liberation

I never told you about lovely bridesmaid and I taking an unplanned trip to 'liberate' some slate from the Lakes. because its a naughty thing to do.

We had gone out from the day to woolfest, yes, thats right, woolfest. next week I go to potfest, twice. its a crazy place, Cumbria. After we had dragged ourselves away from all the wool, we went for lunch at a pub that lovely bridesmaids sister manages, and realised that we were halfway to one of the places on my list of things to do which we were planning to come back to in a few weeks time. I love killing several birds with one stone!

After lunch, we set off on a further tour of the lake district, to one of the scariest rides my little car has ever done, via a tour of my bridesmaids own wedding day. I wasn't at this wedding, as we had lost touch at this point, but she got married in a beautiful tiny church nestled in between hills, with a reception in the village hall afterwards. They had photos taken in the nearby bluebells where her husband originally proposed, and more photos in (yes IN) the lake opposite. I had never been to any of these places before, and they were all on the way to our final destination of near car death, so we had a couple of stop offs in beautiful scenery.

the path up to the bluebells

Crummock water - I have a picture of her in the lake on a rock she stood on in her wedding dress!

Then we headed on to the place which shall remain nameless, but very steep. I should point out that my dear little car, is 11, was born in the fens (well, not born, its a hyundai, but you know, lived) and is still somewhat reticent to attempt a good hill. So just after stopping for a drink/icecream (us, not the car), to see a sign saying 20% INCLINE or something to that effect, struck terror into my heart. However, it pootled on up, and about halfway up we stopped for a 'wander'. While on this wander, we encountered sheep that look like rocks. They creep up behind you and listen to your conversations.

can you see the sheep? THERE ARE THREE.

Anyway, after much shenanigans, we managed to liberate enough slate for my table numbers. There was a point, near the top of the hill, where my car almost started rolling back down again, but it made it. The other side was far scarier,many more bends, and steeper inclines, but we made it.

When I got home that evening, I rang James, and said
'we did the scary hill' (obviously I said the real name)
'HOW?!'
'in first gear.'
cue much laughing from him, and later everyone in the pub I suspect, when he told them. Incidentally, everyone there just said I was 'tidying up' by taking a bit of slate. they do seem to have rather a lot...

speeding along.

Firstly, thank you for your lovely reactions to my previous posts, I had been putting off telling you all about the house for a while, but I needn't have worried!

I had a moment on the way home today, where I realised that 3 months is NOTVERYLONGATALL, even less when you consider that its now less than 3 months, and even less still when you consider that we are about to move.

However, most of the things left to do are choices rather than necessities. Our banns have been read, (no objections, yay!) the rings are here, and the church/reception is booked.

RSVP's have started rolling in to my parents, which is very exciting!

We have started booking the travel arrangements to our honeymoon - we are going completely by train so we had to wait til 3 months before to book any of the journeying. We are both really looking forward to a good rest after everything, this hasn't been a particularly stressful wedding to plan, but when in conjunction with everything else happening around us, we are slowly becoming mentally (me) and physically (James) exhausted and are VERY ready for the break!

We even sorted the bridesmaids shoes the other week, so now we can all walk to the church, properly shod. Phew!

On the list of things I still want to do/have just done but are not necessary to render us married but make me happy:

James kindly mended a very cheap velvet covered jewellery box for me the other day, to keep our rings in, and he managed to do it without pulling that, 'you want me to do WHAT? WHY' face that tends to come with blog induced ideas. its the maroon velvet thing the rings are standing on in one of my previous posts.

I want to make the bridesmaids little clutch bags. I think I mentioned this before, maybe not, but its my main source of procrastination at the moment. I've done the trial run, which is going to be my bag, in the hope that the other 3 will be near identical, and better than the first. This, I have justified not only by thinking that bags are useful, but it teaches me the new skill of fitting those metal purse frames.

Having a jacket fitting this week, I'm having a little bolero jacket made in the same material as the dress.

Still collecting jam jars for the favours, getting there, I'm eating a lot of Greek yoghurt and honey as the honey comes in perfect jars!

There are lots of other little bits and bobs to do, but the main bits are coming together. As my mother keeps saying when I tell her about another thing slots into place, 'its all dovetailing!' (very old obscure darling buds of may reference - we are odd people, my mum and I)

On the other hand, health and safety have pissed on my bonfire with regards to some of the flowers in the church. Apparently we are now not allowed to put anything on the windowledges, where we were going to put vases of gypsophilia. However, there are other places in the church where we can put them, and we will still have the wicker hearts hanging off the pew ends. Having also been told that the church do not do wedding flowers, I was then told that people do pay to have the flowers done on a specific week at the altar, for example in memory of someone, and someone is doing just that on the weekend of our wedding, which saves us about £90 for a pedestal at the altar. So between that and the vases issue I can only assume that some greater power than me is determined that we don't waste too much money of flowers, which will only die in the end, and get seen by us for even less time!

When Mum comes across for my jacket fitting this week we are going to try and get into the church to have a look at what we can do instead, so I'll maybe have more on that later in the week.

image via weheartit

At the risk of sounding like I'm copying other beautiful ladies, I can't let today pass without saying that the lovely R becomes a MRS today! A year ago, we'd never spoken, never heard of each other, but shes become a very lovely supportive lady to me, and I want to wish her every happiness today, and for the rest of her life with O. She really is a darling!

Congratulations to you both, I can't wait to hear about it all afterwards.

once more with feeling....

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

the ring!

finally got my wdding ring back from the jewellers, its my own fault its been so long, I kept adjusting bits, so the whole thing took a long time. but finally, after a bit of internal grappling and terrors that I wouldn't like it, I lov it! the millgrain texture they've put on it has made it so much more dainty than before, its lovely! at least I think so anyway!

home sweet future home / my own personal big and scary post.

I'm a little scared of writing this post, so please, you've been so lovely for the last year, can you be nice again just for this one?


The reason why you might have seen that I've been moving boxes today on twitter, is because well, we are moving.


The reason why I said I can do it slowly, is because we're moving to James parents house.


They aren't going to be in there still, before you ask! They are moving next door, into a building they have been converting, and we are moving into the home James spent the majority of his life in, to make it our own. Its been in the works for a long long time, but the timing has meant that this has become a wonderful accidental wedding present.


I'm not going to tell you about the monetary side of things, that's quite frankly noneofyourbeeswax, but don't go labouring under the illusion that we are spoilt little rich kids turfing our parents out of home for our own gain. We both work hard to earn our pennies, James particularly so, having spent the last 18 months working every weekend to help convert said new home next door, when he works a full week in between. And most importantly, this was their choice, their offer.


You might say that I didn't need to tell you this, that I could just have said that we bought this place, but
a - that's a lie,
b - we will know the house very well from day one, and that would show in my posts.

yes, I will post about it, that's why I'm introducing it now, because we move in a month, and it probably going to be one of the topics on the blog after my wedding. I love interiors, and decorating, I love this house, and I'd like to share some of it with you.

*runs away quickly after hitting publish*

the full stationery shebang unveiled.

The past few weeks have been punctuated, as you know, by the making of invitations. There have been several invitation construction afternoons, one with lovely bridesmaid, and one with the parents. Barring a couple of evening invitations still to do, we are now done, and as of last night got posted/delivered! So here, for your viewing pleasure, are all the photos of them, in a sort of order...

WARNING: gratuitous shots of bridesmaids legs...

We took this:

paper and card all from daintree paper

ribbon from the market

and made them into these:

we punched corners ...

and threaded ribbon...

and licked stamps...

and Dad addressed envelopes in nice handwriting...

and then put all of this, along with a map for visitors, or a slip of information for the locals into an envelope, and that, was that!

I got the lace image from iDIY while trawling it one night for ideas, and I'm so glad I did. nothing was coming together for me on this until I found that and changed the shape. I had it in my head that we were having folding card invitations with a paper inner, but my two problems were that they really did not have the nice finish that I wanted to be able to create, and that all the ones that inspired me from blogs and whatnot were a completely different style so I had nothing to draw from to help me. The best bit was how simple they were, no folding or sticking, we simply had to cut the sheets into 3, punch the corners, and the holes for ribbon, and tie the ribbon through it. bobs your uncle. have to say though, not at all sure that they'd have gone out this week were it not for lovely bridesmaid or my parents! so, not that my parents read this, or know about it, but thank you very much!

p.s. in case anyone else sees that fiskars punch and thinks wowee I love that, they are great, but check what weight of card you're punching. mine was 200gsm, only read while trying to replace it that its only designed to punch up to 130gsm. oops. no wonder its got so sticky that I have to whack it on the table to release each piece of card! It did hold up a good while though, and can still be teased into use. Cutting tin foil in it did seem to sharpen it again, a tip from a work friend, but one piece of it seems to have bent slightly out of shape! no idea how, I might be wrong...

Bookcase: Notwithstanding

I've been wanting to write a little about books I've read for a while now. Since I've moved to the other shop I've got more time to read and I love passing on a good book afterwards, so I hope you'll bear with me on this one! I read a wide variety of books, they wont necessarily be a newly released one that I write about, just one I've read, or re-read recently that I enjoyed enough to tell you about.

(yes that cover is by Rob Ryan! another good reason to own this book)

I love all Louis de Bernieres books that I've touched so far, so I asked for Notwithstanding for Christmas. I finally got round to reading it a month or so ago, and loved it. If you've read any of his before (Captain Corelli's mandolin anyone?) this is lighter than most of the others, but doesn't avoid subjects such as death. Its an easier book to read in snippets, as each chapter is about a different character from the fictional Surrey village of the book title. In the space of a chapter you are told a story about them which encapsulates their personality, their claim to fame, or defining moment. The characters then dip in and out of each others chapters, so that by the end you have a sort of understanding of the villages complicated web of relationships. Although its lighter, its still able to provoke all the emotions I've ever felt from his books. Just wait til the story about the crow. it got me, especially when the next day one fell down my chimney.

I'd love to know if you have read this, or if you read it because of this what your thoughts are?

time is marching on...

3 months today I'll be getting married! Appropriate then that my parents are coming over today to help finish the invitations - 80 envelopes to address, and the printer doesn't like them! So heres a sneak peek...

warpaint

I had me a makeup trial today in boots.
To clarify, until this morning, I did not own makeup. any makeup.
When it comes to the wedding, my bridesmaid will be doing my makeup, but we had a trial at a beauty counter to get the right colours and products for me. At the age of 26 I decided it was maybe time to own some makeup of my own. We went to the clinique counter, for a full consultation (£30 redeemable against anything you buy - call me a sucker if you want, I need all the help I can get!) and this is the end result:

and thats all semblance of anonymity gone, right there.

maybe it doesnt look like much, I dont know, but then we wanted it to look natural. I've bought foundation and lip pencil for now, they didn't have the colour lipstick we used in the trial for now, but I'll go back and get that too, but the eye colour stuff we'll probably buy other stuff thats cheaper.

be gentle!

map.

Inspired (yonks ago) by Rosalies wedding map, I've been working on my own to go with the invitations. Its almost finished now, just a couple of tiny tweaks to make to it still, but I'm quite chuffed really. Lovely bridesmaid has taught me the rudimentary skills of photoshop for this, and I had to dust of my watercolours too. As you can see from the title (which I'm hoping my parents don't mind me leaving on...) it is both completely not to scale, and innaccurate, but it gets the point across!