I’m not even exaggerating, this is one looooong report.
Personally,
I love a good long juicy report, which is why I’ve written it that way myself …
I’ll not be offended though if you just look at the pictures (except, like, I
totally will because why wouldn’t you want to read about the best week of MY life … why, why wouldn’t you!? 
)
So anyway, I’ll split it up in to sections …
Before
We don’t have a gorgeous engagement story – well, it’s gorgeous to me, it involved a big surprise and lots of tears but it’s not a particularly exciting story for other people to hear about.
We’d talked weddings before we got engaged in a very hypothetical manner “If I ever got married…” we never really talked about us getting married as I think it remained an unspoken agreement between us that we didn’t want to have that conversation until we were engaged – we didn’t want to have the wedding planned before we’d agreed even to get married – I think because it felt like it would make an engagement/popping the question less special. Anyway, we both knew we were on the same page, we both thought that outdoor weddings are gorgeous but almost impossible to guarantee here. We also hate the bureaucracy of weddings, the politics, the spending money on people you don’t particularly care for, that traditions that you must adhere to, just BECAUSE!– so abroad was on the forefront of our minds. We got engaged on 5th October 2013 – and looking back over my emails, I can see I was sending enquiries off to Spain by 7th October. We knew what we wanted; a short engagement, and a wedding in the sun. It was relatively easy to plan, we flew over, picked a venue, picked a wedding planner – flew back over a few months later with a suitcase of decorations, met the photographer, had a makeup trial … and we were done. Perfecto!
I'm pretty proud of our stationery - we spent months trying to come up with the perfect idea, and then I stumbled upon this image online, after someone has said to me "Oh it sounds like A Midsummer Nights Dream" when I'd described our wedding plans to them
so I did a bit of research, found the theatre company who was putting this production on, found the person who designed the poster approached her about a commission and this was the result ...
We then used the tree for all our stationery throughout the wedding ...
Tuesday 30th Sept - The day before we flew
I was in work the day before we flew as stupidwork wouldn’t give me any more time off than I absolutely needed (I was back in work about 7 hours after we landed back in the UK after the wedding too – stupidwork!) My desk had been decorated by my colleagues, they did an amazing job, they had loads of A Midsummer Nights Dream fairies hanging around my desk and lovely sparkly things…
I was sent off with lots of gifts and cards and bottle of fizz. Totally spoiled. I was really overwhelmed with how generous they all were. I breathed a sigh of relief as I walked out of the building, rang Bec and we squealed a lot! We raced home as we had a nail lady coming to do our nails. She didn’t show up. No answer on the phone. I was panicking, my nails were an absolute mess. We had a friend who has her own beauty business coming later to do the pedicure and the waxing so we were really short on time. I ended up calling around our local area and had to get a taxi out to a different nail bar who could do a Shellac French Manicure (because in my mind this was the ONLY option!) and Bec decided to just have our friend do normal gel nails for her.
The nail bar was a comedy Chinese set up, it reminded me a bit of ‘Desmonds’ with all the drama going on, people coming and going, clearly some kind of underground sideline business being operated, one of the old Chinese nail ladies going out back to loudly vomit every five minutes, a couple of ‘Housewives of Manchester’ swanning about for a loud and interesting gossip, and then finally the ceiling caved in with water when someone in the flat above had a bath. I was glad I went there. My nails were lovely. I’m totally going back.
When I finally got home after my nails, we cracked open the fizz with our beauty friend and set about beautifying. We then ordered a Chinese and ignored all the packing we still had to do.
Wednesday 1st October - The registry office and flying to Spain
We made a start on the aforementioned packing. This is so unlike me, I’m the organiser of the two of us, I think I was just overwhelmed/tired after a year of wedding planning and so we had to pack early and leave the house by 10:30. Of course, all our cases were about 3 kilos over, so 20 minutes before the taxi was due to collect us, we were pulling items out of the cases. Items we of course would later need (I pulled out my holiday wedges but left a pair of stilettoes in my case!?) We had five cases! Three large cases, one each for holiday clothes and one for wedding stuff, plus two cabin sized cases with our wedding dresses and bouquets in.
We managed to squish ourselves in to the taxi and headed off to the registry office.
We had booked ourselves in to the registry office closest to the airport rather than our local one, so didn’t know the area. The taxi driver didn’t either so we got the sat nav up on the phone. When we arrived at our destination the taxi driver deposited us and our luggage up a back street – Bec was panicking at this point about us finding witnesses to use and ran off down the road leaving me with all the cases. I looked around and realised we were at the back of the courthouse, not the registry office and so started shouting for her to come back and help me. She ran back and we cluttered off down the road with our five cases. We couldn’t see the town hall anywhere, we didn’t even know what we were looking for! We went in to the courthouse and were given directions and then we ended up in the police station where we caused a bit of a stir with all our luggage and our loud proclamations of “We’re late of our wedding!” – a lovely security guard came to help us, relieved us of a case or two (we were like a pair of damsels in distress – “why thank you sir, you’re so strong!”) and took us to the registry office.
It was a very warm day for October 1st, and so by the time we made it to the reception of the reg office, we were puffed out and hot messes – we burst in, dropped our cases, started peeling off cardi’s and scarves and said “We’re here to get married!” to which all the office staff came out for a look! We then broke the news that we didn’t have witnesses and Bec ran off promising to be back soon. At this point, I was surrounded by office staff (who apparently couldn’t be witnesses for us!?) who wanted to hear our story, and who fussed over me, bringing me water, taking my all my woollies from me, sitting me down, telling me to breeeeeeathe (ha ha, no idea what I must have looked like!!) … then, my hero, my Bec, wandered back in with two young girls who were looking at little shell shocked and grinning from ear to ear! She had run out on to the main road, spotted the two girls on the other side of it, dodged in and out of traffic to get to them and asked them, to which apparently one of them responded “oh, I’ve never been to a wedding before!”
Not one like this, you haven’t, m’loves!
Funnily enough, I hadn’t given the next bit much thought. In my mind, I was just here to sign a contract. We’d told them in advance that we weren’t doing readings or rings or anything. They’d said we would have to make a declaration which I thought was fine. I wasn’t prepared for what came. We had to do the full on “I Melanie ….. take thee Rebecca ….. to be my lawful wedded wife” Plus listen to the sanctity of marriage speech and do the I do’s. I was a sobbing mess. I was completely unprepared emotionally!
The registrar fella and the deputy registrar who’d done all the paperwork (the marriage cert etc) then walked us and our bags out to the street and hugged and kissed us both goodbye and wished us luck. As they walked away – Bec and I Wooped and did a little dance in the street.
We had a few hours to kill before the airport and had decided (in advance) to head back in to Manchester for afternoon tea as there was nowhere we fancied locally – even though we were close to the airport where we were. We drank a bottle of Prosecco and basked in our Just Married glow and sarnies and cakes (and I took a quick pic and flashed here while Bec was in the loo – GEEK!)
Then, it was back in to a taxi in the direction we’d come from, to get to the airport. We still ended up paying for overweight luggage (I could have brought my wedges!), got through security and some of our friends who were booked on to the same flight as us were waiting there for us with (another!) bottle of Prosecco – we had about 15 minutes to drink that, then got on the flight, managed to get extra leg room seats all together (no idea how this happened, I was a little light headed by this point) and enjoyed a boozy flight to Spain! By the end of the flight, we were being congratulated by all those around us! There was a little boy in the seats behind us who gave us a sweetie each to say congratulations. So cute!
We picked up our hire car (we had a designated driver among us!) and headed for our villa in Nerja. As soon as we got there, we wandered out (it was about midnight by now) in search of water and cigs (we are usually ex-smokers but allowed ourselves the luxury and stress relief of smoking before and after the wedding!) and ended up drinking rum in a bar. We then came back to the villa, the girls who were staying with us produced a couple of bottles of Veuve they’d picked up in Duty Free and we sat out by the pool on the sunbeds wrapped in blankets, by candle light, until about 4am drinking champagne.
Such a wonderful, wonderful day! I would say it was the best day ever … but of course, it was only the start!
Thursday 2nd October
We went to meet my Mum and Uncle who had arrived the previous day, for breakfast. Over breakfast, Mum announced that she would pay for us to have a honeymoon as a wedding present!! We were amazed – I even had a little cry!
We then spent a gorgeous lazy day by the pool, hiding in the shade (no tan lines for the brides, please!) reading OK magazine and chatting celeb gossip with a couple of our friends (this point is only noteworthy because none of us have touched an OK magazine for years and aren’t the celeb following types – so it amused us to do this. We were like a bunch of WAG wannabe’s sitting around in our large sunglasses, sipping Cava, discussing Kardashian and her North West.) I wish I had realised then that this would be the only one we’d get to do this. There were only a couple of people in Spain for us at that point and we spent the day wishing for tomorrow to come when the skies would bring us our troops. Looking back though, it was lovely, this was the only day our villa was peaceful and clean and tidy and we were able to actually have a full conversation from start to finish.
Both our Dads and Step Mums arrived that afternoon and were staying in the same hotel, so we went to meet them for drinks in the evening. Our friends joined us later, the Dad’s went off for dinner, mum came back to meet us and we ended up drinking too much and having a late night again.
I should take this moment to give Nerja a shout out. We love it. We fell in love with Nerja the first time we went there last November (venue scouting.) It’s such a beautiful little town on the south coast about 40 minutes from Malaga. There are a lot of holiday makers there, but not a neon light in sight. Windey cobbledy streets, sangria served in clay jugs, tapas with every drink. It’s gorgeous.
Friday 3rd October
We drove the 40 minute drive up in to the mountains to our venue in the morning for our pre-wedding meeting – it was so exciting to walk in to the venue and see it all again before the big day. We had some tea with our wedding planner and went through all the details, minute by minute, with a fine tooth comb with her. We then had a practice of our entrance with the music, so that we could time it that we would walk up the aisle on the closing bars of the song – it was so much fun, and so nerve wracking to be there walking through it in the blazing sunshine. We got really giddy and were dancing about all over the place! Even our wedding planner and decorator were getting giddy with us!
Then the madness began when we returned to Nerja – as we pulled up to our villa, some other friends who were sharing our villa with us (C&J) arrived with their cases – they are a married couple, both my best friends in different ways (he, C, proclaimed to be my ‘best man’ since I’d asked him to do a speech for me!) and had just the week before found out they were expecting a baby! They were keeping it quiet obviously as they’d only just found out, but had told me – what with the wedding etc. The secret didn’t last long – J ran out of ways to refuse drinks!
Bec’s Mum and some other family also arrived at the same time, and we all went for a nice lunch together. We got back to our villa at about 4, and a party had started already! As more people arrived, they all immediately dropped their bags and made their way to our villa. It was so much fun, it all got crazy, with more friends arriving later (some didn’t land til after ten) the party went on and on … I couldn’t tell you much of what happened, except for people winding up in the pool fully clothed (we were concerned there was going to be a Barrymore incident – luckily it wasn’t to be.) I don’t remember sneaking off to bed, but Bec found me there later, fully clothed, sprawled across the bed, still with my shoes on. Apparently I had a little tantrum when she tried to take them off me.
Nice bride.
Saturday 4th October
We woke up the following day to a crazy mess. Not a single glass went unbroken. It seemed a couple of full bottles of red wine had emptied themselves over the patio. A team effort to clean up (a broom, some washing up liquid and a hose for the patio!) and a trip to the shop to purchase a new set of glasses and we were good to go again. The villa was never quite as nice after that day though! It didn’t matter how much sweeping and scrubbing we did, there was broken glass and stickiness everywhere.
I went and met my Dad and brother for lunch and then when I returned to the villa it was like the party had started up again. Most of our friends were staying nearby in small cheap hotels/hostels without pools and so our villa became the meeting point. I really needed some headspace (“Do they not know it’s my wedding day in a few hours!?) and went off for a lay down in a strop. Bec came to find me and saw I was upset, so ushered people off to go get themselves ready for the evening.
I got showered and had half an hour with my kindle, and gave myself a talking to. Bad Bride.
We then had our “official” pre-wedding party in the evening. We hired out a stunning terrace overlooking the sea (the Nerja skyline is beautiful, with gorgeous beaches, huge rocks which change colour with the light, and a backdrop of mountains which melt in to the sea.) The party started pretty subdued with everyone on their best behaviour (or hungover) and we started to worry. We’d hired a salsa dance instructor to come and provide an hours entertainment and we thought it was going to be an awkward flop. We needn’t have worried though, as soon as the music started up, everyone was up and dancing against the backdrop of the sunset. My face was aching from laughing. We have some real characters among our friends and they provided so much entertainment.
At about 9 (the evening had started at 5) Bec and I decided we wanted to make our exit. We didn’t want to spend hours wandering around saying goodbye to everyone (answering the “how are you feeling!?” question 44 times!) so we grabbed hands, and shouted “BYE!!” as we made for the exit – then everyone started singing “Going to the chapel and we’re gonna get married” as we made our way out. It made me cry a little bit! A lady who was dining in a different area stopped us and asked “excuse me, is there a wedding going on?” to which we replied “yes, ours!”
We went for dinner in a beautiful little restaurant that had a candle lit outdoor court yard. I realised I hadn’t eaten a thing since I could remember, I was starving! We had a beautiful meal, and I felt instantly sick. We headed back to the villa and took a sleeping pill (best forward planning ever!) and were drifting deep in to the land of nod by 11.
Sunday 5th October – The Wedding Day (getting ready)
I had envisaged that on the morning I would be like Monica from friends was on the day of her wedding – waking up screaming that it was my wedding day. In reality, I woke up about ten minutes before my alarm, really chilled, and just lay there quietly for a bit, contemplating. Bec did too.
Then, chaos. I don’t really remember the morning. I don’t really want to, to be honest! We had to go out to find food and drink to take to the venue with us, and people started arriving at the villa to get their hair done by our hairdresser before we took her off to the venue with us.
I kept panicking that I’d still not ever said my vows out loud so my friend, J, took me off to have a go. It wasn’t good. I choked up and wobbled all the way through it, tripping over my words. It certainly didn’t help. Note: the moment to practice your vows for the first time is not a few hours before the wedding!! If you haven’t practiced them by then, leave them be.
There were 10 of us going to the venue in the morning, on my side C&J, another friend, and my mum. On Bec’s side, her Mum and sister. Then our hairdresser and videographer also. We hired a couple of taxis and we drove our hire car. Of course, the taxi’s arrived 30 minutes late, and then didn’t know where the venue was (it’s literally up in the mountains miles from anything else.) I ended up giving one taxi driver my phone with my sat nav set up for him, and then sorted out someone elses phone’s sat nav for them. Tasks like this, on your wedding day, are stressful!
I hadn’t had a chance to get myself sorted in the morning (or should I say I wandered around in a dithery mess not knowing what to do with myself) and so didn’t even properly pack a bag to take. At least I remembered my wedding dress and shoes!
We got to the venue, Bec and I said our goodbyes and we went off to our rooms. And then … I sat down. I didn’t really know what to do with myself. Bec’s Mum came down to see me and gave me gifts from Bec and a card from her. The card from her (Bec’s Mum) was beautiful, it made me sob, it was so heartfelt and sentimental! Bec had made a photobook for me of ‘our life so far’ it made me laugh and cry, then on the back page it said “Now let’s grow really, really old together darlin’”. She also bought me a pair of diamond/pearl earrings which was lucky really, as I’d forgotten to bring mine to the venue!
I had stupidly not brought with me the top I had planned to wear for makeup, as I was having my tattoo on my back covered over, so needed something where she could access my back. I ended up just wearing my bra and tucking a hand towel in to the front to try to preserve some dignity. I wasn’t very happy with my makeup – I knew I could have done a better job myself – although she was professional and used better makeup than I own, she didn’t really make me look like me, in fact, the makeup was more ‘natural’ than I would usually wear, so I felt quite plain. Because she had already taken such a long time on me and had to get to Bec, I had to just accept it. At the trial, she’d done quite a nice job, but I felt the same then, and topped it up a little after she’d left. I’d intended to do this for the wedding too, but of course, I was being pulled in so many different directions and was so stressed about everything that I just didn’t care about my makeup at that moment!
We had our friend/hairdresser with us as a guest at the wedding (she’s a pro and our usual hairdresser, so we were very lucky to have her there to do our hair!) as my makeup had taken longer than planned she was hanging around waiting for me. She was great, so professional, completely unflappable – even when my mum complained that she needed the mirror we were using because she needed to dry her hair, she placed a hand on my shoulder as I was about to start shouting and asked my mum if she could try to find a different mirror. We found out later that she had been really ill during the day, but we didn’t know at the time.
Then the wedding planner was letting me know guests had started arriving!
It felt like chaos again. Everyone trying to get ready, the TOG kept asking when I was getting my dress on, every time I tried someone else came in and needed to ask me something. The minister came to meet me. She came in and said “Melanie I just wanted to see you before the ceremony” and my mother screamed at her “NO! Oh for gods sake, you can’t come in here, can’t you wait until the ceremony!?” I had to pull my mum back and explain that she was the minister and then apologise on her behalf. Mother has no tact.
I got my dress on and J did the buttons up for me. She was taking a while and I was asking if there was anything wrong – she assured me there wasn’t. Then C wandered over for a look (she must have caught his eye) and I felt her undoing them all and redoing them, and counting under her breath while she was going. She kept assuring me there was nothing wrong, and then finished and said ‘There, perfect.” I found out the next day that there were 19 buttons and only 18 hooks on the back of my dress and so one of the buttons remained undone. J is an angel, she knew there was nothing that could be done about it and that telling me would only upset me, so she made out like all was fine. Bless her. Everyone says they didn’t notice, but I can really see it on the pictures; I’ve emailed the dress shop to complain and heard nothing back. At my fittings, they never once did up all the buttons, only the hook and eyes, claiming that doing the buttons up weakened and loosened them.
The tog came back, and we did a little photoshoot – it was bizarre, I felt so uncomfortable, but then he started jeering me up and shouting things at me (“Heeeeeeey baby, hey guapa, show me those pretty eyes, aw look at you, perfect, more of that”) and he had me laughing and relaxed in no time.
Then the wedding planner brought my Dad round to me. I had been so worried about this moment, my dad and I are so close, he brought me up on his own, so I’m a proper Daddy’s Girl – I thought I would fall apart at this moment, but we were both very composed. I think it was nerves!
My brother then came round to us and I could see by peeking around the corner that everyone was being seated. I was so nervous, I kept swearing and my Dad was saying “I’ll let you off, just this once.” When the entrance music (Songbird by Eva Cassidy) started up, we had about a minute before we had to start our walk – I was holding on to my Dad’s arm, and my brother and mum were behind us (we wanted to make our entrance with our families, Bec entered from the other end of the garden with her Dad, Mum and Sister.) My brother took this picture when the entrance music started!
Then the wedding planner who was standing in my line of sight, gave me the nod, and we started walking.
Sunday 5th October (continued) – The Ceremony
We walked around the corner in to the main garden and Bec walked out from behind a curtain under the archway she’d been hiding behind and I swear to god, when you hear people say that they saw nothing else in the world it sounds so cliché, but it was just like that. Have you seen West Side Story, when Tony and Maria spot one another on the dance floor, and everything except the two of them becomes nothing more than a blur – it’s just like that in my memory. I had of course known that she would look beautiful, I had known that she would take my breath away, I had known that it would be emotional, but I was not in any way prepared for that moment of seeing her walking towards me. I had a physical reaction – I don’t think I even cried, I was completely stunned, my legs turned to jelly, I couldn’t breathe – I couldn’t believe how beautiful she looked. So much more beautiful than I ever could have imagined – and that’s saying something! We stopped at the end of the aisle. I kissed my Dad, my Mum and my Brother (and I assume she did the same on her side!) and they all walked down the aisle to be seated. She and I grabbed on to one another – I’ve no idea what we said but then we made our way up the aisle, perfectly timed with our entrance music, we arrived at the end just as the closing bars of the song played.
(Note: I’ve put all the readings and vows etc in to my report in bold italics as I know I liked to read them when others wrote their reports – feel free to skip through it though if it’s not your thing!)
We designed our ceremony ourselves, and I had had a vision that I’d wanted a poem at the beginning, sort of like a prologue (a bit theatrical, like!) so two of our friends were already standing at the front (both sobbing by this point!!) when we walked up the aisle, and as soon as the song ended, they began, in cracked voices:
The first dance of all when they danced heart to heart
They knew, they both knew, it was only the start
Of something more wonderful than a dance
More than a thrill of a passing romance
They knew without saying, the love, the real thing
Had touched them that night with its shimmering wing
No word had been spoken and yet they both knew
That suddenly all sorts of dreams had come true
It’s many a year since that night they first met
But that first dance they will never forget
Then just two girls, now for each other a wife
Still happy, still dancing, now partners for life
Hearing their voices cracking, and having a moment to have a look around at our guests sent me off – everyone was crying! I turned to my Dad (who was sitting where my mum should have been sitting with a handbag full my belongings) and asked him for a tissue, which Bec and I then passed back and forth between ourselves for the rest of the ceremony!
Our minister then welcomed us and our guests and talked a little bit about the ceremony and humanism. She then asked us “Bec/Mel are you ready to enter into this marriage with Mel/Bec, under your own free will, and believing that the love you share and your faith in each other will endure all things?” to which we had to reply “I am”
Then our friend did a reading which we wrote ourselves (he was going to write it but then suffered a personal tragedy so we wrote it for him last minute as he still wanted to do it) which we felt was quite an important nod to the marriage we were about to enter in to. He’s not overly camp, but can switch it on when needed, you need to know that as you read it!
“We are all happy and excited to be here to celebrate this marriage of two people that are special and important to us all. It’s such a gay affair!
I know both Becci and Melanie feel it is important for us to take a few minutes to recognise that this celebration that many take for granted would not be possible if we were living in another time or place.
Prior to 1967, and thanks to our old Queen (Victoria), it was not recognised or considered possible that two women could have a romantic relationship. However, it was against the law in England for two men to be romantically involved. Since de-criminalisation in the late 60s the battle has been ongoing with regards to equal rights both in the UK and around the world.
It may seem impossible to believe that in over 80 countries around the world, falling in love with someone of the same sex is still against the law. In some countries, people are punished with isolation, ridicule, a life of hard labour, or even death.
Coming back to our home country, the United Kingdom, prior to 2005 Melanie and Becci would not have been able to have their love legally recognised. When this recognition did come into effect in 2005 it was with Civil Partnerships rather than Marriage. So although they may have been afforded the same legal rights as their heterosexual counterparts, they still wouldn’t have been treated equally, because their union was given a different name, further singling them out as ‘different’.
It’s worth noting that this beautiful country we celebrate in today led the way in Europe by becoming one of the first countries to allow equal marriage.
We’re proud (ha!) of how far we’ve come. We’re grateful to society for allowing its own shift in view. By allowing us equality, the world has witnessed that the sun still rises every day, and no-one has broken out in unsightly skin diseases. You don’t wake up with frogs in your bed because two women got married. The world and life just goes on. Though we won’t mention the floods which spread across the south of England that were of course (according to a clever UKIP counsellor) the result of equal marriage.
So although this is truly a celebration, not just of love but of a step towards equal rights, let us not forget the difficult journey it has taken to get here and let us not forget those who still live with fear of violence or criminalisation. Let us remember the individuals who are not so lucky to be able to share and celebrate their love safely and equally, supported by their friends and families, as Becci and Melanie are here today.”
It was nice because it was poignant, it meant a lot to us to acknowledge the political climate for “our sort”! It also got a few laughs! The day after the ceremony, our minister posted this on facebook: “Where do I start? This gorgeous couple poured their heart and soul into their ceremony and the results were amazingly spectacular. To be able to include a heartfelt, informative, political and historical statement on equality and human rights into your ceremony was nothing short of genius. To have all your guests (and celebrant and wedding planner) choked up with tears was inspirational. Ok, I seriously need to write a blog post about this one! Thank you so much Melanie and Rebecca for letting me share this with you. Awesome stuff!”
*sob*!!
The minister then talked about commitment, she had quizzed us before hand on what commitment meant to us individually and she used quotes from us here. Then my oldest friend stood up and gave a really beautiful reading from The Velveteen Rabbit. The minister then asked our guests to make a vow: “As friends and family who have been witness to the love and happiness that Melanie and Rebecca have found together over the years. Do you support them and their promises that they make to each to each other?” to which they responded “We Do!” and then my brother gave a reading to bring us in to our own vows:
“You have known each other from the first glance of acquaintance to this point of commitment.
At some point, you decided to marry. From that moment of yes to this moment of yes, indeed, you have been making promises and agreements in an informal way. All those conversations that were held riding in a car or over a meal or during long walks — all those sentences that began with "When we're married" and continued with "I will, and you will, and we will"- those late night talks that included "someday" and "somehow" and "maybe"- and all those promises that are unspoken matters of the heart. All these common things, and more, are the real process of a wedding.
The symbolic vows that you are about to make are a way of saying to one another, "You know all those things we've promised and hoped and dreamed- well, I meant it all, every word." Look at one another and remember this moment in time.
Before this moment you have been many things to one another- acquaintance, friend, companion, lover, dancing partner, and even teacher, for you have learned much from one another in these last few years.
Now you shall say a few words that take you across a threshold of life, and things will never quite be the same between you. For after these vows, you shall say to the world, about each other, this - is my wife.”
And then … we read our own vows, which we had written ourselves. We agreed before we wrote them that we’d go for a structure of a) here’s the reason I’m marrying you b) here’s the promises I make to you c) 250ish words. I’m all about symmetry, and I didn’t want our vows to be wildly different (i.e. one very short and sweet and funny, the other very long and romantic!)
I went first. We hadn’t agreed this in advance, and the minister said “Who would like to go first?” and I got in there first with “me!” … we both wanted to go first as we knew that after listening to the others vows, getting through our own would be hard!
I said the first line and lost it. I then said to everyone, “bear with me, this may take some time” …
I am so proud to stand here beside you today. I’m proud that it’s you and me.
You came in to my world like a whirlwind, and blew pieces of me up in to the air,
yet you are also my anchor and make me feel safe and content just by being next to me.
You’ve lent me your strength when my own has wavered.
You’ve taught me clarity when I’ve needed it, but also to throw caution and care to the wind and that sometimes it’s enough just to forget everything and have a little dance.
In your company, I see a future I always dreamed of.
And for these things that you have brought to my life, I promise you this:
I promise to follow you through the perfect times and the merely fabulous times.
I promise to hold the reins when you get tired.
I promise to work tirelessly by your side to achieve the things we value and dream of, to devote my life to our family, whether it consists of a herd of small people, a pack of Bichons, or just the two of us.
I promise that you will always be my favourite
I can’t promise that I will always deserve you, but I do promise I will try my very best.
Above all of this, I promise you all of my heart, for all of my days.
I adore you Rebecca, and I always will. You are my soul mate, and my best mate.
Now let’s show them how it’s done; let’s grow old disgracefully together.
I’m pleased with how I did in the end, although there were tears, I think I just about managed to keep them to a minimum, and managed to get from start to finish snotless. Bec was clinging on to my hand and almost breaking my fingers throughout, I could feel her shaking!
Then it was her turn …
When I started thinking about my vows I decided a good place to start was to try and explain my love for you. The list was endless, I love your kindness, your empathy, your creativity, your beauty and your amazing eyes, your cute little wrists and ears, and your values, amongst many other things.
However I was left feeling dissatisfied as nothing in my long list justified or explained the strength of feeling I have for you. And then I realised, it’s because ultimately you can’t ask why about love. It’s a magical thing that happens and that we have found.
However there are promises I can make that I believe will feed our love and make our marriage strong. Therefore I promise to work by your side to create our life together, a life I am so excited about, I promise to be your constant friend, I promise to always laugh with you (and not at you) and I promise to make laughter an integral part of our family, I promise to dance around the bedroom with you every morning before work, I promise fidelity, I promise to tell you I love you often but although words can be beautiful it is actions that are meaningful, so I also promise not to just tell you but also to show you I love you. And I promise all of these things not just when life seems easy but perhaps more importantly also when it seems difficult. Let’s get really, really old together darlin. Thank you for marrying me.
I cried all the way through hers, too!
We then exchanged rings, and Bec’s best friend Andy stood up to read the following, as we held hands:
“These are the hands of your best friend, young and strong and full of love for you, that are holding yours on your wedding day as you promise to love each other today, tomorrow and forever.
These are the hands that will work alongside yours as together you build your future.
These are the hands that will passionately love you and cherish you through the years, and with the slightest touch will comfort you like no other.
These are the hands that will hold you when fear or grief temporarily comes to you.
These are the hands that will countless times wipe the tears from your eyes, tears of sorrow and tears of joy.
These are the hands that will tenderly hold your children, the hands that will join your family as one.
These are the hands that will give you strength when you need it, support and encouragement to pursue your dreams, and comfort through difficult times.
And lastly, these are the hands that even when wrinkled and aged will still be reaching for yours, still giving you the same unspoken tenderness with just a touch.”
And then we signed the minister’s register and were pronounced married! Our song (This will be an everlasting love by Natalie Cole) started up and we danced about a bit in the aisle as confetti was thrown over us. And that was it! We were married!
I had been sinking in to the grass for the entire ceremony and it had made me fidget (why oh why didn’t I buy those heel protectors I’d been looking at months before the wedding!?) so the moment it was over, I kicked off my heels! I was so mad about this later, and if you ask me now if I’d change anything about the wedding, this is the first thing that comes to my mind! Without my heels I was shorter than my wife (we’re the same height but she kept her heels on) and also, I think it changes the shape of my entire body – I stand taller, have a better posture and my tummy is flatter with my heels on!! Every picture I’ve seen so far makes me mad that I took them off!
We had hugs and congratulations from everyone. This felt weird, it was like everyone was queueing to hug us (and every person to hug me knocked my hair out a little bit further!) By the time they’d finished with us, we felt the need to get away and get a second where someone wasn’t lunging at us (I don’t know how people with large weddings do it!) We grabbed the tog and begged him to take us for a cig under the guise of photos! We wandered around the corner and found a lovely stone bench to sit on and lit up and both breathed a sigh of relief! The tog said “does that feel better!?” and one of us said something about needing something stronger, meaning a glass of wine – and he replied “I don’t usually do this, but I’ve got a little something in the car you might appreciate later – I’ll grab it before I leave.” I know, sounds creepy, right? But true to his word, before he left, he delivered a little bag of weed to us! We couldn’t quite believe it, we were gob smacked! We decided to keep it quiet, we didn’t want all our guests rolling around stoned at our wedding!!
While we were having our photos done, Bec’s dad came and found us, he was green. We didn’t know until then that he was ill. He said he was going to have to go, he’d called a taxi. Bec was furious and stormed off, I could see she was holding back the tears but she was letting it all out as anger. I left them to talk for a moment and then went over and persuaded him to cancel his taxi and go to bed for an hour in our room. At this point we were assuming that he’d over done it the night before and was hung over. We later found out that he’d been sick all the way to the venue, as had a couple of other people (who then on the night ended up taking it in turns to go for a lie down because they were ill.) I think there were about 4 people with some kind of sickness bug. Luckily, before the wedding, we hadn’t fed anyone so couldn’t take the blame for it!
We were led through to the reception area ...
and we were absolutely stunned.
I had been dreaming up how I wanted this area to look for a year, I had been collecting items, DIY-ing items and had carried it all over to Spain in my luggage in two and a half suitcases in April and then in October. It was perfect, exactly how I wanted it. I had seriously asked if I could spend the wedding day helping with the décor, because I had such a clear idea in my mind of what I wanted and couldn’t imagine anyone else would be able to pull it off for me, but our décor lady did. I almost cried as we wandered through the arch way and saw it all for the first time. Then, as it got darker and all the twinkly lights came on, and candles were lit, I was blown away. I was so proud, too, of all the comments people made, and to be able to say that I had bought/made/designed every single last bit of it myself (minus the chandelier, I didn’t take that over in a suitcase, I sent the decorations lady on a mission in Spain for that!) At one point, my wife grabbed my hand and said “darlin’, look, you did it!” and I could have burst! Later in the evening, all the behind the scenes venue staff were coming out to take pictures of the gardens/décor. The venue had never done a wedding in the ‘back garden’ before where we had ours, they usually use the main garden where we had our ceremony – the looked at us like we were mad when we suggested using the other area – I’m glad we were proved right!!
OK – that’s it for the self praise!
We had a long table of 20 for the family, and we put a seating plan on that – the politics of our families trying to seat themselves gave us a headache, so we decided at the last minute (just a couple of days before the wedding) that we would tell them where to sit. There were four round tables at which all the friends could seat themselves. It was great that everyone had met the night before and were friendly already, and everyone was really well behaved and mingled/mixed themselves up so it wasn’t just two tables of my friends and two tables of hers.
We had a Spanish Guitarist playing – this was the first time we’d really heard him, but he’d been playing before the ceremony as the guests arrived, and also then played after the ceremony and while everyone was being seated. We then had a gorgeous band on, a singer called Sarah Howard – she does acoustic covers quite similar to Live Lounge, and has also previously sung on Hed Kandi tracks. She’s lived over in Spain for years, but purely by coincidence is from just down the road from where we live! She was a massive hit. Her first set throughout dinner was quite chilled and then she picked it up for her second set.
I barely ate a thing, in fact at one point Bec brought me back to the table while I was off mingling at other tables and sat me down with a plate of paella and told me I wasn’t allowed to move until the plate was clear. I felt like a child gobbling my food up as quick as I could so that I could go and play!
The evening was absolutely awesome, it felt like it was over in two minutes, the band did a salsa set which everyone loved and then switched over to DJing. I tried to bustle my dress but the bustle broke after two minutes, from then on, I just hitched my dress right up and jumped about! We didn’t have a proper dance floor and was worried this would dissuade people from dancing, but then no-one minded kicking off their shoes and dancing on the grass. The ‘dancing shoes’ flip flops were a massive hit! Thanks Primark, for those!
(doing our famous 'Bad Romance' routine!)
Although the wedding wasn’t cheap, (it wasn’t expensive by any means either) we got so much more for our money by having it in Spain. We never could have afforded to have all that live music, and an open bar all night and all the food etc over here.
Way too soon, it was time to end. We were gutted about this, in the planning, we decided to end it at 1am (we could have gone all night if we wanted to!) because we were conscious that people were ‘stranded’ there and couldn’t chose when to leave – but then on the night, it was like the party was just really starting to pick up and then it had to end. The coaches arrived to take everyone back to Nerja and Bec and I slumped down at a table while the band packed up. It was strange to see our wedding all quiet, with no-one there! The singer came over to join us for a drink and we chatted to her for a while. We then decided to go up to bed and the staff bought us over a bottle of champagne on ice, we teetered off with that and a rum and coke each!
We then spent about 45 minutes undoing one another’s buttons, it was a nightmare, I didn't have my glasses and those bugg*rs are FIDDLY! Then, still in our dresses, all undone and hanging off us we went and had a seat on the balcony, drank our champagne, spent about another 30 minutes trying to pull our hair out (well and truly derobing - there were bits of hair extensions everywhere, and odd shaped foamy items the hairdresser had put in to our hair and we looked like a pair of homeless old trouts with birds nests on our heads who found some wedding dresses to sit in.) We spent about an hour laughing about the day and opening our cards, playing a guessing game about which card was from who before we opened it, based on hand writing, spelling of names, and the titles used.
Monday 6th October
I’m conscious this is getting crazy long now (yes, I am aware I’m blabbling!!) so I’ll speed things up a bit!
We were horrendously hung over the following day and had probably only had a couple of hours sleep, the last thing I wanted in the world was to go another day. But we’d made plans, so we had to!
We’d hired 30 sun beds down at the beach so that we could all sit together, and by the time we got there our whole wedding party was there already. We had a BBQ lunch supplied by one of the local beach restaurants. We all lay about for half an hour or so and then perked up a little, once the beers were flowing! We had a proper giggle. The beach started emptying (asd the sun went down, not because of us!!) and we were kicked off our sun beds by the guy who owned them, some people left, and then a group of us walked down and sat on the sand. We got some beers and pizzas and enjoyed the TOG’s wedding gift and watched the sun set. We headed back to our villa and grabbed a Chinese on the way, which sat untouched on a plate on my lap as I slept in an arm chair. Gazonked!
Tuesday 7th October
Most of our guests flew out on the Tuesday. My brother kept trying to catch us all day and Bec mentioned that she thought we hadn’t seen much of them over the holiday, and usually him and his gf (G) are right at the centre of the party with us. I thought back over the week and realisation dawned on me – I asked Bec if she’d seen G drinking at all and then that was it, we were on a mission!
We went out for dinner that night as a family and sure enough, G was drinking lemonade. By this time I’d shared my thoughts with my step mum, we were all exchanging glances. We talked about the wedding and were asking people what they thought, I said I’d not had a chance to try the Sangria and asked G if it was nice, she said she’d had a headache and had drunk water instead. I sent a sneaky text to my brother which said “Baby?” and then ten minutes later, he said “We have an announcement” … that was all he had to say, we all squealed, and then subsequently burst in to tears. We all kept setting one another off, my Dad was sobbing saying “I can’t take much more of this this week” which set me off, and my brother off, and Bec off, and G off … we were all just sat crying! This is the first baby in our family, and in G’s family too, so it’s an extra special one. I’m getting tearful now just thinking about it!
My bro and I went for a little walk and he apologised to me saying he’d not wanted to steal our thunder on our week (he’d been trying to catch us all day to ask if it would be OK to announce that night) but the family wouldn’t be together again until Christmas and that would be too late (she’d be 5 months by then!) – I couldn’t believe he was apologising to me, it was the best best BEST wedding present we got (yep, even better than the honeymoon!)
And on that good news, I shall end it there. The next day we went for the day to Malaga and then flew home, but you don’t need to know the details of all that!!
It was more than I ever dreamed of. And I don’t have post wedding blues, because I have an amazing wife – which was all I ever wanted. The wedding was just a bonus.
Our wedding highlights video (By Mel Jones of Forward in Reverse)
