Hello all, and sorry for not posting here for such a long time! I have been keeping busy with wedding preparations, but until recently there’s been little to show for my efforts.

Firstly, I would highly recommend Your Wedding, Your Way by Sophie Vincenzi if there’s anyone out there planning to get hitched. I got it from my local library recently, and it’s proving extremely useful (and not as scary and bridezilla-like as the title would have you think!) Thanks to the book and some web research, I now have a vague idea of our order of service (including possible music and readings), and was inspired to make a list of things we still need to do. It was three A5 pages long. I am daunted.

On the positive side, I have had two dress fittings, and now have my freshly-altered dress home again with newly-attached straps, thanks to the seamstress at the local dry-cleaners. I was a bit scared of letting a virtual stranger do things to my dress, but she’s done a lovely job and I’m really pleased. On Thursday we also made progress with choosing flowers for the wedding party from one of the three florists in Crayford, and a tiara for me. Rosy and her boyfriend Jezz came along to give us third and fourth opinions, which was very helpful. I think I’ll probably order a tiara online from Yexley Designs, as the one I wore in the shop was lovely, but also cost over £70! Once I’ve got that, my outfit for the day will be pretty much complete, so it’ll just be Paul left to worry about!

The honeymoon plans are going well too - we’re going to Paris for a week, and now have the Eurostar tickets, accommodation and insurance sorted out. I’m really looking forward to having a relaxing time to recover from all this planning :)

By the way, we’ve just published our second newsletter (PDF), which will be winging its way by email to invited guests imminently. Hope you enjoy reading it!