness and joy, carried along by smiles and hugs and wrapped in a big ole' blanket of love. Pretty much all this feeling is directed at you - people want to speak to you, they want to hug you, talk to you, share the love with you. I felt utterly blessed to have close friends and family surround us on our wedding day but the feeling of coming back to reality the week after was like waking up in a draining bath, cold and prune-like. Those special wedding day feelings are so immeasurably special because you don't feel them to that intensity everyday.  But you do still have some wedding day glitter, some sparkle, some marriage fairy dust at your disposal - you have the photos and more importantly, cherished memories. We started a memory box for our wedding - all the RSVP's, a copy of our invitation, the sweet bags we had printed, some of the bunting that my gorgeous sister-in-law kindly made for us, my headpiece and the pearls used to hand-tie my bouquet. Jeez - even writing this I'm fishing for a tissue!! Excuse me whilst I indulge in a joyful weeping moment ...

Til next time...x

#WeddingWednesday - to Choo or not to Choo, that is the question

So I obviously Choo-ed

Searching for 'wedding shoes' has been a relatively easy process. Discounting all the satin ivory horror stories that showed up on my Google searches, I did spot a magnificently sparkling shoe on a blogger's feed on Instagram. A shoe from Dune that was part of the Autumn/Winter collection - I didn't let that put me off. I dropped an email to Dune customer services - when and where can I get said shoe? In September came the answer, and it won't be country wide, you can't pre-order and we can't send you the press office sample. 

Ok.

I left it a couple of weeks, headed off on some awesome family holidays (yes, there were 2) and when I came back I arranged a tea with my mate Laura. I said, "let's go and get my wedding shoes". Laura owns and runs Manor Drive, a pre-loved Dress Agency selling designer items and she has the best taste ever. She was HORRIFIED to think I was getting some satin ivory heels for my big day. 

After we finished our brews we headed for Selfridges, and the mecca that is Jimmy Choo. There was no contest, the battle of the wedding shoes was won fair and square by Jimmy. Sorry, Dune. These bad boys are super comfy (I'm pictured here wearing in my Choo shoe babies whilst in my pyjamas - they go with everything, right?!) and they look AWESOME. The idea of getting some super awesome (and yes, super expensive) wedding shoes had been rattling around my mind for a few months. These are shoes that I can keep and wear again and again, unlike my dress unless I run out of clothes one day and decide to go to Tesco in it. 

We had a final meeting about the flowers last night and I could picture Rich and I in the church, saying our vows, surrounded by friends and family, and a huge wave of joy rushed over me. 

I am so excited - my wedding outfit is coming together, loose ends are being tied as we speak. It all feels so, so real now.

Til next time...x

#WeddingWednesday - #Hen Hen Hen Hen Hen Hen

What an awesome Hen Do day - afternoon tea, spa and a tasty meal. Having been teetotal for nearly 5 years it was a low key, chilled affair minus veils, willies, that Mr & Mrs quiz, and the dreaded L plates; I drank elderflower presse whilst my hens sipped Prosecco. My trademark red lips were the order of the day and most of my hens turned up to greet me with a slash of red lippie in my honour - go team Hen!

Most of my hen clan were school friends - The Halifax Girls - who I have known since the grand old age of 11 years old. We went to different universities, have lived in different cities and countries but have always stayed in touch. It's one of those friendships that's like slipping on an old jumper - it always works. Then there were 2 really good mates from my mid 20's in Manchester. I share memories of many nights out with them and a particularly awesome holiday to Ibiza, plus both their Hen Do's. My uni friend, Jen, who was my chief organiser and British Cheerleader during our year abroad. We spent a year at The University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign (yes, it's a real place) surviving a tornado, 9/11 and the lure of coming home with an American accent. My sister, Penny and my sister-in-law also made the trek up from London to enjoy all Manchester had to offer. And last but not least, my dear friend Dawn who was my 1st Wardrobe Angel client and my mate Joban (real name Emily) who I share a love of hysterical films with. Her nickname came about after watching I Love You Man. My nickname is Carlos from The Hangover - the 1st film we saw together.

A gleeful Joban after finding her "perfect" moustache.

Greeting my friends I was filled with mixed feelings; joy and anxiety. I was the only person in the room who knew everyone. All the threads of my life were right in front of me, so many shared histories, stories and experiences. Would everyone get on? But, in true northern style, the ice was well and truly broken when one of the first topics of conversation was waxing of the lady garden area. My favourite part of the day was when I was presented with a bag of gifts - one from each hen - but with no labels attached so I had to guess which gift was from which hen. The gift was something that reminded the hen of me. I was bowled over by the hilarity of some of the gifts (a picture of David Crystal springs to mind) and by the thought that had gone into some. The frame which two of the Halifax hens had collaborated on made me well up - it was an A-Z of Stephanie Ann Roper:

How utterly blessed I felt to be surrounded by this gang of immense, shiny, sparkly women who I am lucky enough to call friends. Friends who know me inside out, have stood by me, supported me, laughed with me (and at me), and for whom the door is always open . 

So with my Hen Do a funny and long lasting memory, Rich and I are on the "6 weeks to go" wedding home straight. We've finalised the seating plan, the Order of Service and dished out the usher's jobs. I have my wedding shoes and a clutch of appointments to get my dress altered and my head piece finalised. 

It's going to be here before I know it, isn't it?

#WeddingWednesday - The emotionless robot that is Royal Mail

With an arbitrary system of weights and measures, Royal Mail has made inviting people to our wedding a whole lot more difficult. After posting our invites on Tuesday 7th July I felt really giddy - like the wedding was really happening. At first we received a steady stream of texts saying "LOVE THE INVITES" and swift RSVP's (Auntie Libuff - you win the award for quickest RSVP for the Brown wedding) lulling us into thinking that all our invites had been happily received. 

Then I was made aware that a cousin in London hadn't received anything in the post. Then 2 friends. Then Rich's mum told Rich she'd had to pay extra postage for hers and had to collect it from the Post Office. Cringe. Extra postage?? Cripes we should've got them weighed before we posted them. That one is on us. But why oh why Royal Mail have you delivered some (postage was obviously fine) and not others? A few postcodes in London received their invites without issue, yet a postcode in Manchester has had to pay an extra £1.20 excess postage. I'm in awe of how arbitrary the system is, and how bureaucratic - each invite was 20p under postage but the admin fee for each to get delivered is £1. Talk about a self-serving industry. 

As it stands today half the invites have been delivered no problems, a quarter have had to pay excess postage (sorry ladies and gents!) and a quarter are still missing in action with the recipients receiving no invite and no letter of excess postage. Now this is where Royal Mail have been no help - I can happily give them the addresses and postcodes of these missing invites to locate them, but they won't consider them missing until 27th July. The thing is, we need all our RSVP's by the 31st July. 

I had a tiny glimmer of hope yesterday that the Royal Mail PR machine would swoop down and turn this thing around but alas my communication with them has been akin to communicating with an emotionless robot who has clearly never planned a wedding. 

Luckily friends and family have been awesome and incredibly understanding - we've received texts saying:

"It's ok; we know when we aren't wanted *winky smiley*"

"I'm sure I can find a quid down the back of the sofa to pay the postage"

"I think it's bloody genius you've essentially made us pay for an invite to your wedding"

to one friend "refusing" to come unless we reimburse him the £1.20 excess postage he's had to pay (Ben - you'll be reimbursed at the wedding). Rich pointed out, as I had a little weep over the invite list last night, we're lucky to be in a close network with everyone reachable by phone and Facebook. 

It seems this kind of pre-wedding mix up can happen to the best of us - just this morning at a networking event my friend Sarah said she'd managed to post a fistful of her wedding invitations without any stamps at all. Phew! Hearing that story made me giggle - I'm never been a bride for whom everything has to be "perfect" - so it's good to know that the path to a wedding can sometimes be bumpy.

So please taketh this lesson away from today's #WeddingWednesday blog post - 

always weigh your wedding invites before you post them

It will save you a heck load of trouble and if they do go missing, don't expect Royal Mail to do anything for you. 

Amen. 

#WeddingWednesday - Invitation Only

And so to our wedding invites. Ever since Rich proposed I had my heart set on ordering our wedding invites from Becky Lord Design. I've been following her on Instagram for ages, impressed by her visual aesthetic, use of colour and all round friendly tone. Her Fetti wedding stationary was one of the first pictures to make it on to my secret Wedding Pinterest board.

We ordered her stationary pack from Etsy so we could see the samples of her House Collection wedding stationary before we made a final decision. When it arrived I felt like I had been sent a gift: beautifully presented, the wedding stationary samples were wrapped in tissue paper and a free pencil with heart soaring inspirational wording was included to boot. How's that for business branding?!

With some wedding related decisions it's been instant: the church for instance, having fish & chips at our wedding breakfast was another swift choice. But other decisions have felt really hard to make - even though Fetti had been my original choice, we deliberated over Writer and Bodoni for 3 hours one Sunday morning. The hardest thing about organising our wedding has been keeping a fixed idea about what our wedding means to us - everyone has an opinion, is quick to tell you what they did, and in the nicest possible way tell you what you shouldn't do. So that's why I dithered from my original wedding invite decision: were we more of a Writer wedding? What would the Bodoni set say about our nuptials? Then at the bottom of the wedding stationary pack we uncovered The Huxley: a simple, rustic, come as you are kind of invite. Was that 'us'?

To clear my head I sat down one morning and did a moodboard for our wedding - pictures of what the venue will look like, swatches of material from Rich's suit and my dress, a picture of the wedding car I'll be transported to the service in. Nope - Fetti it was but with a change of colour palette. After what seemed like a gazillion emails from me starting in February and running into May, Becky, with endless patience, mocked up a Fetti invite and BOOM - it matched the feeling of our wedding:

chic and elegant yet informal and friendly

There is now less than 4 months until I become 'Mrs Brown' and I cannot wait to send out our invites when they arrive this Friday!! 

#WeddingWednesday - If your names not down, you're not coming in

Apologies for the lack of wedding related updates; I have been down to Telford, Bath, Bristol and Essex visiting new clients and sorting out many a wardrobe. Then there's the not so small matter of a TV show pilot in the pipeline. Wedding plans have been bubbling away in the background like a hearty stew on the stove nonetheless, and Rich & I sat down last weekend to write the final jobs "to do" list. The fact it is 5 sides of A4 has given me sweaty palms to say the least!

So what have we been doing? Our invites have been designed, ordered and printed. Penny, my sister and Maid of Honour, has her dress. I finally had a breakthrough with my flowers after what seemed like months of self-diagnosed "flower blindness" and our table centres have been crossed off the list with a huge sigh of relief. Searching for 10 vintage teapots in the land of Yorkshire where tea runs thicker than blood has been a tall task. We've managed it (albeit with a few broken lids and various expeltives along the way).

If you see any teapots like this on your travels let me know - better have too many than not enough.

Bar Christmas, I think we picked the worst time ever to register our Gift List with John Lewis: The Trafford Centre on Spring Bank Holiday weekend. Even the overflow car park was full as we queued to find a space amongst the off-roaded vehicles (or abandoned? Hard to tell) and the throng of shoppers. John Lewis know how to treat you right - they gave us a voucher for free tea and cake, set us up with a scanner and let us loose on their shopfloor. We scanned away amongst the throng of bank holiday shoppers. Dear God what a day! So. Many. People.

Wedding schizzle just got pretty real pretty quickly!!

When we moved in together it seemed like over the subsequent months we made endless trips to the charity shop to donate bedding, kitchenware, stuff. We are 2 adults in their 30's who have both set up homes and we have the material possessions to prove it so writing our wedding Gift List proved interesting: lots of things that would be lovely if we receive them but equally happy if we don't. Shopping for them was quite romantic, even though we shared it with what seemed like a gazillion other shoppers. It was also our 2 year anniversary that day so I was feeling the love as we picked out our matching toaster and kettle and some epic Cath Kidston mugs.

Finding my shoes has taken another huge weight off my mind and making some decisions about my make-up has set my mind at rest. There's less than 4 months to go and I alternate between "AAAAARGH!!!" and "I've got this."

Til next time...x

#WeddingWednesday - what about the Groom?

With my dress sorted and my mum's Mother of The Bride outfit in the bag, attention has turned to Rich. As soon as we started planning our big day people kept asking about my dress, what I was wearing (probably spurred on by my outpourings around wedding blindness and general ignorance in the bridal arena on this here blog!) and saying things like "it's the bride's day." Erm....really? Last time I checked there were 2 of us getting married. I didn't see why I should have all the fun sartorially speaking so we stretched the budget and asked Micheal Pendlebury (he off of The Denim Doctor and the TV show This Old Thing) to make Rich a bespoke suit for our wedding day.

A bespoke suit bit of a "once in a lifetime" kind of experience but so is our wedding so we figured why the heck not? 

After an initial meeting where Rich had various fabric swatches draped around his neck he selected the fabric and lining and Micheal took his measurements. He has since been for his first fitting where all the pieces are coming together! Micheal was also kind enough to send us a swatch of the lining and the material so we can colour match the fabric for the usher's suits.

In other wedding news I now have my engagement ring! People automatically say "let's see the ring!" when you let them know you now have a betrothed and for months I've felt like a bit of a fraud as my ring finger has been stark naked. We visited a myriad of jewellers and even toyed with the idea of getting one designed when one day on a trip to the tip and charity shop (that's domestic bliss right there!) we parked outside the Kingston Diamond Merchants and gravitated towards the window.

The first ring I tried on I felt the same swell in my heart that I had felt when I tried on The Wedding Dress.

This ring will be gracing my hand for the rest of my days and that feeling told me this ring was the one. 

Since picking it up after having it resized I feel like I've been lost in a time vortex sitting staring at it; I feel like such a lady grown-up!  And yes, Rich re-proposed with the ring after we picked it up!

Til next time...x

#WeddingWednesday - what do I wear in my hair?

We spent last weekend doing 'wedmin' - choosing our invites, finalising which baker gets to bake us a wheat free, dairy free cake, and sorting out our Gift Registry (thank John Lewis!) All the other elements of the wedding are coming together bit by bit so it has made me get 'the fear eyes' around the other elements of my outfits. I was greeted by a stress dream a few nights ago of what to put/wear in my hair on the BIG DAY. This lead to a freak out on Sunday afternoon followed by a frantic Pinterest session looking for inspiration and hoping for an answer, whilst Rich calmly and wisely exited stage left to make a lasagne.

What I'm finding very difficult is seeing how things fit together; I usually build an outfit from scratch by throwing laying items on my bed and adding and subtracting until the outfit feels 'done'. My wedding dress is currently being made, I don't have it to hand and so visualising what else to put with it has me in a panic ridden tailspin. To veil or not to veil, that is the question. Or is the question a tiny veil and a hat? Or no veil and a tiara? Or just a tiara? Or no tiara and a dead bird ala Carrie Bradshaw in her wedding outfit?

"I made the effort, I put a bird on my head."

I thought I was pretty set on having a veil after I tried one on when I went wedding dress shopping with my sister-in-law for her wedding dress a couple of years ago. In truth I was obsessed with the veil, I wanted to buy it and wear it then and there, parading around Reading in all my veiled glory. But when I was stood in my own gown (and the tears had subsided and the snotty tissues had been thrown away) they attached a veil to my head and

it looked a whole world of wrong. 

I didn't feel like me anymore; I felt swamped. like I was pretending to be something I wasn't.

So I need suggestions, help, advice, friendly comments about what my wedding head-gear should consist of. What did you wear? What didn't you wear and why? THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!

PS - 'the fear eyes' is a phenomenon my friend Emily noticed about me - when I don't like something or something scares me my eyes dilate uncontrollably, literally widening with fear. Hence, I get the fear eyes.

Shopping for my Wedding Dress (Part Three)

So I went online this week to try and cure my wedding dress blindness and put together a coherent wedding Pinterest board to send to my wedding florist, Cate Wood who owns Flowers at 180. I had had a tweet from Oxfam who directed me to their second-hand wedding dress site after hearing about my wedding dress dilemmas. Initially, when we got engaged, I adamantly told people I would find my wedding dress in a charity shop and buy some designer shoes to go with it which I would wear again...and again...and again. Sustainable shopping is one of the pillars of The Wardrobe Angel and half my wardrobe is from charity shops so it just felt right to go down this route.

Then something happened:

My Mum very, very kindly offered to buy my wedding dress. 

She remembered shopping for her wedding dress with my Nana as a pivotal moment in their relationship. I'm only going to do this (get married) once: so this kind of enduring, wonderfully special memory, this mother/daughter experience of wedding dress shopping was something I realised I wanted too. As Rich and I planned the guest list and the congratulation cards rolled in late last year, I realised that I had just been going through wedding planning motions, I forgot (or didn't quite realise) how many other people were supporting us and loving us during this frankly awesome time. (And I wasn't about to start dragging my Mum round every Oxfam in the area - she would not have been into that at all!) So I put down my ideas of a thrifted dress and dove head first (albeit terrified) into the wedding dress experience.

Even though I'm committed to trying dresses on in person, feeling the garments, seeing how they looked on me rather than on a picture on a model online, I did find an immensely awesome, minimal stylish label called Houghton based in New York. I spent a good hour browsing the bridal collection wistfully imagining the slim fitting dresses pulling like an elastic band on my 28F chest, dragging miles of fabric behind me as I'm at least a whole person shorter than the models. This was my wake-up call - yes the Houghton dresses are awesome and wonderfully aspirational but they aren't me. Not on my wedding day. They look perfect for weddings in castles, sleek registry offices, cool swanky London bars and on boat trips down the Thames. But a church wedding in Halifax followed by Fish and Chips? Pull the other one.

This is another big realisation I've had in wedding land - I've got to be realistic. I'm 5'3" and my weight is 7 1/2 stone. Too much fabric and I'll be like Alice slipping down the rabbit hole; blink and you'll miss me. Our wedding location isn't high profile, it isn't fantastically glam, but it's our home. And I want a dress which fits our bill, not the bill certain dresses give license for.

So onwards.... I've had so many positive messages from people...

"Just keep an open mind."

"Focus on hair and make-up so all the focus isn't on the dress."

And a lovely message on my blog from a lady who works in a wedding dress shop:

"Everyone is uncomfortable the first time they try bridal dresses on and why wouldn't you be?! You probably have never done it before and hopefully never will again!"

Thanks for all your messages and for reading... it's fun writing these blogs! 

PS - here's s bridal horror story if ever I saw one - click the link ... Brides ordering online receive dresses which can barely be called dresses, and certainly aren't a patch on what they thought they were ordering.