2013

Yesterday I had a pretty full on day working with my sister Izzy to write up some truly beautiful real weddings that will be coming to the blog really soon.  At 25 weeks pregnant spending a day working at 100mph is, it seems, not sensible – I was pooped!

So I needed to share a super sweet and make-you-smile kind of wedding cake today, to bring a bit of light relief – especially as it’s Friday as well.  I don’t think I could have done better than this pretty floral wedding cake topped with a tiny bench and a pair of love birds.

I believe the entire cake is edible, all the decorations included, made from sugarpaste.  Isn’t it stunning!  I am so envious of some people’s talents.  There is so much attention to detail in this delightful wedding cake, just look at the bride and groom’s initials carefully scribed onto the back of the bench.

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2013

Coming up this weekend TNWC wedding venue The House Meadow are holding an open weekend for all you lovely brides- and grooms-to-be out there who are looking for a beautiful meadow setting for your wedding day.

If you’re looking to get married in Kent, or if you’re on the hunt for that dream spot to say your vows beneath a tree in an English meadow, then you must get yourselves along this weekend to take a look at what The House Meadow has to offer.

The House Meadow is described as “country charm in its purest form.”  It’s one of those special places that can be a completely blank (and rather stunning!) backdrop to enable you to create the wedding you want.  The meadow is full of beautiful details, whilst remaining rustic – something that is so often difficult to find amongst wedding venues.

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2013

Today Mr Rigg and I are celebrating our 2nd wedding anniversary.  Two years ago today (or at least this past weekend), we were saying our “I do’s” and celebrating with 70 of our closest family and friends.  If you’re new to the blog and would like to see some photos from our wedding you can find them all here.

This year is pretty special as we’re sharing it with a new addition, a little person in my belly that likes to wriggle around and remind us that it’s here and on it’s way.  Last year we celebrated with a picnic dinner on our allotment, this year it’s the cinema and a meal out – as we are being told so often we should make the most of this baby free time.  Personally, I’m just too excited about this baby arriving to currently care about forfeited meals out and trips to the cinema.

Neither me nor Mr Rigg are particularly big on celebrating anniversaries, or buying each other extravagant gifts, but this year I felt the urge to create something as a lovely reminder of our wedding day.  With so many lovely businesses featured on The Natural Wedding Company directory, I am always seeing beautiful ideas not only for weddings, but for holidays and gifts, and much more.

This was how I came across Lucy Says I Do.  A relatively recent addition to the directory, Lucy Says I Do is run by Lucy Clark (of this incredibly beautiful wedding), who it turns out hired our wedding photographer Mark Tattersall to capture her day after seeing our wedding pictures.  As well as creating rather beautiful wedding stationery, Lucy also designs prints incorporating your wedding vows, poems or readings.

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2013

Sometimes I get the urge to do a whole blog post dedicated to one particular flower.  Usually I’ve seen something that inspires me and off I head into the internet in search of inspiration on that particularly bloom.  I’ve previously done ‘an ode to violets’ and ‘an ode to old-fashioned roses’ and just last week ‘an ode to snake’s head fritillary’ and was pleasantly surprised by the ideas I found.

Today I want to share a seasonal ode to springtime blossom.  The few fruit trees that I have in my garden (cherry, apple, and crab apple) have made my garden frothy pink and white these past few weeks, and the air has been swirling with their petals.  I am completely in-love with this time of year – as you will see later today when I share the anniversary gift I had commissioned.

So when it comes to weddings, how can you use blossom?  Firstly, this is a truly seasonal spring wedding bloom, I can’t imagine you can find it out of season and if you can it will be astronomically expensive, and besides, who wants blossom in October?  Here are some of the ideas that I came across to inspire you to incorporate blossom into your spring wedding.

Grouped vases

If you have certain areas of your wedding venue that you want to decorate with florals, why not collect a variety of large clear glass vases and jars and fill them with apple blossom cuttings.  The variety of jars and glasses adds a certain quirkiness to the look whilst remaining elegant with the uniformity of clear glass and soft apple blossom.

Bouquets

Finding blossom in bouquets was more of a challenge, but I did find a couple of beauties that showed how you could incorporate branches of blossom into your spring wedding bouquet.

This pretty trailing bouquet features pink blossom and what I think are sweetpeas.  Along with some striking leaves and a big bow, this is my favourite of the blossom bouquets I came across.

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2013

Last autumn a group of local Kent wedding businesses got together to create a wedding photoshoot inspired by all things vintage and eco-friendly.  They created a number of different looks and I have some of them here today to share with you, featuring some pretty vintage dresses, dainty crockery, lovely florals and an exquisite brooch bouquet.

The shoot was another collaboration between TNWC photographer Rebecca Douglas and make-up artist Suzanna who created this ethereal harvest shoot I featured last year.  This time, Rebecca and Suzanna swapped the English country field for the beautiful eco-chic The Pines Calyx wedding venue, also one of our TNWC businesses.

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2013

I didn’t last long did I before I returned to a wedding cake covered in flowers, although in my defence this isn’t a sweet wedding cake – instead it’s a tiered tower of scrumptious cheeses.

Spotted over on a rather lovely wedding on Love My Dress that was featured recently, this cheese wedding cake is mounted on a tree trunk stand and covered in herbs, lavender and gypsophila.  If you go and have a look at the full wedding, a locally sourced homegrown flower affair (which you should!), you’ll discover that the bride’s mother grew and arranged all of the wedding flowers, including decorating this cheese tower.  What a mum!

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2013

This is a pretty special post today – in just two days my first ever TNWC Real Bride will be getting hitched!  The lovely Caroline will be getting married to her Mr-to-be Gareth this coming Saturday in Nottinghamshire.  I love this weekend and time of year, it’s the same weekend two years ago that me and my Mr got married, and despite the recent rain the countryside is looking stunning.

Caroline started sharing her wedding journey with us back in February, and now three months later her big day has almost arrived.  She has one last post to share with us all, and I’m delighted to hear that she’s already keen to come back and tell us all about the wedding in a couple of weeks.

For everyone who’s followed along with Caroline’s plans for a laid back, eco-friendly farm wedding, I hope you enjoy this last instalment, and if you have a moment to leave her some well wishes that would be lovely.  Over to Caroline…

Wow- this is it – 2 more sleeps to go until the big day!  I honestly can’t quite believe that in 2 days time I’ll be waking up on the morning of my wedding day!  (It’s 5.30am as I’m writing this – have pretty much given up on sleeping beyond 5am this week – way too excited!)

I’ve managed to wangle the whole week off work, thanks to friends and family pitching in and taking care of REloved for me, so we’re properly able to enjoy this last week of getting everything ready.  Gareth and I have soooooo many lists all over the house, that get a bit shorter, then a bit longer, then a bit shorter again, and now the only things left are the fun bits – the final touches, and I’m loving it!

300 Metres of Fairy Lights

We’ve decided to leave a lot of the barn decorating until Friday, after a torrential downpour last Thursday left rather a lot of puddles all over the floor (eeek!) but thank goodness, it seems that ‘normal’ rain showers are ok, as its pretty much rained every day since on and off and other than a couple of drips its all ok!

We have however been busy collecting small hay bales from a local farmer and making sofas in the barn, and a couple of nights ago Gareth asked me to go out to help him move a few of them and when I walked into the barn, he’d only gone and strung up 300 metres of fairy lights, so instead of an old cow shed, for the first time I walked into a wedding venue and it pretty much took my breath away.

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