I cannot believe we finally had wedding #2 after 4 postponements. For those confused or haven't seen me speak about why we had a second wedding celebration:
We originally were going to have our wedding and get married in 2020 but then the pandemic hit and we had to postpone our wedding. We didn’t know how long it would last and didn’t want to put our life on pause. We are Christian so we wanted to wait until marriage to move in together and start our life together. So in 2020, we decided to legally get married with our family and had a tiny ceremony of 15 people in Sydney because that’s all the restrictions at the time would allow. We couldn’t do a big wedding or invite our friends and extended family to celebrate our marriage which made us sad. We wanted to celebrate our marriage with all our close friends and family. So after two years of already being married, on 9th December 2022, we renewed our vows in front of all of our loved ones and were able to have a proper wedding. 2020 we got married, 2022 we had a wedding - there is a huge difference between the two!
Let's get into the finer details!
The style details: dress, jewellery, bridesmaids, makeup, hair, tan, nails
I really wanted to stick with what I normally do for makeup, hair, nails and jewellery. I wanted to feel like me.
My dress: My dress was made by Anna Maurer Couture and was made from silk and tulle. It was the dress of my dreams. It had detachable sleeves, cape and veil.
Shoes: My shoes were my best-friends wedding shoes from Mimco and my dress maker added the tulle bows.
Earrings: From the Iconic. They were $60 and I loved them! I'll link them here.
Bracelets: I wore a simple dainty gold chain bracelet under my sleeve for the ceremony.
Nails: SNS and square. This is what I always get. I didn't want to do something different and regret it! To be honest I don't know the colour, but I asked for something similar to OPI Funny Bunny but more pearly / translucent. I wanted them pretty natural looking.
Makeup: I asked for the focus to be my skin with some bronze, peach and gold. She used the Charlotte Tilbury flawless filter mixed with Elis Faas skin veil - it was so perfect and lasted all day and night!
Tan: natural (I was way too nervous about getting anything, even gradual tanner, on my dress!)
Hair: I got my hair done by the Bloe Bar and asked for a loose bun with bits of my hair out at the front. I wanted it to look 'done but not done'. I didn't want ringlet curls or it to be too polished. I was really happy with it! Between ceremony and reception my Maid of Honour re-curled the front bits and took my veil out but aside from that we didn't touch it.
Outfit change between ceremony and reception: I didn't have an outfit change between ceremony and reception but I took my veil and sleeves off and added some chunkier jewellery (this cuff and this ring). I was actually supposed to take my cape veil off too, but I loved it so much I ended up keeping it on and I'm so glad I did!
Ceremony Details
Aisle song: A slow acoustic version of 'Home' by Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zero's sung by Dave McCredie. We had Dave singing during canapé hour and dinner and he was phenomenal!
Grazing board and Canapés: to tie guests over until reception / dinner
Florals: Wilderness Flowers. I sent her a few photos with blushes, roses and orchards but left it in her very capable hands. I really trust people with their work and she was amazing!
Photographer: Hayley Rafton. She was everything I could have ever wanted and more! Not only is her work amazing, but she made everyone feel so comfortable. I had so many guests saying “wow, your photographer really went above and beyond” she was on the dance floor capturing candids and everyone was just so impressed by her commitment!
Videographer: Blake Lisk. Again, we were so impressed by him! He was able to be there without being over-bearing or pushy. We can't wait to see our video!
Reception Details
Cocktail style food stations: We had different pastas (ragu, chicken, etc) as well as a Mexican taqueria which was so much fun. We had long tables with big tablecloths, florals and candles as well as bar tables all around the grass. We didn't have assigned seating - we wanted people to eat as much as they wanted and mingle as much as they wanted. We loved that everyone could walk around to different tables and chat! It was catered by Eat Drink.
Dance floor: Brenton and I love to dance! We loved that everyone joined us on the dance floor, it was so much fun.
DJ: One of our friends from Church, he was great!
Wedding favours: we didn't do them! Being a destination wedding, I was sure 99% of them would be left on the venue. I didn't want to get a bunch of things made only to throw them out, that would be super wasteful.
First dance song: Leon Bridges - Coming Home
Bouquet toss: I did this toward the end of the night
Speeches: This was one of my favourite parts of the night. So beautiful, so heart-felt, so special.
Wedding Cake/ Dessert - We actually didn't do a cake! We had hot donuts instead.
Highlights of the day / fave moments
It's cliche, but I loved all of it. I loved that it was a destination wedding and everyone was there for a number of days being able to hang out with us. A few moments that stand out to me are (in no order):
1. Me and Brenton getting photos just the two of us - being able to take some time out and just be together was such a special moment
2. Having all of my favourite people in one spot: Brenton, Luca, friends, family. Soooo special.
3. Speeches
4. The dance floor with everyone
5. Getting ready with Luca and my girls
Advice for future brides
My number 1 piece of advice is: focus and put work into your marriage. Your wedding is over in the blink of an eye. Your marriage is what you have every single day. Remember to invest in your marriage, not just your wedding. Things will go wrong on your wedding day, just roll with it.
Other things:
- Designate someone to remind you to drink water (I needed this!)
- Ask your bridesmaids not to tell you when things go wrong, ignorance was bliss for me haha! So funny to hear all the things that went wrong after the wedding. My bridesmaids kept it from me so I didn't stress out, bless them!
- Stay with your husband, it's so easy to get split up over the day
The reality of having a 9 month old at our wedding and breastfeeding him
I didn't want to wean just for my wedding. I really enjoy breastfeeding him and wanted to make it work at whatever cost. It did make things a little hard, mostly with my dress because as my milk levels fluctuated over the day, my dress would fit differently - depending on if I had just fed or was due to feed. But I am a glass half full gal, so I loved that it made me take pockets of time out, away from everyone in a quiet place. I can’t feed and talk because Luca gets super distracted so I just sat there in a room and reflected on the day at each stage throughout the day, it was actually really nice for an introvert like me haha!
I’ll be honest, having your baby at your wedding is a lot. I felt I could never switch off and was always conscious off his feeds, if he was happy, had napped etc. He also was teething and out of routine / not in his own environment so he was extra grizzly and hard to settle. It was a huge juggle trying to get ready and strategically timing his nap and feeds around the wedding schedule. When he had a short lunch time nap, I knew he’d be tired for the ceremony and be hard to settle etc. it was definitely hard to switch off but I could not have done it without my village - you know who you are. Special shout-out to Luca’s Mimi / my MIL and my sister in law who looked after him for most of the day.
Any regrets
Honestly, none!
In closing, I wanted to say nothing from our wedding was sponsored. We believe in paying people for their work and we were SO blessed to be working with the most amazing creatives and vendors. Of course I want to tag and mention them to thank them - they made our wedding so very special.
I think that's everything but let me know if I've missed something! xx