Lovely Date 03/06/09 (by sarah)

Need I say more?

Walks off humming happily.

Arty Shots from the Wedding (by sarah)

I took some arty pics whilst at my cousins wedding!

I liked this white mirror and loved catching the reflected light and atmosphere in it!

I caught myself in the window of the car taking a photo which I thought was most apt!

This butterfly was on one of the wedding presants and well its a butterfly so I had to take a photo!

Jean pulled her guazy skirt over her head the effect was quiet erry which I think this ophoto conveys.

This picture is my favourite - it was a fluke but shows the light and movement and is somehow graceful and other wordly.

I really loved the way the disco lights highlighted Claires dress so took lots of photo's of the first dance!

More disco lights - the arc across the floor and the darkness beyound drew me to this image.

The little boy is looking at his balloon but the way he is highlighted by the lighting again just seemed to make it a fantastic portraite as far as I'm concerned!

Not sure these are any good but the roses changing colour was something I just wanted to try and catch.

The vibrancy of this picture drove me to keep it though you can't really see who is who.

This picture is almost perfect (the 99p shop bag sort of ruins the composition but I love it anyway) it's Jean at the top of Dave's stairs.

The Morning After (by sarah)

The morning after the wedding found us all bleary eyes - except Jean who was having a great time with my hat and eating her bear!

There then insued unhappyness on my part on finding out that we were supposed to be back before 4 to catch Lionel before he left for Bristol - I had to hurriedly cancel all the arrangements I'd made - people I was planning to see in the morning and afternoon which didn't greatly please me.

We then set out and it was hot and there was traffic and we had to stop at two lots of services on the way home for health's sake!

These are the flowers mum got - we almost took them home with us!

Anyway the journey basically took twice as long as normal meaning that even though we left with plenty of time we got back here about 20 minutes after Lionel had left - Al was stoical about it. Jean however was not and became very grumpy that there was no Lionel to play with!

Clare and Adam’s Wedding (by sarah)

Saturday saw my cousin Adams wedding 🙂

We were staying at my brothers flat and so spent the morning getting ready - as this included the arduous task of waxing legs, washing waist length hair and painting nials - it took a while!

To my amazement I discovered my brother actually irony his suit trousers!

We kept Jeany entertianed by watching the first Harry Potter Film which she has been obsessed with ever since :/ The previous night I had discovered Alaric had double booked me and triple booked himself and there had been some confussion over a Frontline meet-up on the Friday which we consequently missed 🙁 But I had a lovely meal with David and Michelle and then we watched O'Brother Where Art Thou which has to be one of my favourites films ever 🙂

Anyway...

As I had feared there was the last minute panic when Mum and Dad weren't ready when Dave went to pick them up and the booster seat for Jean had been forgotten and her dress hadn't yet arrived and I had to be told off for panicking! So the norm before a wedding really!

I spent the time making the presant look nice and writing the card I'd made, unfortunatly there was no bride and groom wiggly pets as I just haven't been well enough but hope to be soon.

Eventually Jean's stuff arrived, she had been getting a bit worried as Mummy was Gizelle and Aunty Michelle was Gizelle too but she wasn't - we apparently were pretty princesses but when she put her dress on - she was definatly the Gizelle! (For the uninitiated Gizelle is a character/princess in a film called Enchanted she arrives in our world wearing a filly marangue of a dress...) Jean was very excited as there was a pose of gold and cream and sparkly shoes and even lacey socks!

We liturally shoved her into the dress and fled to the church. In the panic of seeing the bride arrive just before us I managed to leave my camera in the van and so all the actually ceromony stuff is on Al's camera phone! He also wore his recording glasses in the church - managing to look like my body guard half the time as he sat so ridgidly.

Claire did look fantastic and the church was aglow with golden bridesmaids and page boys in neat little grey outfits! The Vicar Dude was quiet funny too which made it an upbeat service!

I trotted off to get the camera as soon as we got outside - praying i wasn't going to miss the confetti and getting back just in time to be ordered into line for the official photos!

Outside the church after service

I had found some small bottles of bubble mix with doves on the top or shaped as champiagne bottles - I had these squirreled in my not large enough handbag and gave them out to all the kids - hoping I got them all!

In hind sight this was a bit risky - giving three year olds bubble mix when they are in finery! Jean poured her's all down the front of her :/

The boys - where trying not to photographed initially but soon caved in - two of these where my little page boys - hard to believe really! They are so big now!

I took general photos of mum and various people.

Finially I have a discent pic of Uncle David and with his boating insignia on his suit!

This is aunty Lizzy Adams Mother.

The Bride and Groom outside the church.

Rebecca and Rebecca and Rebecca and me 🙂 Rebecca was my chief Bridesmaids, she again managed to look fantastic! Other Rebecca (my other cousins fiance) had done her nails to match her dress with a burnished orange flowers at the tips of a french manicure.

Alaric and Ivan managed to look like they were being under cover agents of some sort - not quiet sure how they managed this!

Then it was Confetti Time!

Adam said he tried for the fire engine (Jez) but Claire wasn't having a bar of it 😉

The reception was at the Moby Dick pub where Claire works and they had decorated it in gold and cream again including a balloon arch! I just had to take photos of all the Candles and Balloons:

The Meal

Wedding cake - another Aunty Lizzy piece de la resistance! There was chocolate cake, maderia cake and rich fruit!

Presant time - Jeany got a lovely little bridesmaid bear for being a bridesmaid which she has been inseperable from - she even took it into pre-school for show and tell! Mum also got flowers for making the grown up bridesmaids dresses!

Outside in the Garden - the kids had a great time in their wedding outfits playing on the slides and swings!

Bridesmaids dancing

Later in the Evening

The First Dance!

Dancing in disco lights

Jean kept going for naps in the van and there were asleep children all over the place by the end of the evening! Alaric managed to drop our presant as he put it on the presant table so some of the glasses got smashed and my bow came undone etc... he was very sad about this!

I attempted to dance with Michelle and Sam but was very very tired by the end of the evening! It was great and Jean loved every minute of it (until she got grumpy tired towards the end but even then she didn't want to go!)

Lionel’s Parting Tea and Cakes (by sarah)

Friday we had to leave for Essex for my cosins wedding and were not sure weather we would get back in time to see Lionel on Sunday so at four o'clock we went for an 'early' tea with Barbara, Lionel and some of the neighbours. I had asked for tea to be early ie 3 o'clock but this was seen as far too early to have tea and cake :/

This cuased a few problems as it turned out Jean was supposed to have a finial fitting for her bridesmaids dress but I hadn't actually been told about this so didn't factor it into the equation.

Still the tea was interesting with Maureen T bringing along her victorian Lady's visiting cards holder that had the appearance of being quilted with mother of pearl and was really a very buetiful object - it's the sort of thing I could imagin keeping my business cards in and sparked my interest as a craft idea.

Lionel apparently had a few of these cases as a child to play with as he loved the finishes so but they were sold at some point.

Muareen was saying that there was a whole ettikette to laying your cards out at peoples houses and ways of saying if you were widowed and stuff!

Just as we were gearing up to leave the Shaw's arrived with some five year cualiflowers for me and Barbara which is intreging and I look forward to planting them and getting collies for five years from the same plant.

There were disgussions of wood work and boating and victorian psycics which was very interesting and I got abit involved and made us later in leaving that I had intented!

Barbara kept slipping Jean more cake when I had said no more and even hid Jean behind the kettle so I wouldn't see she had more cake - sigh ;/