Rustic Summer Festival Lakeside Wedding

Sarah and Dan tied the knot at their lakeside ceremony at Blithfield Lakeside Barns. The summer of 2018 has been glorious, just like the outdoor festival weddings that I have been asked to officiate. Their day was so glorious that it is featured on the Whimsical Wonderland Weddings blog where you can read all about it in detail and see their fabulous photos by Daniel McClane.

I loved the rustic touches that they added, especially the table that we used to sign their commemorative certificate – no white tablecloth with creases there! Just a lovely old wooden desk that suited their style perfectly…

Tell me how the bridesmaids and groomsmen were involved in the exchange of rings

Sarah and Dan are such a lovely relaxed couple, and they wanted their outdoor lakeside ceremony to be just that: relaxed. I love outdoor relaxed ceremonies – so that suited me just fine!

We included their love story as part of their ceremony, and then when it got the exchange of rings, they wanted to include their bridal party in some way. Up until this point of the ceremony, Sarah and Dan had been the focus of their ceremony (umm obviously!) standing in front of their ‘wigwam’ style wedding alter. I asked the bridesmaids and groomsmen to come forward and create a two receiving lines by standing on either side of the bride and groom creating a ‘V’ shape.

Sarah’s ring was passed up her line of bridesmaids, while Dan’s ring was passed up his line of groomsmen. They each offered a good luck wish to the happy couple before Sarah and Dan exchanged rings to seal the personal vows that they had written to each other.

It was so simple, yet so touching!

The Handfasting and Tying the Knot

Sarah and Dan met at a rock music festival and it wasn’t long before they never left each other’s side. Their favourite band at the time was Slipknot, so it seemed super appropriate to include something that they could tie and keep as their keepsake. That’s when the idea of their handfasting came up. Each couple has a unique story, so each set of handfasting ribbons must be made to reflect their story. That’s where I get Billie-jo from Dunns Jewels involved who I ask to make all of my handfasting sets, so as much as I would love take credit for the beautiful creations, I do what I do best which is the ceremony, and then I leave the handfasting ribbons the professional! I always ask my couples what their wedding theme/colour is, and then I surprise them on the day with their ribbons which include personalised charms to reflect their story.

Sarah & Dan’s handfasting ribbons included their initials, a musical note, a black cat and a pumpkin to reflect Sarah’s love of Halloween parties (she does an amazing Halloween party each year!)

The black cat represents good luck, but it also had a more sentimental reason. Dan proposed by writing on the scroll that was housed in their car’s new collar and would normally have their contact details in case Nala got lost. How romantic is that? He knocked it out the park.

So you see? Their handfasting ribbons will become a lovely keepsake of their day and their story…

As we didn’t want to hold a religious wedding, we wanted to have a celebrant to hold our ceremony. We met Justine at an Elite Tents opening day and just knew she was the one we wanted to marry us.

She has been such a pleasure to be in contact with during the lead up to our wedding as she is such a wonderful lady. She met up with us prior to our wedding to get to know who we were as a couple and what love meant to us. It has been such a fun process planning the ceremony with her – we choose to have a hand fasting ceremony which Justine made beautiful ribbons which we are going to get framed as our keepsake. It has also been a very special process too as we decided to write our own vows which Justine was so supportive during this and was very helpful if we had any queries.
We would like to say a massive thank you to you Justine…you ran our ceremony just perfectly!! Everyone after has said how wonderful the service was and how personal it felt.

We wish you all the best and will definitely be recommending you to our family/friends who are planning to marry in the future 🙂 xxx

Sarah & Dan

The Bride & Groom