 I went to see Kurek Ashley, a motivational speaker, one night and was inspired to reach out and grab my dreams. So when I got home I sat on Shane and asked him to marry me. In my nervousness I missed Shane's unique answer, the conversation went something like this
Rebecca – “Will you marry me?”
Shane – “Is it dark outside?”
Rebecca – “Yes but will you marry me?”
Shane – “Is it dark outside?”
Rebecca – “Yes, but . . Oh Yes!”
So that's how it happened, we've been pretty unconventional from the start.
We set the date and then spent the next 10 months and 3 days planning our wedding. There were a few months where not much happened then it would start with a rush again. We decided to invite 94 guests and have the wedding in my parents’ garden. Having the wedding at home meant a bit more organizing but it was worth it in the end as the day went really well!
I wanted to do as much myself as I could so I designed all the invitations and had them printed at a local copy shop. I also designed and printed all the place cards and the wedding update that I sent out a month before the wedding (and something I would recommend to other brides-to-be to consider doing).
I chose to wear a ball dress that belonged to my grandmother. It was a very special dress to wear as my grandmother had died the year before. It is ivory taffeta with big red roses on it. My friend, Jill Melville from Tauranga, altered it to fit me perfectly and added in some special touches like the ivory and gold tulle used in the petticoat and the veil to make it special for me.
After much searching we found the perfect dress for Janine, my bridesmaid, close friend and sister, at Modes in Auckland. It was a red cocktail dress in a style in keeping with the wedding dress. Our beautiful flowergirl wore an ivory satin and chiffon dress.
The boys wore black suits without ties but ofcourse rose buttonholes, red for the grrom and white for the bestman. Our handsome page boy wore a black waistecoat to match his uit.
Probably you can guess, the wedding theme was red roses and lots of them!
We had an excellent celebrant who after meeting with us wrote six sets of vows from which we cut and pasted the final copy from (which was a great help). Also as a part of the ceremony we had 12 people each read us a wish for success. Neither of us knew what the wishes were so it was especially touching to receive these from friends and family members. Our parents also agreed to support us in our marriage as both sets of parents are great roles models - each having been married for over 35years.
During the ceremony it was funny as Shane's ring would not go on smoothly so I had to push it on to his finger really hard, which caused us all to crack up laughing at the funny face I pulled while doing this.
The most romantic moment of the day was staring into my new husband’s eyes when we were having our photos done. We were soooooooo very very happy!
The food at the reception afterwards was fantastic and the evening flowed very very well. All the speeches were heartfelt, honest and very moving. We had six in total, my dad, Shane's dad, David, the best man, Janine, the chief bridesmaid, Shane and then myself. I decided to speak at the wedding which is not traditional but instead of saying a speech I read a poem that I had written for Shane.
Shane and I had our first (and probably last) ever dance which was great as right up until the day before Shane was saying he wouldn't dance.
 It was important to both of us to honour our families as well on our wedding day and we placed on the table where we signed our register the bibles that each of our mothers carried on their wedding days. I also decided to follow the wedding traditions:
Something old - my dress
Something new - my lingerie
Something borrowed - my sister's earrings
something blue - blue flower embroidered onto my garter belt.
In hindsight there's nothing I would have changed about the day, it was perfect, everything we could possibly have asked for and more. The best decision of the wedding for me, apart from asking Shane to marry me, was finally deciding to wear my Nana's dress. It was perfect for our day.
We spent a week in Northland a part of the country that neither of us had ever been to for our honeymoon. It was nice and relaxing just spending some us time after all the planning and excitement of our wedding day.
And the couple’s advice to other couples contemplating a life together “Married life is great, the only thing that is very different for me is getting used to signing a new signature and for Shane is getting used to wearing a ring.
Be organised with your planning so that on the wedding day you can enjoy every moment because the day goes so fast that before you know it, it is all over.”
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