Petals & Pumpkins: Wedding

Today's guest post is brought to you by Naz who blogs over at Odd Socks N All Sorts.

I don't believe I am the best person to give anyone advice on planning their wedding or even tips as to the little things that may help. To be honest most of my wedding day and the planning prior to it was a whirlwind and a blur. You may be able to relate to that aspect of the planning but trust me when I say the rest was definitely not a 'normal' wedding day.

To give a bit of background I come from a very academic Asian family, by the time I was able to speak I knew what I wanted to be and what I needed to do to get there. Priority was studying and achieving the grades required to get there. Basically I wanted to be a Consultant Paediatrician I even knew what University I wanted to go too. Safe to say I was very career minded and so were my siblings, it was how we were brought up. Don't get me wrong we did have fun as well but studying came first.

Lets jump a few years and explain that my dreams did not come true. I was one grade away from getting into my desired University and studying medicine. So I wanted to take a gap year, but that was a big NO!!. So instead of doing medicine I ended up studying law and going to a University that I didn't know …. that's another story for another blog.

The relevant bit is during studying law I met a guy who was the guy I wanted to spend the rest of my life with.. you know that warm gushy feeling that you get when you see someone, or you miss them when they are not around. Your constantly texting, talking to them or staying over at theirs, well that was me a few years ago (a couple of decades now) wow that makes me feel old!!

The problem was that I knew my parents wouldn't a) like him b) accept that I was in love

c) entertain the idea of marriage.

So after discussing the problems that I had with my future husband lets call him John the only option available to us was to elope and get married. Even that sounded romantic at the time. The whole secrecy just added to the intensity of our feelings and the future that was ours for the taking.

Since I was not able to discuss the proposed marriage with my family, we needed some help. John wrote to his parents and spoke to them and explained the situation I spoke with them too- they seemed lovely and genuinely happy for us. They lived overseas and only came to the UK on holidays so I wasn't able to meet them. However John had a lot of family in the UK – uncles, aunties, cousins and a brother.

By now I had got my law degree and needed to do the training and went up north to Yorkshire for this part of it. John came too when he could but it was difficult as my siblings would come and stay over at the weekends and drop in.

Basically I had lied to them, as I was in love. They would ask me questions about boyfriends etc. but I would say "I don't have time" as I'm career minded. Don't get me wrong I felt horrible lying to them, I was living a lie every time I was with them, it was tearing me up inside.

I was in love, it was the only way and once we were married, then I would introduce them to him and they will love him just like me.

I digress so we had limited funds for this wedding so it had to be a registry office. It seemed ideal that the registry office should be in the town that we both went to University and met. So we started making inquiries about dates and prices. I had to take time off work which was hard and it had to fit in with John's family hosting the after party.

Honestly once we had a date and ironically their was only one date left the in registrars books everything had to revolve around that. Johns parents knew it was in November but coming from a hot climate they were not coming over and catching their death of cold in November- funny really.

John liased with his brother for me to spend the night there and I invited a handful of my best mates as it was and had to be a small event. John's cousin was amazing she told us to focus on the wedding and she will deal with the catering and hosting of the after party. That took a load off my mind. As far as I was concerned all I had to do was find a frock and turn up.

One minor detail I have missed out and may be important I was and still am a major tomboy. Jeans and tops was what I lived in and still do to a point.

Its so bad that my mates even had to ask that I was sure that I was wearing a white dress (as I usually live in blue or black)- the cheek of them!! but I knew that they were just making sure.

Ok so in my noddy guide to the DIY wedding the following points had been checked:-

1. Potential Husband

2. Date

3. Venue

4. After Party (and all that comes with it)

5. Guests

6. Outfits

7. Transport

8. Vows

9. Married

You see all of the above had been dealt with except number 9.

We came to Johns brothers from Yorkshire and I became ill I don't know if it was nerves, not telling my parents or just what I had eaten but I was ill!! John refused to leave me ( the whole not seeing the bride before blah de blah went out the window).

We awoke to hear that Lady Diana had been killed, not a good start to the day….

We were running late and had to get from one end of London to the other and the car wasn't starting, so we took the train and tube.

It wasn't until we got the registry office and met with the registrar, me truthfully sweating like a pig, not very graceful, and going through our vows, that anyone had ever mentioned the fact that rings were important and that we needed them!!!.

Luckily we knew the area and ran to H Samuels, bought the cheapest wedding bands as we were officially skint now and ran back to the registry office to meet with family and friends.

In all the madness I hadn't noticed I'd forgot to bring a change of shoes and was wearing a beautiful white dress with black court shoes- trust me not a good look!!

However it was too late… we were called in…

We came out married!!!!

We were then driven to Hubbys cousin's to have a good old fashioned knees up – the company was great the food was wicked the toasts were apt, then we all danced the night away.

Truthfully all the stress lies and deception building up to the marriage was at that point worth it- everything was perfect, I had married into a loving caring fun loving family and I was being spoilt rotten. Accepted for who I was and no judgement being passed about why my family wasn't there- I felt so lucky and humbled by their love.

I had married into a fun loving mad family and I couldn't have been happier…..

A great addition to any wedding is some bunting or garlands hanging on the walls or across the ceilings; it’s even good for outdoor venues. Giving an extra dimension to your décor it’s a fab wedding DIY. Traditional fabric bunting looks lovely but if you are looking for something easy and inexpensive to make that you can personalise to your theme then some paper bunting or a garland is the way forward.

Here’s how to make your own paper bunting or paper garland in a few easy steps.

Firstly plan to get your wedding helpers together and feed them pizza and wine; the first step in any great wedding DIY. Maybe hold off on the wine until after the bunting is finished!

Gather a collection of sturdy papers that match your colour scheme.

There are various ways to create shapes for your bunting or garland. If you have access to a die cutter, you can use your favourite dies to cut lots of shapes. If you can’t use a die cutter you can draw out or trace chosen shapes and cut them with scissors or a craft knife on a cutting mat. You can also buy ready cut shapes but this limits your paper choices. I cut these shapes using a Sissix Big Shot and various dies.

Lay out your shapes to get an idea of how they will go together.

Some of the shapes I used were too small for me to add to the string on their own and some die cuts were layered. If you have any shapes like this, assemble them using a small bit of PVA, a glue stick or some double sided tape or sticky pads.

Decide on the kind of string you will be using. My shapes were too small for jute twine which looks great so I used some neutral cotton thread. Cut your string to the lengths you want them to be.

If you have large shapes, a regular hole punch might do but ideally one of these punches with smaller options would be best. You can get one for around £5 on Amazon or even better, ask around to borrow one!

When you punch holes into your shapes, remember that if they are not double sided, you wont want them to turn on the string and you should create two holes. Once you have punched all of your shapes and placed them in the order that you want them to be on the string, you can start threading. I used a large needle to make this task a bit easier. Thread the string through one hole from the FRONT feeding the string across the back of the shape and out through the second hole (back to front).

Once all of your shapes are on and you are happy with the spacing, tie the string at either end creating ‘hanging loops’