How we Met

We first met over 9 years ago in a club in Romford when we were 21, so cool :). However, we lost touch and almost 7 years later when we were both living in Thurrock, we got back in touch and the rest is history!

The Proposal

Steve’s proposal was perfect. We were back in Cyprus, after falling in love with the place on our first holiday together and we had been to the beach for the day and were having cocktails at our favourite beach bar watching the sunset.

I mentioned to Steve that 2 years to the day we had been at the exact same spot, as a photo memory had just popped up on my phone. I didn’t think anything of it except that it was a nice coincidence.

Walking back to our hotel, Steve mentioned we should walk back along the beach as it was empty and the sun was almost setting, and that’s where he surprised me, he got down on one knee, on the beach with the most perfect ring and proposed! After lots of tears and “are you joking?” I said yes!

The Wedding Dress

My wedding dress will always be so special to me (like most girls I am sure), but more so to me, as my mum actually picked it out. After trying on a few that I thought were “my style” that didn’t suit me at all, my Mum and I went round the shop and picked out 5 different ones each for me to try in completely different styles. As soon as I tried it on I knew, more so as my mum had burst out crying :). I only went to 2 shops in 1 day and decided that was the 1. I made some subtle changes to the dress to suit my shape and it really was the dress of my dreams.

The Bridesmaid’s Dresses

The bridesmaid dresses were gorgeous. I had seen the style I liked to compliment my dress online and I met up with my bridesmaids about 10 months before the wedding and asked them to try it on, they also picked out a few more options that they liked as well. They all fell in love with the one I chose and looked absolutely beautiful in them, they made that process so simple, we were in and out the shop within half an hour, I was very lucky as we all have similar taste and it suited them all perfectly.

Suits

The groom and groomsmen’s suits were not as straightforward. After the dads and Steve had tailored suits made for them and the groomsmen had all been measured for suits we were buying them as presents, a month before the wedding they arrived and they were, to be kind, awful. We had 4 weeks to find 8 suits, but our dads and groomsmen were amazing, dropping plans so they could meet Steve late at night to get the suits sorted, we finally did it with a week to spare and they all looked amazing on the day.

The Wedding Venue

We got married at Maiden’s Barn. This was the first venue we saw and we fell in love with it, I couldn’t stop thinking about it and wanted to book it straight away, but the sensible side of me thought we should see a few more to compare. We saw just 2 others and I was always pulled back to Maiden’s barn.

It was exactly what we wanted, a gorgeous barn with it’s own accommodation and a venue big enough to hold all our family and friends. We loved that it has 2 rooms/barns, one for the ceremony and one for the wedding breakfast, it was important to us that nothing from the wedding breakfast had to be moved to make way for a dance floor and with Maiden’s barn the room was big enough to seat our 130 guests as well as have a gorgeous light up dance floor all set up throughout the day. We wanted a party in the evening and another thing that was a massive plus for us was having the bar next to the dance floor, so it meant the dance floor was never empty :).

Maiden’s Barn Staff

The staff throughout the whole wedding process at Maiden’s Barn were amazing, they answered every question we had, set up the venue exactly how I dreamed it would be and on the day they couldn’t do enough for us. I just want to also mention our caters who were fantastic, creating a bespoke menu for us as we had many different allergies to think about and they also could not have been more helpful. Everyone made our day so special.

Dressing the Venue

As soon as we knew we were getting married in February we knew wanted a winter vibe, and we settled with a silver/white theme. To be honest I was hoping for snow as I love the cold, but that didn’t happen, but we knew we wanted to create that winter/cool vibe to also tie in with how gorgeous Maiden’s Barn is.

The girls bridesmaid dresses were grey/silver, so we had silver/grey and white roses as their bouquets with diamonds in them, along with gypsophila, which they also had in their hair. The flower girls each wore a white dress with diamonds, a silver sash and had a rose wand, along with gypsophila in their hair and I had a gorgeous white rose bouquet with gypsophila and diamonds in. I had 2 gorgeous diamond clips made for my hair that resembled gypsophila. We knew we wanted to keep it quite simple with a splash of diamonds and sequins to add that to that winter sparkle and to keep in theme with the girls dresses. The men had grey rose button holes and silver ties with navy suits to compliment the bridesmaids.

Centre Pieces

The centre pieces consisted of log on each table with a jar of white and grey roses, candles and a jar of crystals and sequins. To match the bouquets and centre pieces, we had rose petals going along both sides of the aisle along with lanterns at the end of each row of chairs. We created a pallet for the order of the day in white and silver, our own table plan using white photo frames and we upcycled an old ladder to add photo’s of the ones we loved who couldn’t be there, this was also white and silver.

We were very lucky as the venue was empty the day before our wedding so we were able to go in and set up on the Friday with our families which was perfect. I think I can say we definitely knew what we wanted and it came together perfectly.

The Wedding Cake

The wedding cake was amazing! It was 5 tiers of 5 different flavours. We had Fruit, Victoria Sponge, Carrot Cake, Chocolate and Lemon. The cake was quite traditional, covered in white icing, and then added with special touches that linked to our theme and my dress. The bottom tier was covered in flowers made of icing, the 4th and 2nd tiers were decorated with small silver edible hearts and tiers 1 and 3 were covered in edible sequins. It was made by a friend of the family who is a very talented cake maker, but said this was his biggest challenge yet.

As we had a total of 190 guests invited for the evening we knew we wanted a big cake and for everyone to have a piece and I love cake so I knew I wanted to be able to take some home and taste every flavour. It tasted absolutely amazing and it was amazing to see the picture we had in our head come to life – it was everything we wanted and more.

My advice to couples just setting out to plan their Wedding day

Remember that your day is for the both of you, not everyone else! Do what makes you happy and be a little selfish, especially if you’re not normally like that. I spent some of the wedding planning worrying about other people; where they were going to stay, how they were going to get to the venue, what certain foods people could eat, and I shouldn’t have done.

You want a day that celebrates you both and your love, and planning as a team was key for us.

Steve was really hands on with helping plan the wedding and we decided so much of it together. I would also be honest and say it can be daunting and overwhelming if you do not normally plan events so make sure you take some time away from the wedding planning once in a while and enjoy date nights where you don’t mention the W word :).

Finally have fun and don’t forget throughout the planning why you are doing it, lets be honest, it can become stressful, especially if you have a few hiccups along the way, but you will get there and your day will be perfect and the little things that may not go to plan, you won’t even notice, as you will be having the best day of your lives.

 

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Sian + Steve 😍… A little flash back to ealy 2020 view the full video here https://www.talkingfly.co.uk/sian-steve/ @sianey_p @stevep87 #essexwedding #essexweddingvideographer #maidensbarns #chelmsfordweddingvideographer #weddingvideo #weddingfilm

A post shared by Talking Fly (@talkingflyfilms) on Aug 28, 2020 at 8:42am PDT