Getting ready

I am not a person for waking up early. However, at 6.15am there I was, wide awake, staring at 3 gorgeous bridesmaids dresses and my own dress.  Despite my mum being told not to come into my room until she had proof that I was already awake, at 6.20 she was sitting on the edge of the bed. It would appear that both of us were feeling the nerves.  I stayed in bed and was brought a bacon butty and unsurprisingly played some candy crush to calm myself down.  I jumped in the shower at about 8 and got my myself ready to go to the hairdressers

Lisa was arriving at about 8.40; my mum decided at 8.35 that this was the perfect time to go to the shops and buy a fresh loaf of bread. Obviously. By 8.50, she wasn't back and my dad had to drive us around to the hairdressers.  Apparently, I am destined to be late everywhere..but at least it was the same for my other bridesmaids too. The hairdresser started by washing my hair, dried it, put some rollers in and sent me off upstairs to get my make up done.  It was very relaxing lying on a couch being pampered, except for the break to pop down and check that the bridesmaids' hair looked how I wanted and the constant buzzing of my phone in my hand.  It was only once I got confirmation that all of the last minute jobs had been done that I started to ignore all noises.

By the time I got back downstairs the BMs were finished and went back to my parents house to do make up etc, whilst me and my mum got our hair finished off. I was done first and spend the half hour waiting for my mum by pacing up and down and getting congratulations and well wishes from everyone walking through the salon.  I would like to think that I was a vision of calm, but the calm was definitely interspersed with moments of complete panic!

By the time I got back to the house, the BMs were no more ready than when they'd left me and were tucking in to bacon buttys.  As they started to get make up sorted, the photographer (our friend Andy) arrived with his wife Anna.  They started snapping some pics, my mum started nagging me to get into my dress and I tried to avoid it as much as possible! I gave the BMs and my parents their gifts, then BMs got into their dresses and then operation 'Wedding Dress' began.  As I took my vest top off I completely forgot that I had my veil and tiara on and succeeded in knocking my veil out.  Good start.  My mum and the 3 BMs all had to hold the dress as I tried to clamber in to it from the bottom. However, we hadn't noticed that a bit of the dress was still fastened, and so I ended up stuck, half in the dress while everyone tried to figure out what to do. The feeling of claustrophobia was the closest I think I came to panic all day.  Eventually the dress was on, and we were fairly behind schedule, but I got to swish around the house, feeling like a princess and really quite excited. From this point forwards, things seemed to go in to fast forward; we had pictures outside next to the cars, my mum and the BMs got in the bus, my dad locked up and we were ready to go.

Going to the chapel and I'm going to get ma-a-a-ried....

Wedding dash

There have been all sorts of nice things about getting to know Laura & Sean, & lovely touches about the service (Matt's rendition of "Love Monkey" being well up there) but my wedding dash from a (priest's) funeral in Stockport will always dominate my memory of the day. I think it was undertaking a car on the bend where the M56 becomes the M53 and then weaving between two cars to get in the fast lane that still slightly bemuses me when I think back on my manoeuvre...BUT I made it (more or less in time) and right glad I am that I did.