Wedding Forum - A very vintage wedding <3 14/05/16...

Hey beautiful ladies, hope you're all OK!

Thought I'd start one of these wedding diaries so I can keep track of what I have and haven't done, and get expert advice from all you guys obviously ;)

My fiancé James asked me to marry him on 13/05/13, and we decided there and then to tie the knot pretty much 3 years to the day. Exactly 3 years would have fallen on Friday 13th so we opted for Saturday 14th!

We then set about deciding on a venue. The most important thing to James regarding the venue was the option to get married outside. We live in Devon and there's some really beautiful views down here, and the weather is usually pretty nice! Especially in May. We did some googling and narrowed it down to a few. We made an appointment to visit the Lavender H0use H0te1 in Ashburton. We fell in love with it as soon as we arrived. The hotel is small and homely and cosy and quite olde worldy! The gardens are amazing. There are water features and swing seats and huge trees with fairy lights. Its magical. There's a beautiful archway to mark the beginning of the aisle, which leads to a little wooden garden gazebo where the ceremony takes place.

We went back to visit the venue on their wedding open day the next month. It was a beautiful sunny day in July, and they had set up the venue as though a wedding was taking place. It just confirmed to us that that was the place for us and we paid the deposit there and then without even viewing anywhere else! When you know you know, right?!

So included in our wedding package is:

- Ceremony and use of the garden gazebo
- Exclusive use of the hotel for Friday, Saturday, Sunday
- Bridal party staying over on the Friday night before the wedding
- Family BBQ at the venue the night before the wedding
- Welcome drinks (summer cocktails) for 80 guests
- Mini devon cream tea canapes for 80 guests
- Table centrepieces (cream birdcages with pillar candles and pearls)
- Chair covers and hessian and lace sashes
- Scatter pearls for the tables
- 3 course dinner for 80 guests with choice of 3 starters, 4 mains, 3 deserts
- Half a bottle of wine per guest
- Toasting Prosecco
- DJ and lighting with no curfew! Woohoo
- Bridal suite on the wedding night
- Bouncy castle :)
- Venue and ceremony decoration
- Cake stand, cake knife etc.
- Breakfast the next morning
- Free teas and coffees all day so we can all chill as a family and recover!

We have booked this for £7,000, which I think is pretty good :)

The next thing we booked was our photographer. We discussed things we'd be willing to scrimp on and things we wouldn't, and decided that this was one of the things we would rather pay more for. Again, I used good old google to see what sort of things were around. We wanted to avoid the old fashioned posed group photos and go for a more modern style of photography that told a story of our day :) She came over to the house with her portfolio and her photos were amazing, but her packages were quite expensive! We had a chat and I managed to get her to reduce the price and throw in a pre-wedding shoot about 6 months before the wedding so we can get used to being photographed together and the sort of things she'll be asking of us on the day. The package includes having her there all day, from bridal preps to after the first dance, and 750+ images all edited, plus copyright. We got this for £1000 in the end.

James keeps getting sent through vouchers for bay of e so I've ordered quite abit of stuff off there e.g a vintage sign for the candy table, hessian and lace guestbook etc. I also got a really good deal on my bridesmaids jewellery on w0wcher!

I got our old fashioned sweet jars from a discount store for 99p each!

My other big bargain was my flowers. I saw an offer online, and one of our local florists was offering 10 couples really good deals on their wedding flowers. I was a little wary so emailed her to ask her some more about it. She specialises in vintage wedding floristry and is re-branding her business and setting up a floristry school. She was providing the offer in return for the couples letting her use their images for her advertising. So I went ahead!

For £380, I've managed to secure:

- My bouquet
- 4 bridesmaids bouquets
- 2 mum's corsages
- 5 buttonholes
- 10 pew ends
- 2 pedestals
- 10 table centres!

As entertainment I've booked a magician to mooch around. I went to see him at a local wedding fayre and he was amazing. My jaw actually dropped! I just couldn't understand how he was doing the things he was doing!

The next thing for me to do is sort my save the dates. Last time we were in Cornwall we wrote out our save the dates in the sand and took a photo, and I've had them made into fridge magnets! I'm sending those out with people'e xmas cards this year to save on postage.

I've booked and paid a deposit on our other wedding stationary, which we're getting from s@r@h w@nts. Her stationary is so pretty and really goes with our theme :)

OK I think that's it so far! Sorry about the huge post, but I'm planning the majority of the wedding by myself as my family and friends live 5 hours away!

How's it all sounding so far? xxx

You got engaged the day we flew out on honeymoon!

You've already done so much.

Yep. We went to Hawaii for just over 2 weeks and then a couple of nights in LA on the way back.

wowee all sounds amazing :) I'm hoping we can book a venue like that with loads included ^_^ can't wait till we can actually start planning it properly! x
can't wait to hear more of your planning :) x

ahhhh sounds lovely, I live down the road - in Totnes :) My friend is getting married at Lavender House , having vintage theme too . It is gorgeous there, I drive past quite a lot on the way to the Moors :) I agree Great packages they do !

I like these ideas, they're simple yet look really nice. I really want beautiful lighting, flowers, centerpiece (candle-bras with scented candles or Yankee Candles), Scatter pearls... Amazing..