...the wedding's ON!!!!
(LOL to those who thought "Oh no, she's mentioning the 'C' word! It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!")
A quick update - some of you may recall the financial issues we encountered in the middle of wedding planning, and me saying in an older post that we may really have to cancel or postpone the wedding, even though the Save the dates had been printed and so had the personalised napkins.
I am happy to say we have been saved. We can have our day after all! Who saved us? Who is the Fairy Godmother? The Good Samaritan?
None other that my future in-laws, OH's Dad and his wife (his dad and OH's mum divorced when he was 10). You may recall I was heading for the Deveron Valley in Aberdeenshire where they live to meet them for the first time. OH and his dad also had not seen each other for 4 and a half years and only started talking again last Christmas following my OH being a "stupid, younger hothead" as he calls himself and walking out of his dad's house and never looking back until i came into his life and slowly reconciled them.
On top of being the warmest, funniest and most hospitable people I've met (they gave us their bedroom for the week), not only did they cook us the most gourmet meals (they are both amateur gourmet chefs and have a roomful - no exaggeration! - of cookery books and recipes cut out of magazines!, but they drove us around everywhere - even to Loch Ness and Culbin Forest even though it's quite a ride from where they live in Aberdeenshire! To top it all they offered to pay for the reception AND our Wedding night suite and wedding car (the latter two of which we had cut out of budget as we couldn't afford either!). They also refunded us the deposit we had already paid for venue hire! I was in tears and OH speechless, literally stuttering. Not content with that, they told us in no uncertain terms that they do not want to be involved in the drawing up of guest lists and such, as they had a bad experience with their own wedding with OH's paternal grandma interfering and making them both miserable on the day. What can one say??? The perfect in laws? Where's the catch??? There wasn't one! And yes, they are for real! They even drove us 50 miles to Culbin Forest and spent hours in pouring rain with us, picking up pine cones for our decorations and bringing each one to me for approval and "quality control"! LOL!!!
We are so humbled and grateful, we just can't find any words to express what we feel right now! Just thought to post also a few pictures taaken by my OH on our trip... In this selfish, self-interested world, people like them are sooo rare! I feel blessed! From top left: OH's stepmum, Barney the red and white setter, me; OH's dad and Hugo, the other setter; Bert, or Mr B; The majestic view at Glen Affric; Morning mist in my future in-laws' garden; Kerry; OH's dad in the woods where they walk the dogs; their lovely cottage - looks deceptively small; me, FIL2B, MIL2B.