It is terrible to toot your own trumpet, but this is one of the ideas that we had for our wedding that I was so pleased with.  Nick and I love our food and love supporting local producers, so we always knew this was going to be woven throughout our wedding.  There were moments we worried we might be overfeeding people!

We have a wonderful local farm to where we live in Cheshire that makes its own ice cream – we practically live off the stuff.  Somehow we wanted to incorporate this into our wedding day, and the only place we could think of when people might need something to eat and break up any standing around was after the ceremony.

So we set about creating our own ice cream stall that would greet our family and friends as they exited the church.  We commandeered a nice old trestle table from my parents, which meant we didn’t need to cover it.

Nick built a wooden cone holder by drilling holes into a plank of wood and attaching legs to it.  Then I painted it with leftover paints (tester pots are great for small projects).

After we’d been to see the ice cream farm and selected our flavours, Nick used one of the tubs to measure out and make a box to hold them.  That way it would look nicer from the outside (not plastic tubs) and hopefully make it easier to scoop the ice cream.  This was also painted by me.

On the morning of the wedding the boys went down to the church and set up the stall at the back in the church yard.  They used two long bamboo canes, fastened to the trestle legs, to string silk bunting between them.

This beautiful bunting was made by a good friend’s mum Michelle Samuels, who is a talented seamstress and gifted us this bunting when we got engaged.  It is made from off-cuts from her dressmaking (she makes wedding dresses).

My sister Izzy wrote out the three flavours – Farmhouse, Chocolate, and Raspberry Pavlova – onto a small blackboard, which was propped up against the box.  We bought tiny cones from the ice cream farm, and borrowed their scoops.

After Nick and I had left the church beneath a shower of confetti, everyone headed off to get themself an ice cream.  The best part about being the bride and groom was queue jumping.

It made for great photos – like this one of my granny…

A lovely one of Nick’s stepbrother and wife…

Silly pictures of your mommy eating ice cream whilst still looking glamorous…

And your littlest flowergirl…what a cheeky face…

Oh and not forgetting this one of Nick and I – I’m pretty sure I knew he was having a bite, though I wouldn’t put it past him to sneak my ice cream normally…

So while everyone was munching on their ice creams, it meant they didn’t get bored while we swanned around as the happily (and now married) couple – I love this photo taken by my sister Izzy, what am I doing?

Images from top: (1) Mark Tattersall; (2+3) Izzy Burton Photography; (4-10) Mark Tattersall; (11) taken by family; (12) Izzy Burton Photography; (13) Mark Tattersall; (14) Izzy Burton Photography