Planning Archives - Page 8 of 15 - The Natural Wedding Company

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Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Caroline’s final guest post with just two sleeps until her handmade, eco-friendly farm wedding

Charlie

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.

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Myfanwy and Tom’s handmade mini milk jug wedding favours and woollen heart place names

Charlie

Our lovely TNWC Real Brides are really planning some most beautiful things for their weddings, and today Myfanwy is no exception as she tells you about the stunning wedding favours they are making (wish I was a guest at this wedding!).

This week we just have the one TNWC Real Bride post but will be back next week to hear from Caroline who is into the final countdown to her wedding which is a week on Saturday! I can’t wait to hear what’s her and her Mr-to-be Gareth are up to in their last week.

Over to Myfawny to tell us about these gorgeous wedding favours her and Tom have been making…

Within a few days of being engaged we’d decided on our favours, Tom tells it differently, he says I told him about the favours… I’m sure he volunteered!

Tom is a potter and has been for nearly 10 years now, his style is very unique and exceptionally fine pottery for hand thrown work. His normal range is exquisite kitchen ware. When we opened our tea shop Tom decided to make a range of new jugs that we could use and sell in the shop, serving milk to customers in them.

These have proven extremely popular, I personally use them as mini vases for flowers. Everyone enjoys these jugs so much and Tom told me they were relatively easy make so we’ve decided these will be our favours!

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Nik’s floral conundrum and her thrifty ideas for wedding flowers on a budget

Charlie

I hope you are all enjoying reading the wedding adventures of our TNWC Real Brides – they are all planning such varied but personal days and I can’t believe that it’s almost time for some of them to actually get married! Today we have the lovely Nik who is planning a two part wedding and she’s got some fab ideas for being thrifty with your wedding flowers….enjoy!

Tick Tock!

Before I launch into today’s post, I just wanted announce that there’s only just over two months to go ’til we say “I do”!!

This is both terrifying and very exciting. On the one hand, soon I will be married to the love of my life, which is indescribably surreal and wonderful; but on the other hand, I’m a terrible coordinator in charge of the biggest day of my own life, and am constantly terrified that I’m forgetting something important! I hope this is a normal fear, and I keep reminding myself that we want a simple, relaxed day and that the ONLY important thing is that we come away from it married to one another.

All Things Floral

This month, I thought I’d give you a rundown of the many ways we plan to feature flowers/plants in our wedding celebrations. With our wedding being split into two parts, two days apart, it was crucial that we came up with floristry solutions that would ensure we could decorate both our venues, but that also fit within our relatively small budget of £200.

Fortunately, I’m not a fan of huge arrangements or expensive blooms – I much prefer a rustic, simple, ‘thrown in a tin can’ kind of feel and adore wild flowers and abundant foliage, so I’m happy to go with a ‘whatever I can get my hands on’ approach.

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Emma’s pre-wedding wobble about having her photo taken and how her engagement shoot helped

Charlie

Well firstly I want to announce that this is my 1,000th blog post! Whoop whoop! I can barely believe it, but it seems like a pretty neat achievement. What could be nicer than my 1,000th blog post being written by one of my lovely TNWC Real Brides? Today we have Emma back with us and she’s sharing her super sweet engagement photoshoot, along with her feelings on being photographed on her ‘big day’.

I think it’s fair to say there’s a great number of us brides-to-be who aren’t thrilled about being photographed all day long, I was pretty apprehensive about the whole thing, but my experience was that we picked the right photographer for us (the lovely Mark Tattersall) and we both felt so at ease (plus we were pretty loved up all day!).

For any of you worried about having your photo taken on your wedding day, I hope reading about Emma’s worries and her experience of having an engagement photoshoot helps you feel that it will all turn out fine…

Last month I had a wobble; the only real wobble I’ve had in this whole wedding planning process. I started to freak out about having my photograph taken on the big day. This is probably because I have always been the one behind the camera and despite having taken photographs at lots of weddings, I had never really thought about what I would feel like; really feel like, on my actual wedding day.

I am really good at reassuring the brides I have photographed myself but was worried I wouldn’t be able to reassure myself, so started to worry I would have a mini meltdown about being in front of the lens. So I picked up the phone to our photographer and booked an engagement shoot…

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Stephanie’s been making homemade honeybee themed gifts for her bridesmaids

Charlie

I’m so delighted that we had an American bride-to-be amongst our TNWC Real Brides as although British and American weddings are similar in so many ways, there are little extras that I love hearing about. Stephanie is getting married this September at a beautiful farm in Rhode Island and her guest post today is all about the homemade gifts she made for her bridesmaids and Matron (or Maid) of Honour.

As well as making the gifts herself, she also sourced honey from her dad who is a beekeeper, so really keeping her wedding details in her family. Plus I am an absolute sucker for honey, always picking up locally produced jars whenever we are visiting new places. I’m sure you will find some lovely inspiration from Stephanie’s blog post today…

I was really excited about asking my sister and a few girlfriends to be in my wedding party, so I really wanted to do something a bit more personalized and special than simply asking them on the phone or over some coffee.

I’ve been in a dreamcatcher phase lately and have been making them from old scraps of fabric and other items around the house. They’re pretty basic, but my sister, Dayna, has loved every one; naturally, I decided to make her a dreamcatcher of her very own as a gift when I asked her to be my Matron of Honor. I also thought it made sense since I’ll be making a few for my reception… I need all the practice I can get!

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Caroline tells us about making a wedding cake and getting help from family and friends

Charlie

The countdown for TNWC Real Bride Caroline has really begun – her wedding is less than a month away now so preparations are going at full tilt! Caroline, and her Mr-to-be Gareth, are planning a very homemade wedding on their farm in Nottinghamshire with a picnic lunch full of local produce. On top of it all, this month Caroline has been busy making a wedding cake for her friends wedding!

Over to Caroline to tell you what she’s been up to in the lead-up to her wedding…

Well the most exciting news this month is that the cows are out of the barns and in the fields!!!

The clean up job has officially begun! This is the bit where I gracefully bow out (I have sooooooo much crafting to do so not possibly time to get up to my elbows in cow poo!!) and leave the mucking out, power hosing and yard sweeping to the boys.

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Sarah has been hunting down an affordable country tweed suit for her groom-to-be

Charlie

On Tuesday we had the lovely Myfanwy telling us all about the fab tea towel wedding invitations she’d been making, and how her Mr-to-be Tom had recruited their cute daschund Arthur to help punch out confetti. Today we have TNWC Real Bride Sarah back with us, and she’s been helping her fiancé Lee look for a country style tweed suit at an affordable price.

Over to Sarah to tell you more…

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a lovely Easter, this month I will be writing about my struggles to find the perfect suit for my groom.

When we first began organising the wedding Lee began researching the type of suit he’d like for the wedding, and quickly decided he’d like a tweed, country looking suit to fit in with our relaxed, vintage theme. He showed me a photo he’d found on Google and so we began to try and find something similar.

Initially we wanted to hire the suits and so we began to research local hire shops, but soon found none of them hired anything other than plain, or over the top suits which wasn’t really us. And so we made the choice to buy the suits.

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Myfawny has been busy designing their tea towel invitations and making confetti from old books

Charlie

For those of you keenly following the TNWC Real Brides feature you may have noticed we skipped a week last week. That’s my fault as I had become a bit disorganised following a rather nasty cold over Easter, and as such didn’t get ready in time – so apologies! I am delighted that we are back on schedule this week and have two lovely guest posts from Myfawny and Sarah.

I’ve also made it easier for you to track down all your favourite TNWC Real Brides stories, simply click on their names and you’ll be taken through to all their guest blog posts: Emma, Nik, Myfawny, Sarah, Caroline and Stephanie.

Today Myfawny is sharing details about the designs for their tea towel invitations (how great do they sound!) and making confetti – the picture of Arthur their dog helping them stamp out confetti from old books is not to be missed! Happy reading…

Easter has come and gone the season is upon us and our shop is now open six days a week until July and then seven days a week until we close five days before the wedding. The realisation that we may have bitten off more than we can chew is slowly sinking in but we are not to be defeated! So during the last month we have concentrated on invites and confetti.

Tea Towel Invitations

We wanted some unique invites – we had been lucky enough to win the TNWC competition for a personalised hand painted map of our day by the wonderful Pigeon & Quill. Alex really was a pleasure to work with and the map is truly fantastic and incorporates all the elements of our day.

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Nik tells us about their DIY wedding invitations and building a wedding website

Charlie

Welcome to our second TNWC Real Brides guest post of the week! Today we’ve got the lovely Nik to tell us all about her beautiful DIY wedding invitations and how they created their wedding website. I’m a little bit jealous because I love the style of Nik and Chris’ invitations and think they fit so well with their coastal farm wedding.

If you’ve not read Nik’s first few guest posts, you should first read about her plans for their relaxed coastal farm wedding, and her experience of choosing an ethical wedding dress.

One of the first jobs we tackled upon choosing our chosen wedding venue was our invitations. Our announcement of plans for a summer wedding was immediately met with panic from several relatives and friends about potential holiday clashes. Getting the invites out six months in advance gave everyone plenty of time to plan their hols around the wedding, and has meant that we’ve only had one clash resulting in absent friends on the day.

Our wedding celebrations will be split into two very different parts: a very small ceremony with 25 close family and friends on the farm where we live in Pembrokeshire; and a big all day reception two days later in our home county of West Yorkshire. This gives us the best of both worlds: a relaxed, intimate ceremony where we can focus on the day and what it means, but also the opportunity to celebrate our marriage with our wider network of friends, which is very important to us.

Ceremony Invites

We planned to DIY our invites from the word go: we wanted them to be very personal, I wanted them printed on ‘green’ paper and Chris is a graphic/web designer so it seemed silly not to take advantage of that! However, in the end, we decided to buy our ceremony invites ‘off the rack’ as we realised that we just couldn’t print them at home without compromising on the quality and appearance. Lela of doodlelove was fantastic and worked with us to create a complementary design to match our theme, even incorporating the little chicken illustration that has sort of become our invitation mascot!

Charlie

TNWC Real Brides: Emma has been sowing wildflower seeds around her outdoor ceremony venue in Cornwall

Charlie

We’re kicking off the week with a lovely guest post from TNWC Real Bride Emma, who has been busy sowing wildflower seeds at her outdoor ceremony venue in Cornwall – what a beautiful idea! She’s also been trying to decide on her wedding transport, so do read on and I hope you enjoy hearing about her wedding plans…

With less than four months to go we have been rapidly ticking off things on the seemingly never-ending wedding to do list, which has been brilliant fun! We kicked this off with a visit to our venue to meet the event organiser at Mount Pleasant Eco Park, Lee, who was absolutely brilliant! He made us tea (won me over straight away) and was happy to chat about our wedding for nearly two hours! We also got to see the new bar that Tim, the custodian of the Eco Park, had built from reclaimed wood found in Plymouth.

Whilst there we were able to scatter our collection of wildflower seeds on the site, which we hope will grow in time for our wedding. Chris did the scattering and I took some photos. It was a brilliantly sunny but very cold and windy day, so most of the seeds probably blew away! We can but try.

This is Chris tucking the seeds, ninja style, into the area around where we hope to have the ceremony, the idea being that the flowers will grow up and around the bottom of the decked area.

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