The official photographs

We were very excited to receive the official photographs on cd today. There are over 1200 of them so it's going to be extremely difficult choosing which ones to blog.

This is one of our favourites:

Reception flowers

Our flowers just arrived from the Wiggly Florist.

The button-holes contain sea holly, lavender, goldenrod, variegated greenery and pink carnations:

My bouquet contains goldenrod, lavender, pink carnations, sweet stock, snapdragons, allium sphaerocephalon, variegated greenery, kaffir lilies? and safflower (Carthamus tinctorius):

The table flowers for Otterton Mill are similar to the bouquet, but also contain statice and some non-variegated greenery:

Ceremony flowers

Mum arrived today with lots of balloons and flowers. The flowers are so lovely that we've decided to take them to the wedding ceremony to decorate the room. The setting is much more formal than our reception venue and so the lilies, roses and chrysanthemums will go perfectly.

Another Edwards

Helen and I knew straight away that we would like to share the same family name. But the question then was which one? It no longer seems obvious that the woman should take the man's name, and after a few months consideration I felt the most comfortable with changing my name.

Without seeking legal help (expensive!), no one was certain whether the wedding certificate alone would be sufficient for a man to change name, and so we took the recommended route and also prepared a deed poll which will be signed and witnessed at the ceremony in addition to the wedding certificate. The added advantage of using a deed poll is that I can acknowledge my roots by keeping Elliott as a middle name, this wouldn't be possible with just a wedding certificate without adopting Elliott-Edwards as a double barrel surname, and we both agreed that wasn't an option!




From Saturday 16th July 2011 I will be known as Ian Edwards with the full name Ian Elliott Edwards. It is going to take me some time to get used to being called Mr Edwards!

When is a moth trap not a moth trap?

In order to write neat place cards for the wedding, we bought a new fountain pen along with a refillable cartridge and brown ink. Each person's name was printed in Vladimir script onto an A4 sheet - but then we needed a way to trace the names onto each place card.

Since the card was quite thick, the only solution was to use a lightbox, but we didn't have one. Fortunately we currently have Helen's dad's moth trap - and so we managed to make a makeshift light box out of a lamp, plastic crate and the perspex from the trap.


This made the process much easier, and the place cards ended up looking really good.


The Bride and Groom place cards were written in Edwardian script.

Ian Edwards' Otter Cane

On Sunday 10th July, I received an email from Mark Davies (aka Country Sticks) to let me know that the hand carving of the head for my otter cane for the wedding is complete. The order was very last minute as I only saw his work for the first time last week. Usually he wouldn't take on an order at short notice, but he was very kind to take this on, and worked all through the weekend to complete it.

I created a mock up of the head with both brass and silver collars on a number of shanks, and then tested with the grey wedding suit that we're hiring.

In the end, the brass collar was the clear winner. The straight, shiny black cane will not be an option, but we've asked Mark to use the darkest shank that he has and it should work out really well.

I've requested the total height (from top of head to bottom of ferrule) to be 37.5 inches as this is the height of the umbrella that I most often use as a stick.


The next day, Mark sent through photos of the otter with brass collar mounted on the final stick. In the end, he made a special trip to his supplier to find this chestnut shank, and the finished stick just looks fantastic. The glue will dry over night, and then he will apply a final coat of varnish on Tuesday, before posting it out to us special delivery on Wednesday.

The cane should arrive by 1pm on Thursday, and I have to admit that I can't wait to see it!

I think Mark's work is incredible, and it is wonderful that the stick will be in our wedding photos. I'll enjoy the otter stick for many years and I hope that it will remain in the family for generations to come.

A walk in the countryside

Today we went for a walk up to the church at the top of Pinhoe village. We took our wedding rings and programmes to photograph in a natural setting.

The programmes

We had intended to print our own ceremony programmes, but having not managed to do much with our invitations we decided to leave it to the experts this time.

We chose a design from optimal print with maple leaves on:

The ceremony music

After much deliberation we've chosen to play the following pieces of music during the ceremony:

Jim Brickman - piano solos (Prelude)

Enya - Book of Days (Processional)

Dario Marianelli - music from the film Pride and Prejudice (Signing of the register)

Bach - Unaccompanied cello suite no. 1 (Recessional)

The readings

An Apache Blessing
(to be read by Jo Edwards)

Now you will feel no rain,
for each of you will be shelter for the other.
Now you will feel no cold,
for each of you will be warmth to the other.
Now there will be no loneliness,
for each of you will be companion to the other.
Now you are two persons,
but there is only one life before you.
May beauty surround you both in the
journey ahead and through all the years,
May happiness be your companion and
your days together be good and long upon the earth.

Treat yourselves and each other with respect, and
remind yourselves often of what brought you together.
Give the highest priority to the tenderness,
gentleness and kindness that your connection deserves.
When frustration, difficulties and fear assail your relationship,
as they threaten all relationships at one time or another,
remember to focus on what is right between you,
not only the part which seems wrong.
In this way, you can ride out the storms when
clouds hide the face of the sun in your lives – remembering that
even if you lose sight of it for a moment, the sun is still there.
And if each of you takes responsibility for the quality of your
life together, it will be marked by abundance and delight.

Blessing for a Marriage by James Dillet Freeman
(to be read by Clifford Elliott)

May your marriage bring you all the excitements a marriage should bring, and may life grant you also patience, tolerance, and understanding.
May you always need one another - not so much to fill your emptiness as to help you to know your fullness.
May you need one another, but not out of weakness.
May you want one another, but not out of lack.
May you entice, but not compel one another.
May you embrace, but not encircle one another.
May you succeed in all important ways with one another, and not fail in the little graces.
May you look for things to praise, often say, "I love you!" and take no notice of small faults.
If you have quarrels that push you apart, may both of you hope to have good sense enough to take the first step back.
May you enter into the mystery which is the awareness of one another's presence - no more physical than spiritual, warm and near when you are side by side, and warm and near when you are in separate rooms or even distant cities.
May you have happiness, and may you find it making one another happy.
May you have love, and may you find it loving one another.

The napkins

We bought ivory napkins from Linens Limited:

and then had them embroidered with an otter, our names and the date of our wedding by Willow Embroidery:

The napkins will be finished off with ribbon and raffia and with these luggage tag place cards:

The finished napkins:

All ready to go to Otterton Mill:

The Flowers

The flowers for the bride, bridesmaid, buttonholes and tables will be from Wiggly Wigglers.

We're also hoping to gett some hopbines from them to hang from the beams at Otterton Mill:

Favours

We've chosen ceramic honeypots for the adults (£3.75 each from the Little Favour Box Company):


For the four youngest children we're getting soft toy otters from ebay since they are Ian's favourite animal and the reception will be held at Otterton Mill:



We've got Finn (who's a lot older than the other children) some plasticine.

The Rings

Rather than go with traditional wedding rings, we've decided to design our own.

We chose plain Palladium bands from Smooch Rings and are having them engraved with little dragonflies all the way round.


The rings arrived in May:

The suits

Ian has chosen to wear grey tails from Jonathan Hawkes


with the following waistcoat (with cream and not burgundy flowers) and a claret cravat

Bridal jewellery

I chose a necklace with crystal and diamante flowers from a seller in the US.

I didn't like the earrings that came with it so I bought some (fake) pearl and crystal earrings and a matching bracelet on ebay.

They'll work well on the wedding day, but I can also use them for other special occasions.

The Menu

We've chosen the following options from Otterton Mill's Wedding Menu:

Starters:

• Chicken liver parfait with melba toast
• Aubergine caviar with baked flatbread
• Roasted tomato and basil soup

Mains:

• Fillet of salmon with new potatoes, roast carrots and a watercress sauce
• Pork, apple and grain mustard casserole with celeriac mash
• Butternut squash, cream cheese and thyme tart with new potatoes and leaf salad

Desserts:

• Honey icecream with chocolate ganache
• Strawberries and cream
• Cheese selection with oatcakes

The Bride's dress

I chose my wedding dress today. It was the second dress I tried on and I only tried one more on after that. I was obviously very lucky to fall in love with a dress so quickly and didn't need to go to any other dress shops.

The dress is by Phil Collins (not the musician / singer). Unfortunately the only photographs of it on the internet show it in pink (ugh!):

Still, I'm sure that there'll be hundreds, if not thousands, of photographs taken of it in ivory on our wedding day.

Dewi's Dress

We've chosen an Alfred Angelo dress (7027) for Dewi in Claret:

The Reception Venue - Otterton Mill

After the ceremony we'll head over to Otterton Mill - a working water mill on the river Otter. We'll have the place to ourselves including the mill building itself, the terrace and a little garden by the leat. It's only a 30 second walk to the riverside footpath for those wanting to go for a wander down the river at any time during the evening.