The French Connection
Well we’ve passed the 6 month mark and the days are
flying by… so it’s time to start tackling the
very long To Do list. We took a little trip up to Newry at
the end of March to collect our wedding rings from Jack Murphy…
and they are just stunning. We were both absolutely thrilled
with the end result and they have been locked away safely
until 1st October (well apart from the odd sneaky try-on to
make sure mine still fits!).
I went down to the florist a few weeks ago to confirm our
date and talk about what flowers we want… well that’s
all now arranged too. My bouquet will be made of freesias
(I love the smell and they’ll make for a very light
bouquet) and my three lovely BM’s shall be having gerberas.
Mum’s allergic to lilies of all shapes & forms,
so we have to be very careful about flowers both at the church
& in the hotel. I’ve also sorted out the buttonholes
& church flowers, pew ends etc. A very kind friend of
mine is lending me 2 topiary trees for the church entrance
and I have some gorgeous organza ribbon which we can use here
too.
After all that hard work, it was time for a little break
so we headed off to France on the ferry to buy our wine for
the wedding. My very kind boss allowed me to use one of the
big work vans to transport our purchases… which was
a good thing because there was no earthly way we would have
fitted all of it in the back of a car, or even a jeep!. The
crossing was smooth, which was great because I’m a notoriously
bad sailor. We met up with fellow WOL bride Fran & her
H2B Niall for a glass of water or two on the boat so the evening
flew by.
We arrived in Cherbourg at 12.30pm on a very miserable Saturday
and it was like Wacky Races… all the Irish people in
big cars & vans racing to get to Carrefour to buy up all
the booze. We had prebooked all of our wine for the wedding
which made sense because Wine and Beer World (www.wineandbeerworld.co.uk)
where we bought all the wedding wine from, is tiny…
We arrived at the shop & I immediately spotted our order…
it was the one with the 10 cases of beer & 6 bottles of
vodka to calm the pre-wedding nerves!!!! After we loaded all
the drink into the van, it was back into Carrefour to do a
little bit more shopping… my parents are big fans of
French supermarkets & they sent me off with a list of
essential supplies which needed replenishing. We also picked
up a nice big wine rack to store our own wine on… it
cost as much as a bottle of plonk would here in Ireland. I
also managed to buy my BM pressies (and girls, you are in
for a treat!) and pick up a few nice things for the house
Eventually we were all shopped out and checked into our hotel
- we decided to make a weekend break of the trip. I can really
recommend the Hotel Ambassadeur on the Quay in Cherbourg…
it was gorgeous, and incredibly reasonable. We had two lovely
days exploring Normandy, and then it was back on the boat
to Rosslare.
So that’s three things off the list, just another 150,000
to go!
Take care,
Aoife
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