Wedding Photos - At The Church

This week our wedding was featured on Love My Dress, which I was very excited about!  If you want an overview of our whole day go take a look over there, but of course I will be recalling it all in minute detail over then next few posts here!

When I left you last I was walking to the church and Chris was driving over along with his ushers in Pip.  And finally, the big moment had nearly arrived!

We got married in All Saints Church in Martin. I kept the order of service simple and typed out and printed them off myself at home.

The boys were obviously in the church well ahead of us to greet the our guests, and they would also be providing some music. Here's some nice pictures of a few of the boys before the service got underway.

There was a slight mishap before I arrived.  We had given my brother-in-law-to-be, Alfie, the very important job of signalling to the best man when I had arrived, so that they could start playing my entrance music. Unfortunately he got it slightly wrong and actually signalled to them when my mum arrived with the bridesmaids. Apparently much hilarity ensued, and my Mum still thinks she nearly married Alfie!  Since I didn't get to see it myself, I think the picture below captures the moment terrifically, Alfie's face is a picture!

We gave Best Man Ollie a rather tricky job when I decided that I'd like Elbow's 'One Day Like This' to be my entrance music, and I wanted him to play violin! He had some serious multi-tasking to do, but he did a fantastic job.

I must admit, I did get rather teary walking down the aisle. Partly because of my Dad setting me off, but also it was quite overwhelming walking into a room with so many of your friends and family, some of whom you haven't seen for a while, and of course, I was about to get married!

I was quite nervous about the service itself, I didn't really know what to expect. Luckily our vicar was amazing, he told lots of jokes and made the whole service really chilled out. In fact, I think Chris and I spent the entire service giggling away like school children!

As I got the the alter I realised I still had my engagement ring on! I had to pass it to my Dad in a bit of a panic and I don't think he had a clue what was going on since we hadn't rehearsed that bit!! So remember that ladies, maybe even take it off the day before if you can!

During the service my now Sister-In-Law Rosie read us A Lovely Love Story by Edward Monkton.  We picked it because it is a bit silly like us, but still has a really sweet sentiment.  My Uncle Danny also did a reading for us which was lovely. I really wanted to get him involved in the day as he and his family live in Canada, so we don't get to see them as often as we'd like at all.

During the signing of the register the band played, Africa by Toto, and Everywhere by Fleetwood Mac.

At the end of the service the band followed the procession out whilst playing which a lot of the guests commented on.  Then we had them sang 'the confetti song' in order to get the guests to pick up some confetti on their way out. It was basically them singing 'come on and get some confetti' to the tune of The Conga.  Meanwhile Chris and I nipped round the back of the Church and went in the back door, so that we could re emerge through the front for everyone to cover us in confetti!

Everyone said what a great service it was, so we were really pleased about that. I am so glad we decided to have lots of live musicians play though out the service, I think it really made a difference.

Laura xXx

Secret Cinema - Back to The Future

By now you have probably heard of Secret Cinema and their amazing film showing of Back To The Future, complete with recreation of the entire town of Hill Valley!  I decided that this was something we HAD to go to, and booked tickets to surprise Chris.

If you haven't heard of Secret Cinema, they describe themselves as an 'immersive film-experience company'. Their events are pretty frequent, but you have to be on their mailing list to get an invite to their shows. The Back To The Future showing has been the biggest one they have done yet, and it was slightly different in that you could get tickets even if you weren't on their mailing list. I know that in the past they have also based events on Alien, One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest, and The Grand Budapest Hotel to name a few.

It was all very elaborate, we were sent new identities and professions as well as printable business cards with all of our details including a phone number on!  I was now Miranda Conway and I worked for the Hill Valley Stationers. Chris worked at the Sherwin-Williams Paint Company. We were also told to dress the part in 50's attire, so of course we abliged!

Before we went in we had to hand over any cameras or phones. Obviously because they want to keep the whole thing as secret as possible, they didn't want people instantly posting pictures all over Facebook and Instagram. But also, I think it was to really get people into the spirit of the 1950's, and modern technology would have ruined that somewhat. I think it was a really good idea. They did ,however, sell disposable cameras inside, and I made sure to snap one up quick before they sold out.

The other day I FINALLY got those photos back, so I thought I'd share them with you.

There were so many shops and companies that you could visit, all with different things going on inside.   There were lots of actors and actresses scattered around, some of them characters from the film. On our way to the venue we ran into Biff's friends and Chris got bullied by the guy who wears the 3D glasses. What a meanie!

There was a great fun fair, but there was just so much to do we didn't get a chance to go on any of the rides.

There was a little school advertising the Enchantment Under The Sea Dance, which you will remember from the film. In the school hall the dance was happening, and there was an amazing band playing, which we thought were so good we have now put them up on The Band Boutique here.

There was a male vocal harmony trio performing intermittently called the Texatones, they also worked for the garage, hence the outfits! They were great!

There were houses of all the main characters from the film that you could have a look in. Here I am posing outside one of them with a pram!

And here I am at George McFly's House!

The film was projected onto the front of the clock tower, and there were actors performing all the main parts of the movie alongside it.  We saw Marty catch a ride with his skateboard on a van, with Biff and the gang chasing him. We saw the Delorean emerge in a cloud of smoke, and Doc brown risking his life hanging from the clock tower in the finale! It was all very dramatic!

Really, there was too much going on to mention it all, but I did come home with a few souvenirs.  The postcards and the newspaper were free to pick up, and I bought a Town Fair flag for £1.50. I also bought myself a T-Shirt.

It really was an amazing experience. You could tell that everyone there had totally bought into it, nearly everyone was dressed up in 50's clothes. It was a blast. I would definitely recommend signing up to their mailing list, as any future events are sure to be awesome too! You can register for future events here.

Did you go? If you did what did you enjoy most?

Laura xXx

Wedding Photos - The Boys Get Ready

I've shown you the girls getting ready, now its the boys turn! Chris, his best man and ushers, all stayed at his parents house the night before, which was about an hour away from the church and venue. They had strict instructions to leave no later than 9am, as they had very important jobs to do at the marquee, such as sorting out the table placements. I was pretty nervous about leaving this up to chris, but I arranged each table in a very organised envelope so that he wouldn't get too confused, and he did a great job! Phew!

Here is best man Ollie fixing Chris's tie for him, and Usher Tim capturing video footage of the all important moment! These boys really did work hard for us, we were very lucky to have them all!

My Mum made all of the button holes from succulents and some other pretty twiddly bits of flowers (no idea what they were!) The ties came from Swagger and Swoon.

The boys all play in an awesome wedding band called Mister Kanish, so not only did I have the music for the night sorted, but they also came ready with suits! We didn't want to spend silly money on new suits when they all had perfectly good ones already.

If you're interested here's a clip of them playing in their vintage style band below, they really are very good. (Not biased at all!). Take a look and if you like them you can hire them from The Band Boutique here. If you didn't already know Chris and I run a function band agency, of course Mister Kanish are our top band!

At this point it was probably chucking it down with rain, but the skies managed to clear enough for them to get a quick pic in front of our little Tipi.

And here's Chris driving to the Church in Pip! Ooooh, next time I'll be showing you the ceremony, which really was one of my favourite bits of the whole day!

Laura xXx


All photos were taken by my wonderful photographers Peach and Jo Photography!