My Sister's Wedding...

On Friday I was lucky enough to be part of a very special occasion....I watched my baby sister marry her wonderful partner of 7 years.

Baby sister has always been the life and soul of our family. She is vivacious, fun and pure goodness. Being six years younger than me I always thought she was adorable...until she started stealing my clothes and ripping the heads off my barbie dolls that is.

Watching her grow into a beautiful young woman has been a joy. Then, when she met someone who understands, loves her and makes her happy, it seemed to bring a whole new dimension into her life. Having their first baby last year completed the picture.

When I made my way down the aisle as bridesmaid on her wedding day and spotted her adoring husband to be waiting at the end, I started sobbing hysterically. This was the moment, a moment that seven years of accumulated joy, fun, trials, tribulations, laughter and love had ended in... a new beginning, the start of something spectacular.

I turned and watched with pride as my sister walked down on the arm of her beloved Daddy. Our Daddy who, until a few days previously had been seriously ill in hospital.

The ceremony was beautiful, the setting true to their personalities and style. It was a privilege to be part of such an incredible moment.

The rest of the day was a celebration of pure joy. A celebration of their love. I wished it had gone on and on and never ended, but unfortunately it had to.

So congratulations to my lovely sister and my new brother. May your lives be filled with love, laughter and happiness.

The Wedding Edition!

Making the decision to elope rather than have a big extravaganza of a wedding was a fairly easy one to make. Firstly, we were broke. Secondly we had both been married before. Thirdly we wanted it to be about us and the kids....and not really anyone else. Selfish much?

I love weddings. I think they are one of the most beautiful events you can attend....I just wasn’t interested in having one myself (again).

So when we planned our massive holiday to Tassie last year we thought.....why not? Why not kill two birds with one stone? And it’s not like Tassie isn’t beautiful. We had a plethora of incredible places to choose from to have our special day.

We chose the Tamar Valley, just outside of Launceston; it was stunning.

The thing about eloping as that you tend to take a rather relaxed approach to the planning, simply because there is not really a whole lot of planning to do. Trouble is, we were a little too relaxed...and left a lot of things to the last minute......

On the morning of the big day we had our celebrant organised, our photographer and a witness. We had picked a beautiful spot in a gazebo over a lake. The children had gorgeous outfits to wear and I had bought Hubby a nice shirt and pants. I had forgotten one thing however.....myself.

We dashed into Launceston that morning to try and find me a dress. I wasn’t after a traditional dress, just something pretty and flattering. After trawling through quite a few stores I settled on a cute little purple number....that was $30 from Target.  I planned to team it with black boots, black stockings and a black woollen jacket (it was absolutely freezing in Tassie at that time of year)

After that we ‘popped’ into the jeweller to pick up a ring (yes, I’d forgotten that too!) Stopped off at the florist to grab two bunches of flowers (for $10 each) and very importantly visited the bottle shop for a yummy bottle of Verve...for our 'reception' afterwards.

We dashed back to the resort we were staying in and proceeded to get ready. I dashed around getting the children and soon to be Hubby prepared and had precisely 10 minutes to get ready myself (story of my life)

We arrived at our destination elegantly in our huge camper van; it's kind of difficult to be glamorous and lady-like when climbing out of the cab of one of those things.

It wasn't long before we were all assembled and ready to go.

Our bridal party was gorgeous;

Mr 11 was the Best Man;

Miss 8 was the Maid of Honour;

Mr 5 was the 'Ring Bear'

Miss 2 was the Flower Girl;

Our wedding ceremony began. Throughout our vows Mr 5 clutched the box containing our rings possesively. He had taken his role as ‘Ring Bear’ very seriously and hadn’t let them out of his sight. When it became time for him to hand us our rings he did so very carefully. He handed Hubby’s to me and I placed it lovingly on his finger. Then, he handed my ring to Hubby who took it, fumbled it, and then proceeded to drop it. We watched in horrified awe as it tumbled down and right through the gap between the floor boards of the gazebo...and into the lake.  Hubby and I stared at each other in absolute mortification.....and then I started to laugh. I laughed and laughed and eventually Hubby joined in too. Tears streamed down my face as we used one of my other rings to finish the ceremony. The only one not laughing was Mr 5 who was appalled that Dad had dropped Mum’s special ring....it’s something he still tells his Dad off about to this day.

Despite that mishap the ceremony finished amongst laughter and tears and we were offically married. It was a wonderful moment and one that was even more significant because we had our lovely children with us.

Hubby later went back to that freezing cold lake and swam under the gazebo to try and locate the missing ring, but no luck.

The photographer took some fun and fabulous shots and then we went back to the resort for our reception that involved champers for Hubby and I, soft drink for the kids and some crazy dancing from all of us. We took crazy photos and laughed about the ring debacle.

Later, we all went out for a wonderful dinner...it was the perfect ending to the (nearly) perfect day.

A year later, I look back on our special day with joy, pride and just a little bit of a giggle.

PS; On returning from our holiday my Grandfather presented me with my Grandmothers’ wedding ring, which meant more to me than words could ever express.