Before we arrived on St. Lucia, we did a bit of research and picked out a few activities that we really wanted to do. As soon as we settled into our villa, we let Linus, our butler for the week, know what we planned to do. He then took our requests and booked all of our excursions. We didn’t have to do a thing. He organized all of the logistics (cars, times, etc.) so we could really enjoy our honeymoon.
Our first excursion was one we were both really looking forward to. We visited the Hotel Chocolat and got to see firsthand how chocolate is made!
Our tour group was small, maybe 10 individuals (I believe we were the youngest). The tour started in the hotel’s restaurant, Boucan, where we were given a brief history of the property. We then headed out to the plantation, which is conveniently located on the same grounds as the hotel. It was interesting to see the hotel, because it was one we were considering staying at. (Ultimately, I think we made the right lodging decision for us because, even though this hotel was incredible, it was very small with no direct beach access, which was a must for me!) However, the view of the Pitons from Boucan were incredible!
Since we plan on having a pretty formal wedding (in terms of attire, but not in behavior!) I wanted something as casual and low maintenance as possible for our rehearsal dinner. Side note: we’re actually calling this a “Welcome Dinner” since everyone’s invited—oooh the joys of a destination wedding!
Mr. M and I searched high and low prior to our second wedding-planning trip to Montreal back in July—we needed a venue capable of hosting at least 100 people that had inexpensive food and beverage options. It was actually quite difficult to find a place that met this criteria, so when I finally came across a large micro-brewery in Old Montreal (which is only four blocks from the hotel where we’re getting married—huge bonus points there), I reallly hoped it would work out.
The bar is called Les 3 Brasseurs (or The 3 Brewers, in English) and is deceptively larger on the inside than it looks from outside. When we met with the event director there, we learned that it was actually large enough to host over 400 people! Large venue? Check. The place is SUPER cool on the inside—they brew their own beers, so the huge brew tanks are visible all throughout the interior.
The bar’s exterior / Image via Flickr.com / Photo by afagen
I’m all out of pretty profesh wedding photos to share. I mean, I have a whole lot more photos of our ceremony, and about 80 photos of my girls buttoning me into my dress, but I’m pretty sure you’re all sick of us by now. The truth is, our photography package only included six hours of coverage. Mr. Wallaby and I were both smitten with Mustard Seed Photography, but we could only afford the most basic photography package, which was for six hours of coverage with one shooter.
Honestly? I’m 100% OK with that. I l-o-v-e every single photo from our wedding. Kat and Loren did an amazing job of capturing the emotions and ambiance and details of the day. It would be nice to have photographic evidence that our friends are BAMFs on the dance floor. I would love an artsy shot of us running out through the tunnel of sparklers at the end of the night. But we just couldn’t shell out any more Gs.
Maybe people loosened up once the cameras and flashes had vanished. I personally always hide behind Mr. W so my ridiculous dance face (slash duck face) isn’t captured on film. Soo embarrassing. At any rate, we still have some guest photos of the dance party. (Can I call it the after party? OKthanks.) And our videographers stuck around for some of the dancing, so we have some gems. Some of the footage is def NSFW. And some is so embarrassing that I won’t be a jerk and post it online. But here’s a little scene of Mr. W and me dancing to a popular Persian song. Feel free to laugh and mock me—I’m still figuring out the Persian dancing thing.
Wallaby Wedding – Dancing from MsWallaby on Vimeo. Footage from A Sweet Film
Everyone seemed so relaxed and comfortable—Maid of Honor N changed into a pair of cowboy boots:
brittaful shares a photo of her flower girls in pink tutu ensembles.
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Back when I was at university, about a month away from moving 300 miles away to Brighton to live with a boy, I started doing some research about the place that would soon be my home.
I would know no one other than the boy I’d met less than 15 times, and I thought I should probably do some volunteer work to find new friends. I didn’t end up doing volunteer work in the end, but whilst browsing the web that night I came across an art gallery.
This gallery was in the heart of the city, and the building was a church that had been gutted. It blew me away. There were pictures on their website of the space decorated for wedding receptions, and I spent the entire evening looking at them admiringly. I think it was this moment when I saw this place for the first time that I told myself “I will have my wedding there”.
I was drawn to this building like no other. When I first moved to Brighton I went to look at it, and I would continue to go and see the art exhibitions even if I wasn’t bothered by them. Each time I would step into that space and look around in awe. This was it. This had to be it. My imagination ran wild—just look at this space!
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Image via Fabrica Gallery / Photo by Philip Carr
We had been engaged less than a day when I suggested we go look at it, and I already knew what my decision would be before I had even arrived. Luckily Jack loved it too. He said it was obvious that no other place would suit us better, and he agreed that we’d never top this.
After weeks of indecision and frustration (summarized here), I decided to narrow down the dress search for my awesome sisters upon Sister A’s request. I thought she would want to pick her own dress, but it turns out she was perfectly happy being given a dress to wear—she’s not much of a shopper! I wanted to make sure I had options for Sister E, though.
Remember, my dress is the J.Crew Sophia in ivory silk chiffon. I wanted something to match the simple style and flowy fabric—simplest way to do that is to buy the bridesmaids’ dresses from J.Crew as well. These dresses can run on the expensive side (for college students especially), but they’re simple and classy and the important thing is to look for a good deal.
In about 10 minutes I scanned the J.Crew website and came up with four of their bridesmaids’ dress options that fit what I was looking for. Remember that the only stipulations originally were that they needed to be knee length and not strapless (conservative family reasons), and I preferred them to be in a shade of the wedding colors (which included anything coral, light green, light blue, lavender, yellow…or even gray).
Images via J.Crew / The J.Crew Mirabelle, Sinclair, Louisa, and Heidi
Unfortunately, these dresses were still $250 or more. I found some great deals on eBay and other dress-resale sites that made me think this could actually work—and then I found the sale section of the J.Crew site.
After the small snaffu at the beginning of the ceremony, the photographers offered us a Day After Shoot free of charge for when we came back from the honeymoon, to make up for the misunderstanding. So three days after we arrived from our three week romp through Europe, we got gussied up again and took pictures all over my grandfather’s land.
