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The Proposal: 16 September 2005

We went to Waiheke for a friends surprise birthday party. I really wanted to have a look at Mudbrick as I heard that it was absolutely beautiful so Andrew and I went. We went up on to the roof of the cellar which looks over the hauraki golf, I was mucking around and I turned around and Andrew was on his knee. I was so overwhelmed that I can’t even remember what he said. He proposed and I said yes (of course), a few people were in the background and clapped when we kissed. Then we went in to the Restaurant and he had arranged for us to have lunch, the food was awesome. After that we went down to the beach and found a shell ring as Andrew was too scared to buy the ring with out me (good choice). From there we went back to the penthouse apartment and celebrated with our friends.

The Planning:

Well………I had decided that I wanted to get a married at Mudbrick where Andrew proposed. I rang them and they were totally booked out for 2 years, but they had just had a cancellation for Good Friday in 8 weeks. So we booked it!!! Well, I now had 8 weeks to prepare a wedding. I wanted it to be a wedding that everyone would remember so as you can imagine everything had to be perfect. I picked my bridesmaids, my sister and three of my best friends. We decided to have 7 flower girls as we had 7 nieces all under the age of 7.

The planning was perfect, everything just fell into place. My mum and Ann (mother-in-law) helped out heaps, but the majority of it, I did it myself (find it hard to delegate).

Invitations:

We designed the wedding invitations ourselves. A friend is a graphic designer so she made them and got them printed for us.

Transport and Accommodation:

I had pre-booked accommodation on the Island for people that wanted to stay. We booked Onetangi Beach Apartments and Waiheke Holiday Resorts.

I had to arrange for an extra ferry with Fullers as it was Good Friday. I also arranged for a bus to pick guests up from the ferry to take them to the venue. The bus also picked guests up from their accommodation on the island and were brought to the venue.

Wedding Dress:

Next the Dress, I found a picture of a dress that I loved in one of the bridal magazines even before Andrew proposed. So I took the photo in to my very good friend’s mum who makes wedding dresses and who owns Marmont Fashions in Remuera. She said no problem so we started measuring up. She needed 10 metres of Thai Silk material for the dress.

Bridesmaid dresses:

We easily found the Bridesmaid dresses from Stax, they were beautiful black boob tube and tight and straight down to the ground. The flower girl dresses my mother in law found. So we had to buy 7 of them. We also found a little suit for the page boy who is my little nephew. It was so cute.

Suits:

The boys hired their suits from Frank Casey in Newmarket . They were black pants with a white shirt.

The day of the wedding:

A friend of mine, lent us his beach house in Waiheke. The night before, my mum, the bridesmaids and my little niece who was a flower girl stayed the night. We just did girly things, it was a real special time. In the morning, my two very close friends Natasha (hair dresser) and Rachel (makeup artist) arrived and from there it was all go. We all got our hair and make up done. My hair took 3 hours as it is very long. I did not want any of the girls to see my dress until the day. That was such a beautiful moment.

After we were all ready one on the girls accidentally put a hand print (make up) on my dress. So for about 1 hour we were trying everything to get it out. It came out in the end but it was pretty stressful.

The Cars:

I had arranged from a friend to borrow his black Hummer. For the other car we had a big black Ford Explorer.

The arrival:

We arrived, I was so nervous, everything looked perfect, I have always wanted to walk down Red Carpet so I arranged red carpet for the wedding. It set off the whole mood for the wedding. I wanted the mood to be relaxing so I arranged for champagne on arrival for guests while waiting and during the ceremony.

Each of the flower girls had a basket filled up with roses to throw on the red carpet. I wanted them to have a special part in the ceremony, they all felt very special.

The flower girls went first on to the red carpet with their baskets and throwing petals. The song we chose is our favourite song since we first met. It is called “It’s you, its me, from Kascade, it is a house track so it was a bit different to walk down the isle too. The ceremony went awesome apart from me blubbering. I cried right the way through it. I could not compose myself. Andrew cried, actually I think everyone at the wedding cried. It was a very moving ceremony. We wrote our own vowels which made it very special. The funniest part was when we were saying our vowels and Korban the pageboy was throwing petals at the back of my dress.

Once we were married we turned around and had a few champagnes and congratulations with our family and friends before we had our photos. I did not want to disappear for too long so we only had ½ hour to do photos which was plenty of time. By sunset the photos were perfect.

The Reception:

The Reception was perfect. The tables look awesome with the vases and flowers, and also glass tee lights all over the tables. The Management at Mudbrick were so much help. They had everything set out perfectly; I could have not done it with out them. The food was beautiful, the services was awesome, we had one on one waiter, the guests got to choose what they wanted of the la carte menu. The view looked out over the Hauraki Gulf and looked over the Auckland city.

The Cake:

I don’t like wedding cake so I wanted something different. My mother-in-law made for me the biggest cake I had ever seen. It was a porphita roll filled with Bavarian and Baileys cream and covered with white chocolate all stacked on each other. I was so yummy. She did such a good job of it.

Tables:

I did not want normal flower arrangements for the tables, I wanted something different. So I brought big cylinder vases, and on the day, I put white stones at the bottom, filled them up with a water with a white lily inside and put floating candles on the top.

The Entertainment:

My dear friend Andy Barr who is a Auckland DJ played for us. He had some trouble mixing in some Elvis for my Dad.

The next day:

I wanted to share the next day with the closest to us so we arrange for a lunch with crayfish and champagne with our family and friends at the house. It gave us quality time to sit down with everyone and spend some time with them.

The Honeymoon:

Our dear friend Trevor had brought us for our wedding present a honeymoon in New Caledonia of which he kept as a surprise and presented it to us on the night. A lot of our friends knew about it and all had contributed spending money for us. It was such a special present. Everyone knew but us. We flew out two days after the wedding. The honeymoon was so beautiful. We had such a awesome time. So relaxing. A big thanks to Trevor for that.

Wedding No2:

You are thinking Wedding No2?, my nana was a bit frail to come the wedding, so the weekend after our honeymoon we surprised her at the rest home and had another wedding so she saw me in my dress. Her face just lit up and she cried and cried. Ann had made her a little cake like our wedding cake. She was the eye of the Rest home, everyone was wondering what was going on. Such a small thing but it went such a long way with nana. It broke her and my heart not being at the wedding, this way she did not miss out on anything.

Most romantic moment:

I have two: One was when I walked down the isle to Andrew the first thing he said chocking was how beautiful I looked. Two was when we were saying our vowels and Andrew was looking at me crying. It was such a beautiful moment. Better than me blubbering through the whole thing.

Rememberal moment:

When my dad said his speech. He was so nervous about his speech as he stutters if he drinks. He did not have one drink until after he did his speech. His speech was so special that the majority of the bridal party was crying. I was so proud of him.

We had a big long candle with four wicks on it for our grandparents that had past and recently passed. Andrew’s Nana has such a strong soul and one of the candles just kept going out. There was no wind, it just kept going out, we believe that was his nana saying that she was there with us.

What we were most happy with:

We were both so happy with everything. I would not do anything any different. The memories that we had of that day are so special. The photographer was Andrews brother and he made such a good job of the photos. I want to say thank you to everyone who help us with the wedding. We could not have done it with out you all.