Blog: back garden wedding
Charlie Charlie

Our rustic country wedding – afternoon tea in the garden before the ceremony ~ part 2

Charlie

If you missed it, yesterday there was part 1 of our pre-wedding afternoon tea in my parents garden – do check it out before reading on or it all might be a bit confusing!

So we’d set up our afternoon tea tent, the scrummy scones and strawberries were out, and pots of stripey paper straws alongside old-fashioned lemonade were ready.

When our family and friends began to arrive, me and Izzy happened to be getting ready in a room above my parents drive, so we could see people arriving.  This is one of my favourite photos from the wedding – check out Alex’s stunning dress (she’s getting married next April in Cornwall – I can’t wait for their wedding!)…

Here is some of the lovely photos Mark shot of people enjoy afternoon tea in the garden – 18 months of hard work starts to come to fruition…

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Charlie Charlie

Our rustic country wedding – afternoon tea in the garden before the ceremony ~ part 1

Charlie

For us, dreaming up an afternoon tea in my parent’s garden before our wedding ceremony was probably one of the best ideas we had.  So often at weddings you have travelled for a couple of hours, often arriving at lunchtime or soon after, having not had a chance to eat anything and feeling a bit out of it from the car journey.

We wanted our guests to feel as relaxed as possible and well fed before getting down to the serious business of witnessing our marriage.  For a start, on the invitation we told people they could arrive from 3pm, rather than saying ‘you must be here at…’  This meant there was a nice staggered arrival of family and friends, and hopefully it meant people weren’t under too much pressure to arrive by a specific time.

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Charlie Charlie

Our rustic country wedding – setting up the garden on morning of the wedding

Charlie

It has been so lovely to have our wedding featured on Love My Dress, but I know that some of my readers would like to see more detail, and there’s so many lovely photos it seems a shame not to share more of them.

Our wedding ceremony was due to start at 4.30pm, but we’d invited our guests to have afternoon tea in the garden from 3pm.  This meant we had all morning to get ready, which for a wedding at home was all about everyone pitching in to help set up.  So with less than an hour before people were due to start arriving this is what we were doing…

The tents were already up, but we had to get all the tables laid up. This is our lovely friend Kate, who along with her husband Tim set out all the crockery and place settings (among a long list of other things!)…

We hung lots of the jam jar lanterns we’d made from the tents, tying them on with twine…

Here’s Tim setting out more lanterns around the garden and hanging them from trees…

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Charlie Charlie

Our “Rustic, Outdoor, Eco-Chic, Country Garden Wedding” is featured on Love My Dress

Charlie

Such exciting news to tell you all – our wedding is featured on Love My Dress today!  You can (finally!) see the photos from our wedding – the lovely Annabel who runs Love My Dress has called it a Rustic, Outdoor, Eco-Chic, Country Garden Wedding.

I would love to know what you all think.  There are so many more lovely photos from our wedding and other details that I will be sharing here on my blog, so please check back or stay in touch by adding your email address to the mailing list (you can find it on the righthand side of this page).

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Charlie Charlie

A sneak peek of the first of our wedding photos

Charlie

Yes, this really is a photo from our wedding!  Bet some of you can’t believe it (some of my friends are ready to start a mutiny if I don’t share the photos soon!).

Really soon there will be loads of photos from our wedding here, and on Love My Dress (so excited we’re going to be featured on Annabel’s lovely blog!).  She’s posted a few sneak peek photos so do have a look.

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Charlie Charlie

Your help needed – where do I start with blogging about our wedding?

Charlie


1. Crafty DIY paper items
2. Collecting cow parsley
3. Sign painting
4. Jam jar lantern making

So I’m completely overwhelmed by the magnitude of trying to share photos and details of our wedding.  I just don’t know where to start and decided the best option would be to ask where you think I should start.

Today we have finally seen the ‘official’ photographs taken by Mark Tattersall, which will obviously follow shortly (and are incredible!), but there were so many DIY projects, handmade elements, collecting of gorgeous treasures in the lead up to our wedding that I want to share those too.

I’ve included a selection of images here as examples (saving all my favourite bits for later).


5. Building an ice cream cone holder
6. Collecting old bits and pieces
7. Tiny flag making
8. Freshly washed vintage crockery

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Charlie Charlie

With three days to go…we are busy busy busy!

Charlie

A totally nondescript blog subject line, but a bit pooped this evening.  All of us have been mega busy today:

  • Mr Rigg was up early to collect cider, then got to work ironing bunting, shifting gravel, painting guttering, to name but a few jobs.
  • My little sister came over to the cottage to help me print menus, decorate the flowergirl baskets, and a number of other making things.
  • My dad has been painting the living room and finishing off the downstairs bathroom.

The tents went up today (very exciting but can’t share photos yet!) and we ran through the plan for Saturday with my mom’s lovely friends who are going to be helping out.

And yes, with just three days to go until our wedding jobs like this are still going on…!

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Charlie Charlie

Our wedding venue (my parents house) is still in a state of renovation and redecorating just one week before our ‘big day’

Charlie

Our wedding reception is taking place at my parents house.  Last summer my parents decided to add an extension to their house at the same time my dad decided to go back to Uni to study to be a teacher.

I made a flying visit on Monday to drop off a carload of stuff for the wedding, and the house isn’t quite ready to welcome 70 guests a week on Saturday.  Still to do is painting, grouting, and a wash basin and lights to be fitted.  And those are just the things I can remember!

However, my parents are great and on top of work and everyday life they are redecorating and getting the garden looking as pretty as possible.  They have even had a gate installed at the end of their garden so that our guests can walk through the field and into the garden after the church ceremony.

Above you’ll see their dog Alfie with the smart new railings and gate.

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