Our Wedding at Colehayes Park

Ok, so i really should have written this post a long time ago, but life got in the way! I also planned to not add too many photos, but our photographer Chris Barber did such a beautiful job i find it impossible to narrow down any more than this! 

We got married in August 2014 at Colehayes Park, Devon. We had the big house for the whole weekend, so went to town decorating with lots of little touches (and the help of wonderful friends and family).

My clever dad made us these stunning six foot tall light up letters. We had planned to get married in the garden, but on the day it literally poured with rain, so these made an amazing backdrop for the ceremony!

 I spent many happy hours hand sewing this sparkly headpiece, to wear with my mums veil. I hope to pass it down as a family heirloom.

 Nerves!

 Instead of hymns, the bridesmaids led everyone in a rendition of 'We Go Together' from Grease, complete with impromptu hand jive.

 Our parents and grandparents wedding photos proudly on display, showing us how it's done!

I really enjoyed designing all the printed bits for the wedding. Instead of a guest book we gave each guest these cards on which they could share their memories of the day, draw us a picture, and give us their tips for a long and happy marriage. We got some very funny answers! 

The favours were fortune cookies in little chevron bags, with mini badges that said things like 'kiss me quick', 'team R', 'team H', and 'Hooray!'

 Some of the books on the tables contained hidden treasure....

 My mum and i made the cake in the days leading up to the wedding.

A board of local cheeses for the evening feast - look at the excitement on the guests faces!

Phew, if you made it all the way to the end, well done! And if you haven't had enough yet, here's a short video a friend of ours made of the day...

Scream Screen!

There are so many amazing things for mums and babies to do around here, I don't think I could get through them all if I tried! From classical music concerts to zumba classes, there's really something for everything. It's fab, I'm getting to know lots of new areas, and lots of new Mums.

A friend invited us along to Scream Screen at Greenwich Picture House today. It's a special daytime screening aimed at parents, where babies are welcome. The lights are left on, you can spread out blankets and car seats and crying babies are not a problem. We saw Boyhood, it was perhaps a little optimistic to take the babies to a 2hour 45minute film, but they were generally pretty chilled. Bear sat happily on my lap for the first half, had a bit of a cry, then had a nap in the sling for the second half. I call that a success!

It was just so nice to do an 'adult' thing without worrying that we were bothering people, plus I could have totally fallen asleep in the comfy cinema seat!

So what other films are good at the moment? I'm totally out of touch, recommendations please!

Introducing A Little Bear

well, a lot has happened since my last post! One of the biggest has been the arrival of this little guy....

He has a real name, but for the purposes of blogging I will call him bear. He is now eight weeks old, and every day (and night!) is a total learning curve. As expected, caring for him and keeping him happy us the biggest challenge of our lives, so over the coming weeks I thought I'd share a few things that make every day a little bit easier, starting with the Close Caboo Carrier...

Before bear arrived I knew I wanted to get a carrier for him. Living in London without a car means I spend a lot of time on the tube and bus, and often you can't get on with a buggy if it's full of people or there are buggies already on board.
I did lots of research, and found that the baby bjorn style 'crotch danglers' are not considered good for the baby. I knew I wanted a wrap style and asked around, lots of people recommended the caboo.

I've used it a lot, both out and about and at home. It's super comfy, as the weight is well spread across your shoulders and back. Bear loves it - even if he's really worked up and crying he calms right down and usually falls asleep, as he feels cosy and snuggled in and can hear my heartbeat. I've even done the washing up with it on! It's a great halfway between a fully structured carrier and a wrap, and so has all the snuggly benefits of a wrap, but is almost as easy to put on and take off as a structured carrier, here's a how to that i found helpful....



I won't use this forever, as the little guy gets bigger and stronger i want to move onto something with more structure (i have my eye on a Tula) but it is so brilliant as a way to get him from A to B that he actually enjoys in these early days. If you're looking for a baby carrier but feeling flummoxed by the millions available, i really recommend the Close Caboo!

Cappuccinos, MW Nails and Catch-Ups

This afternoon i met up with Carly, one of my best girls, for a proper girly afternoon. We went shopping, had lunch, had gel manicures at the brilliant MW Nails, and then gossiped over coffee while admiring our new nails.

I chose Artistic Colour Gloss in Snapdragon, Carly has Shellac in Vogue - I so love these grey nails on her!

The very cool MW Nails - best manicure ever!

PS, Carly works as an elf at Hamleys, so watch out for the chicest Santa's helper!

An Engagement Shoot At The Horniman Gardens

Hello! For those of you who have never booked a wedding photographer, you may not be familiar with the concept of an engagement shoot - i certainly wasn't! But it is a standard part of most photographers packages. At first i thought 'we don't need that. What a self-indulgent concept. I have a wedding budget to stick to!' But once we'd got over that, we realised it's actually a really sweet idea. A chance to have some nice relaxed photos together, in your usual clothes, in a place that means something to you when you're not busy getting married and talking to 100 guests. It's also a good way to get to know your photographer, tell them all your plans and get used to being in front of their camera.

So! A couple of weeks ago we had our engagement shoot with Chris Barber. We had lots of ideas about clever settings and props and themes, but in the end we realised that keeping it simple would be best, and would mean the most to us. We chose to go to the Horniman Museum and Gardens. It's within spitting distance of our house, so in the five years that we've lived in Forest Hill we've gone there countless times, for autumn walks, picnics with friends and snowball fights.

I think that in ten years we'll look back at these photos and they will capture this moment in our lives - our first home together, making lots of plans, and standing on the edge of our future.