Well, hello there strangers! How are you all?
It’s been a whirlwind few months and the biggest part of that is the fact we got married! It’s been almost 2 weeks already (how?!) so I thought I’d share some photos with you and tell you about our day.
We flew out to Lapland on 4th February and we survived that part (I hated every minute of being in the air) so once we got there, I could finally relax and start to get excited about the big day!
We stayed in a gorgeous log cabin with my parents, great aunt, brother, his girlfriend and my nephew and it was so nice waking up with my nephew for a whole week! He’s honestly the cutest baby ever. I don’t even like babies, but he is cute and funny; when he wants everyone to look at him he starts shrieking to get our attention, it’s hilarious!
And he’s into EVERYTHING lol! If there’s something on the table, it’s being grabbed and put in his mouth…. even our schedule of the wedding day was scrunched up and he tried to eat it haha! And when he gets tired, he gets super silly and must be moving every single moment so he doesn’t fall asleep.
This was our view as we flew into Lapland, snow as far as the eye could see! When we first stepped off of the plane, it wasn’t as bad as I imagined cold wise. It’s that kind of dry cold that catches in your throat, but you’re alright to walk for a bit as it doesn’t cut through you straight away like the damp cold we get in the UK.
When we got onto the plane, the pilot said it was -28 and we were like WHATTTTT we’re only prepared for -20?!?! But when we landed, it was “only” -21!
After we’d settled into the cabin, we met with our wedding planner; we went to view the venue and talked through the plan of the day. We went through what we had to say too and Mr AN couldn’t stop laughing when he said “with this ring, I encircle your finger” he’s a child at heart 😀
This was the view opposite our wedding venue:
On Tuesday evening we went on a horse sleigh ride and of course, because it’s me, nothing goes smoothly. We were happily going along and then the horse straight up refused to go any further and started rearing up and walking backwards. Then the driver got off and was trying to stop him running off and we were like “there’s no way you’re strong enough love, we’re about to be sent flying here!!!”
Luckily she was strong enough and as we continued on, we saw the reason for the horse stopping; about 40 huskies doing their own safari with people. They were howling and barking and it was a little scary I have to admit.
Apparently we saw a tiny smear of the Northern Lights, but I’m not so sure. All I saw was mist…
Wednesday was full on wedding prep day and the day the last few guests, including my bridesmaids, flew out. We went to meet up with them in the evening at their hotel and what should have been a 10 minute walk, turned into a 45 minute walk because we walked too far up the road!!
Hahahaha, I normally have a brilliant sense of direction, but it all looks the same in the snow! I looked at the map, then said it was straight up the road we were going up (it was, just not as far as we walked!)
We got to the end of the road and I was like “this doesn’t seem right… I can’t see any signs of life!”
Then we realised we’d walked about a mile too far so had to turn round and go back. Got there eventually and went to a restaurant to have a catch up.
I woke up super relaxed on Thursday which was THE BIG DAY! And of course, it was the only windy day that week. -15 out there with windchill making it feel about -30!
First of all, we swapped watches, had some breakfast and went to pick up the flowers from the hotel reception. My friends then came over and one of them is fabulous at hair so she was curling mine and pinning it ready to style it later on in the day. It was super relaxed, I’m not sure if all weddings are like this on the actual day, probably not, but it was really calm. We had plenty of time to sit and chat, tickets were released for the ATP finals in November, so I booked tickets… then it was time to be shut away from Mr AN so we could get ready!
We had taxi’s picking us up from different places, so he and most of the guests went from reception and then me, my parents, aunt, friend and bridesmaids were in another taxi which came right to the cabin to pick us up.
It was so funny getting into my dress, I was flashing everyone, in the sauna trying to put tit tape on and then one of my friends had to basically hold the cups of my dress and just push it right onto my chest. My shoes were rubber soled too, so they stuck to the inside of the skirt, so I ended up with two people trying to help me step into it. It’s not even that big of a dress, but the struggle was real!
One of my bridesmaids captured this photo just as we went out to the taxis and it was the one I used to announce we were married. It’s the most beautiful photo ever!
We got married in a little wooden Kota, downstairs had a real log fire and chairs and tables and then up this tiny, spiral staircase was a gorgeous room with an altar.
Dad and I went a little further out from the venue and then got in a sleigh and had a reindeer pull us to the venue. I’ll show you the reindeer, but most of my family don’t want to be online, so I’m being careful with what I share.
We later found out that just after this, the reindeer hit the woman in the face and she had a black eye the next day! Whoops!!
After the ceremony which was precisely 3 minutes long (!!!) we went outside for some photos. We were told in advance we’d be doing groups of people and only in 10 minute batches, so we could then come in and warm up with some hot berry juice. It was bloody freezing!!!
We were then taken back upstairs (that staircase again…. I just about managed to get up it semi-gracefully!) and had some photos of just us and just me and my dress:
I can’t tell you how much I adored my dress. It was only the second dress I ever tried on and it was just perfect. The back is exquisite; it’s an illusion back with lace around the edges. My mum made my veil and she handmade the lace for the bottom to match the lace on my dress. It was perfect!
The final part of the ceremony bit was for Mr AN and I to go off with the photographer and wedding planner outside to have some photos taken. By this time it was properly dark and some of the photos are just stunning!
By the end of the photos, I could not even feel my hands! I actually wasn’t that cold, it was just my hands. I couldn’t even put a glove back on as my hands hurt so much and were so cold. Once we got back to the kota, we stood around the fire warming our hands and they ached soooooooooooo much as they were warming back up!
After that, we got back in taxis and went to a steakhouse to eat burgers and fries because that’s how we roll 😉 It was delicious and great to wind down after such a busy day!
We got back to the cabin at 9pm and I was in my pyjamas by 9:10pm – lol, it was the best thing ever! I’m such a granny and I can’t imagine how brides do it being in their dresses all day and night. I had mine on for about 6 hours and I couldn’t wait to get back into my comfy jogging bottoms!
The day was just perfect; we were surrounded by our closest friends and family and it was a fun and relaxed day which is what we always wanted. I can’t imagine doing it any differently; we’re not showy people, so we felt no desire to have a big wedding with a load of people we either rarely see or don’t like, just to show off our big day.
After we got back on 8th February, it was time to start prepping for the party! We did Costco runs to get drinks and provisions for making the cake. Thursday and Friday were mad cake making days! Mr AN said he would make the wedding cake, but it turned out that he made the actual cakes and then I put them together, crumb coated them, helped ice the cakes and then decorated them. He made the ruffles for me, but I positioned them all and added the flowers.
I went very simple for the cake; the bottom layer was vanilla, the middle chocolate and the top lemon. Here it is:
We hired a barn for the party and the decorations turned out exactly like I envisioned. My great aunt, parents, one of my bridesmaids and my brother and his girlfriend all came to help set up and we wouldn’t have been able to do it without them! Even my nephew was trying to “help” – he was trying to eat the ivy garlands for the table!
Here are some photos of the barn decorated before the party started. There aren’t many as whenever I’m with my family, I am crap at taking photos because I spend half my life taking photos, so normally want to put the camera down!
We went pretty simple with table decor because to us, it’s more about the people and enjoying spending time with friends and family. Oh and it’s about food too!!
We also set up a cork board with an Instax camera to act as a guestbook and then spread out our wedding photos on the table. We found this hanging light thing with pegs too which we hung above the cork board with some of our favourite wedding photos.
Being a baker, I had to have a dessert table; I had the cake in the centre and then brownies and cookies one side and cupcakes the other. I filled piping bags with frosting and got some sprinkles and set up a “pimp your cupcake” area on the table which went down a storm! I thought it might be one of those things that everyone thinks is cool and looks at, but they don’t actually do it, but it was popular!
Being incredibly shy, cutting the cake was a little nerve racking as I hate standing up in front of everyone and having them all look at me, but here’s us cutting the cake:
About 10 seconds after this photo was taken, I snapped the knife in half. It was so funny, I was almost wetting myself. Kind of embarrassing, but since I don’t take myself too seriously, I was the first one to laugh!
We had a fish and chip van for the meal and everyone seemed to love that too. I definitely thought it was delicious, I love chip shop chips so damn much! We had bread rolls so we could have a chip butty and my night was made!! 😀
All in all, it’s been a wonderful couple of weeks. The wedding and party turned out exactly as we hoped, it was perfect! Now I get to do the fun part… changing my name everywhere!
Thanks for all your support and well wishes, recipes will resume next week now we are back home and settled. I say settled… we bought way too many drinks for the party and my living room is still stacked high with boxes, but we’ll get there eventually!
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