Last weekend was full of the joys of planning a wedding – my wedding, to be exact, which is less than 9 weeks away!  On Friday I met with Pati and Vanessa from The Garden & Plant Company, enjoying the sunshine and their little shop filled with the fragrance of hyacinths and the colours of spring.

Here’s an example of one of their spring buttonholes…

I spent the evening with my little sister going through lots of old baby photos in an attempt to select some to be displayed at our wedding.  It was lovely to reminisce and find cute photos like this…yes, that’s me…

Saturday morning my mom, sister and I headed off to Cheltenham for one of my final dress fittings.  You’ll have to stay tuned to find out details of where I’m getting my gorgeous wedding dress from, but it is such a treat to go to there and soak up the atmosphere of this very special place.

I had a horrid moment of doubting my dress – the whole thing is being remade to fit me perfectly, and I was convinced it wasn’t quite the same as when I first tried it on – thankfully there was just one tiny detail missing, and once replaced I was in love all over again.

Me and Clare…

Next on our list was visiting Clare Bryce the makeup maestro behind Pure Pampering.  Now as a girl who wears very little makeup – mascara, a tiny bit of concealer and the occasional dusting of blusher – I was a little apprehensive.  We went up to Clare’s beautiful, light makeup studio, with its lovely views out over the fields behind her house.

I showed her the types of ‘look’ I wanted…which turns out is the no-makeup-super-natural look, which unless you are utterly flawless is hard to achieve.  So Clare worked her magic, and after an ‘oh-my-gosh-is-that-really-me?!’ moment I began to see that what she’d created was just right.

Clare assures me that even people who wear makeup can be surprised how different they look.  But after an afternoon on the road, checking myself out in the rear view mirror multiple times (!), the gorgeously soft and delicate mineral makeup became part of my skin and no longer felt like I was wearing a mask.

By the evening I was totally loving the look and no longer anxious about not feeling like myself, and instead excited about seeing Clare again on my wedding day!  Shortly I will be posting a fantastic tutorial on how to create a vintage bridal look from Clare.

And finally, before a long drive home I headed over to Herefordshire to visit Charlie Ryrie who runs The Real Cut Flower Garden.  We discussed the kind of bouquet I would like, and buttonholes, before going out to her flower shed to look at her huge collection of vintage crockery, vases and pots.

This ladies, is what planning a wedding should be like – full of fun, meeting lovely people, dreaming up gorgeous ideas, and feeling even more excited about the ‘big day’.