JANAPANA´S (joanna) planning thread. ¡¡¡YAY!!!

[janapana]

First of all thanks to all the brides on this forum from whom I have shamelessly stolen ideas. Most of them i never got around to using because I am the world´s greatest procrastinator, but you have all inspired me. Big thanks to the girls on the UK thread for listening to me rant, and making me laugh.

 

We leave for Mexico in two weeks, so I am doing this now before the onslaught of Christmas.

 

How We Met.....

Even though we were born and grew up in the same city, and had mutual friends, Antony and I didn´t meet until I´d moved to Spain. My daughter Mia and I were due to go back to the UK for a wedding where Mia was bridesmaid, but sadly the bride´s father died the week before the wedding, so we had a funeral instead. At the wake I spotted the most gorgeous bloke twinkling his big brown eyes at me, but there is a time and a place for flirting, and that was not it. So off we go back to Spain, 4 months later and we´re back in the Uk for the rescheduled wedding, and lo and behold.... the man with the nice eyes is the best man! I know it sounds cheesy, but I honestly knew as soon as I met Antony that he was supposed to be mine. We spent the rest of my week in England together, 3 weeks later he´d come out to Spain to visit, and two months after that he packed his job up and moved out to me.

 

The Proposal.....

We´d been together 3 1/2 years when Ants asked me to marry him. Our baby Jacob was in nursery, Mia was in school, and we were enjoying some Quality Time togeher. That´s all i´m saying. (it can be a bit awkward explaining to realatives who want the finer details.)

 

The Rings

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Deciding on Mexcio

We looked at getting married in the UK and in Spain, and both were too complicated and expensive, so we pretty much just grabbed a travel brochure and picked a destination that was affordable, but still came up ok on trip advisor!

The Riu Tequila at Playa del Carmen is not the most uber-luxurious by any stretch of the imagination, but we focussed on what is important to us, and that is having the people we love there. Antony´s family do not have much spare cash, so we had to make it affordable for them, as if they couldn´t come, there would be no DW

 

 

Except for my dress and the invitations I´ve tried to do this as cheap as possible, we both work super hard at rubbish jobs, and with two kids I just couldn´t justify splashing thousands on one day.... then my car died and wiped out my secret stash. Luckily I´d already bought the kids Christmas pressies!

 

The Dress

La Sposa by Pro Novias, I accidentally fell upon it in a little shop in our town, only tried it on to be polite to the owner. But it fit like a glove and was half price at 500€.

 

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[janapana]

I have beautiful purple shoes that I can´t really walk in. I will probably end up barefoot!

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My jewellery, just cheapy necklace and bracelet, from a local shop, cost about 20€. looks good with the dress though!

 

This is my backup hair flower, incase the resort want to charge me a fortune for a real one. I think this was my best bargain.... 1,50€ from Primark!

 

For my bouquet I´m hoping for cream /white, with a bit of purple thrown in.... roses, lillies, whatever! I love flowers and I´m sure they´ll be beautiful. This is the photo I´ll take with me.

I ordered a photo charm from an ebay seller, it has a photo of Antony´s grandad in. He was a good man and a true gentleman and is missed

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[janapana]

Hair trial

 

Flower inspiration,

 

Bridesmaid dress´- our ten year old is our only bridesmaid, this dress in Ben de Lisi from Debenhams. She has purple earrings and hair comb, and silver shoes with a silver locket that santa is bringing on saturday!

 

 

Son´s outfit. sorry he´s on sideways but you get the idea. He is honorary ring bearer and will carry the rings attached to a starfish with purple ribbon. If he decided he wants to. Or he may just throw a tantrum.... he´s two afterall!

 

[josietoms]

Yay - love your thread!  Cant believe we are so close now - everything looks beautiful - cant wait to see your pictures :-) xx

[janapana]

Thanks Josie, I have some more photos to put on, but the laptop is playing up, and Antony is lurking! Maybe I´ll get some peace tomorrow to finish the job!

[kimberly333]

Great thread....your son is sooooo yummmmy!!!.......thanks for sharing....

[fmichelle]

Love your shoes! You'll have to get at least a few pics with them before you go barefoot   Maybe check out some barefoot sandals (a kind of jewelry for the feet) so when you take off the fab shoes your feet will still look fab, just a thought   Congratulations!

[sebitasalejo]

Your son is ADORABLE. love thr thread.

[janapana]

Thanks guys, now where was i????

 

My daughter is allergic to just about every type of pollen so i´ve ordered her an artificial bouquet from ebay, I also got 6 bouts, and  4 wrist corsages, all for 28€....

 

 

My Monogram and Invitations were done by Allurements by Rebecca. She´s great. Endlessly patient, always at the other end of the internet, and I love the finished product. The only trouble i had was getting the invites through Spanish customs, but that´s not her fault! Would totally recommend her

 

 

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Instead of OOT bags, which i love the idea of, but no way could we get everything from Spain to Mexico via England, given how stingy Bristish airlines are, we sent out stainless steel thermal travel mugs, and a pen and luggage tag. We will buy maracas once we get there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[janapana]

I ordered us each a t-shirt, the game over t is from amazon, my wife t is from vistaprint, they sent it in size GINORMOUS, but sent me another one for free when i complained! The wife one says  washing, ironing, f*cking, etc on. I doubt antony´s grandma will be able to read it, at least i hope not.

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We have sparkly initially for the top of the cake, they look gold in this photo, but are silver in real life. I am also trying to fashion some sort of cake topper out of the remaining artificial flowers, but I am not a crafty arty person so we will see how that goes!

 

 

We have a white board for the guest book, personalised luggage straps with our joint name on and i need to go and get an egg timer to stop my dad going on too long in his speech!

 

And i think that`s it really. I had great intentions of doing and buying a whole lot more stuff, but i think i´d be the only person who would really notice, and at the end of the day, all i really care about is that i´m marrying my best friend and soul mate, with the people we love around us. 

 

 

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