A pretty crafted woodland wedding…

Believe it or not but today’s lovely bride used to be my babysitter. I knew Louisa and her sister Holly when I lived in Cheddar, Somerset. (No it’s not a village made of cheese but it is sort of famous for it’s caves, the Cheddar Gorge and it’s very own sweet factory). When I was 17 my Mum moved away and I went off to art collage. My ties to the village sort of disappeared over the years but thanks to Facebook I’m kept up to date with the village gossip.
For over a year I followed Louisa on Facebook while she crafted her wedding; sourcing tea cups, making signs and making pretty much all of her decor. Louisa is the Owner and designer at ‘Lady Marmalade’s Wedding Jewellery‘ so it was only right that she would make her own wedding jewellery. She’s so crafty that she’s branching out and launching ‘Lady Marmalade’s Pretty Vintage‘ – Country Wedding Style, Set and Hire services. This creative bride spent so many hours making her wedding personal, and making every little detail count. She also worked on a small budget, so really does deserve a big shout out. 🙂 Louisa married James on 26th July 2014 at their local village hall in Priddy, Somerset, England.
 
The Wedding Theme…
Rustic Country Wedding, Celebration Cream Tea, ‘Vintage’ Prints. Brown Paper and String, Victorian Mother of Pearl Buttons.

The Mission…
To hand make as much as possible, to use local suppliers and like minded small craft businesses. We started with Save the dates and the invitations…I knew it was going to be hard work from then on!!

The wedding look…

My dress was actually in the sale in Monsoon. When we bought it, it was far too long so a friend of a friend of my Mum’s very cleverly took it up. I loved the way that it was very feminine without showing too much. The lace was so delicate and the beading just gave it a little lift. I wore leather ballet pumps which I attached a pair of Grandma Gray’s earrings to at the centre of each bow detail.
My hair was done by my sister Holly. I wanted her to do it for me as it gave us some time together before the big event. I made my own hair grips and the comb in the back. I added buttons to go with my theme. My make up was done by friend and bridesmaid Lisa Poole.
 
 Jewellery…
I made my own jewellery. I knew I didn’t want to have silver or gold as neither seemed to sit right with the rest of the theme. I decide that I would go with a bronze toned metal and chose some cute and inexpensive bird charms. I had an old Victorian Mother of Pearl beaded necklace that my Dad gave me in my early teens. It had snapped some time ago so I used the beads to create something I was really pleased with and something that wasn’t stereotypically bridal.

 The Ceremony…
(Legal Ceremony at W-S-M Registry Office in the morning), The Wedding in the Woods took place in Stockhill woods in Priddy, Somerset. The ceremony was written by James and myself and delivered by a very close family friend, Pete Macnab (Snab) who I have know since I was a baby. Before my entrance our guests were gathered in the car park by our groomsmen, they took them through to our chosen glade together. When they arrived they were welcomed by a dappled light shining through the trees to a glade that was decorated with hearts made of natural materials. There were allowed to sit or stand where they liked. Pete greeted them. We fooled our guest by letting them think that James hadn’t arrived, When our best man shouted “James where are you?” He abseiled down from the top of one of the trees! A great cheer and a round of applause came from our friends and family.

My entrance was less adventurous! but incredibly teary! I entered to ‘Down by The Salley Gardens’ an old folk song remastered by David Nevue (Piano soloist).
One of my bridesmaids read a poem called A Woodland Walk by Nigel Borrington
The rings were in a nest made by Mayliss Boardman which the best man collected from the tree beside us.

Photographer…
We didn’t have a professional wedding photographer. Rachel Cooper (A close friend of both me and James, does weddings for friends) did our official family photo’s, arrival and leaving photos. Our other friends, Amy Green and Rhian and Andy Kendal did a lot of the venue and the props etc. We called in as many favours as we could as we were on a tight budget!

 
Styling and Reception…
The hall has a very old fashioned feel and is right next to a very cute village primary school. We had metres and metres of hand made bunting which went around and across the hall. The bunting was made Janet, a close family friend. She worked on it for months and it is simply beautiful. For our welcome drinks we had the obligatory Pimms, a barrel of Yorkshire Ale and two barrels of Somerset Cider. I had taken a vintage suitcase and decorated it with pictures of James and I from the last 10 years. On the outside I had pasted some replica travel labels and had written moments from our time together in the destination and travel information areas. This was where our guests put their cards. I had Unique Lettering make the L and J letters for us as a prop and a keepsake too and themed the rest of the welcome  table with rustic props.

The tables were all covered in plain white table cloths with (real) vintage embroidered linen over the top. Each table was named after a tree and each table had a disc of that particular tree in the centre (discs supplied by Tree surgeon husband!). On each disc were three jars of varying sizes which I decorated with twine, crochet lace, a wooden heart and vintage buttons. The jars held a posy of wild and cottage garden flowers, Pencils made from twigs and the smallest held a tea light.
At each place setting a trio of mismatched vintage china was placed. The China was collected by myself, my Mum and many friends. The idea came when I found bags and bags of it in a skip and rescued what I could!

My place names were on hand aged luggage labels. They were a combination of ideas from myself and Nikki at ‘Spruced Tags’ I wanted the tags to be place names but also tags for our wish tree. I sent Nikki some buttons and she had the crochet lace. On one side she attached lace and buttons and left room for the name. On the other side she stamped ‘Your Message…’ Our guests wrote us a message using the twig pencils then hung them on the wish tree (tree and stand supplied by Tree surgeon husband!).

We had Cake stands and tea pot on each table and on each cake stand were local freshly baked scones. My mum made celebration ‘Cheddar Strawberry’ Jam and we had Somerset clotted cream. Our favours were little pots of honey from a  family friends bee’s and Somerset Mead.

 The Wedding Cake…
Neither of us are a fan of traditional fruit cake so we went for a Yorkshire Courting Cake (Layers of sponge, strawberries and cream) and a Somerset Apple Cake. Our cake topper was made for us by a lovely lady called Rhian. I stumbled across her on Ebay We were only about a week away from the wedding and we still had no topper. There is usually a wait on Rhian’s toppers as they are handmade to order but she jumped to it and personalised one for us and had it sent to Mums within the week. We love it and have it on display at home now!

Entertainment…
We had live music all night. The main attractions were ‘The Cheddar Blues Band’ and ‘Beside the Gray’ (Holly’s band…Brilliant!). We also had an open mic session. Lots of our friends and family are musicians. It was funny as Holly had written a song for me and I had written a song for James so it was all very emotional.

Flowers…
My flowers were made of Paper. The actual blooms were made by Paris of ‘Panache Par Paris’ I then added brooches that belonged to my Grandma Gray who is sadly no longer with us and dried Gypsophila . The posy handle was finished off with lace, some string and then I added a vintage scarf clip. I was really pleased with effect. I handmade each of the button holes for immediate family and the groomsmen and of course the Groom. I made the leaves out of brown paper and for James he had an extra leaf made from sheet music for ‘Down by the Salley Gardens’ which I had walked in to. Each button hole had dried gypsophila and little button blooms.

The Bridesmaids…
I had four bridesmaids. My sister Holly was my Maid of Honour and then I had my three best friends, Katrina, Jodie and Lisa. My bridesmaids were each given a little pack about a year before the wedding. they were told they could wear any dress they liked as long as it fell in to the colour families that I had given. Each had a paint colour chart of creams in to sagey and forest greens. I ended up with two in green and two in cream, two short and two long. It worked really well. I made them each a heart decorated with buttons and paper leaves and ribbon instead of a posy each to carry. I made each of my bridesmaids a fresh water pearl bracelet with a silver hand stamped heart with their initials on.

The four legged guests… the dogs!
We had 3 dogs attend our wedding. Mine and James Dog, Mishka, James’ Mum’s Dog, Ellie and my sisters dog, Flo. Unfortunately it was too hot for Mr Todd; Mum and Dad’s dog and our childhood pup! Still going strong at the age of 18! Each dog had a hand decorated collar!

It was a scorching hot day and one that I will remember forever. I could gush on and on about it forever!
I think she’s one happy Mrs 🙂 Back tomorrow my lovelies…