Married!

It’s funny really. I’ve spent 37 of the last 40 years married, most of that time to the wrong person. Since Thursday 11th August (4 days ago) I’ve been married to my Mr Right. The last few days have been a whirlwind of fabulousness. It was such a special day and neither of us can stop talking about it. I’d so love to post numerous photos of the day here, but of course I can’t. Partly because of my own privacy, though there are of course photos I am sharing. But more because I don’t have permission from others and this definitely isn’t the place to ask them to review a post on!

Anyway I’m here to give you the low down on the happy day, not to talk about privacy and consent. Thursday was an amazing day and some time before 3.30pm I became Master’s Mrs. This is how it went.

Day before

I’ve never before packed a case with so few actual clothes in it. Except for a dress for that evening, underwear, shorts and a top the rest was what I’d call stuff. Toiletries, makeup, shoes, jewellery. You get the idea, plus it was heavy. He had a tiny bag and we both had our important extras – suit and my dress in bags. Then there was all the wedding things, table plan, favours, place names, gifts, an instax camera. In fact a huge boot full.

We were first to arrive at the hotel and check into our room, which was large and spacious with a lovely view. Well it would be lovely if the huge lawns hadn’t been completely brown. Plus the area where we were due to be married outside was in full sun. The first thing we needed to do (well after having a beer in the local pub) was to move the wedding indoors. I was sad about this as I’ve always liked the idea of marrying outdoors. But it really was a no brainer.

The rest of the afternoon was spent chatting to family, many of whom I hadn’t seen since well before the pandemic. It was really lovely to sit in a big group in perfect anticipation of what was to come.

The least said about the evening meal the better. We were a group of 16 and service was pedestrian to say the least. Afterwards I was a bit nervous about how our wedding would run if we had to wait for food. But as you might expect that thankfully wasn’t the case.

I had intended to go to bed early but that didn’t happen as a small group of us sat in the bar chatting and drinking till 1am. Not much sleep then, so I’d need to run on adrenalin (and Prosecco) the next day!

The big day

Damn I was awake early, stressing over whether everything would go ok. Stupid, but that’s me! Thankfully once I had some breakfast inside I felt ok and to be honest I had little time to worry for a few hours at least. Hair and makeup felt like a great me time and I really enjoyed getting them done. Some other family members had their hair done, but I had no bridesmaids so our room was a peaceful place in the main.

The hotel wedding organisers let us down a bit at that point. Because it was difficult to get things sorted in the reception room. The tables had been placed too far apart and with the flowers arriving imminently we were both getting a bit stressed. Anyway at the right moment the co-ordinator for the day arrived and I was able to go get ready and get photographed and leave people to actually do their jobs.

Once I descended the stairs from our room and was on the arm of my handsome son the next couple of hours were a whirlwind of loveliness. Our ceremony was emotional. I knew as soon as I joined Master that he was going to struggle to get his words out. By the end there were few dry eyes in the room, mine included. My make-up artist had told me not to cry!

The meal was great, the speeches spoken. I might write about the emotion my son’s speech in it’s own post another day. We cut the cake and danced while my niece sang which was an amazingly special moment. Then we did karaoke all night and it was fun, everyone joined in and danced. Well except the oldies but that of course was ok. The evening was just what I wanted a brilliant party.

It was a perfect day for us to remember for ever. I’m sure I’ll write more but that was it in a nutshell!