Our Wedding Day in Cyprus: Told on Our 2nd Wedding Anniversary

Two years ago today, as I was lazily getting out of bed in a gorgeous apartment on the beach, in 40 degree sunshine on the Island of Love (Cyprus), Jonny was pacing the beach, writing his speech.

When he came back in, we talked about our wedding dance. We decided we didn’t like it, so there and then, we changed the routine, in our hotel room.

It was a delightfully chilled out morning. Me and my bridesmaids headed up to the salon to have our hair done, and I had my makeup done too. Best man then phoned bridesmaid to tell her that Jonny… had left his shirt in the UK! I decided then and there, that it was not my problem. 150 Euros later, best man (my brother) was sporting a new designer shirt (and a slight grimace about the cost), and Jonny was wearing my brothers shirt! Like I say – nothing was going to stress me out!

Our wedding was the fairytale of our dreams! It was wonderful to have Bunny there with us  too, but the twins were just a twinkle in our eyes at the time!

I had a tremendously long aisle (about half of Pachelbel’s Canon, long) and had decided to showcase my bridesmaids and pageboy and let them walk first. I walked arm in arm with my daddy, at a leisurely pace, in a fishtail dress custom made especially for me, by my amazing mum.

It was a glorious day, not a cloud in the scorching hot sky (but a nice strong breeze to stop us all sweating!). Jonny and I got married, outside, overlooking the sea, in our favourite place in the world, in front of 25 of our closest friends and family. Jonny got emotional, but neither of us cried. There was hand holding, eye gazing, poetry, rings, and … a fit of the giggles when the celebrant gave us a lecture on adultery.

We had the traditional receiving line, followed by group photos on the lawn. Our guests were then lead up to the verranda for drinks, while my new Jonny and I had our private photo shoot on the lawns and on the beach (where we inevitably stood too close to the sea and the bottom of my dress got soaked by a big wave!).

When we joined our guests, we had a champagne reception, cut and ate our cake and then… got 23 of our 25 guests up Greek Dancing, with the dancers we had booked. It was a great deal of fun.

Then a 52 seater coach picked everyone up and drove them to a clifftop location. Somewhere that Jonny and I think is truly beautiful and one of the places we had discussed marriage, on a former holiday! We had more photo shoots – couples, singletons, the men. Our photographer even had me and Jonny climbing up a very steep cliff for photos! The view from up there… was incredible!

Back at the hotel, our reception venue was almost like an island, as the tide came in and surrounded most of it. Candlelit, flowers, chairs with ribbons, lanterns, a pianist playing soft melodies and the setting sun, made the backdrop for an incredible dinner. Speeches
and toasts ranged from long winded, to emotional, to hilarious and back again.

Moving on to the dancefloor, Jonny took the microphone and sang to me, “Everything”, by Michael Buble. Jonny is a fantastic singer and his voice (and the wine) made some of our guests a little emotional at this point.

But just to make sure there wasn’t a dry eye in the house on the beach, we then took the dancefloor for our first dance as man and wife. “Come What May”, from Moulin Rouge, is our song (Guess what “our film” is?!) and we winged our newly formed routine, with only a few tiny mistakes (mainly to do with my terrible sense of balance).

The Disco and cocktails went on until 1am the next day, where in true, non-traditional style, Jonny and I were the last to leave. (After one of my bridesmaids had undone my dress for me, because we all knew Jonny fingers would be too fat for the dainty buttons!). What can I say? We had just had the wedding of our dreams and we didn’t want it to end. It truly was, the best day of our lives.

We awoke the following morning to a full champagne breakfast on the verranda, followed by a couples massage at midday, and a romantic candlelit dinner in the evening.

We got married at the incredibly beautiful Nissi Beach Resort, where the master of ceremonies and all the other staff, made our wedding very relaxing, completely stress free and truly unforgettable.

We have the most amazing photos, taken by a truly talented photographer called Duncan Cox, who photographs in the UK and in Cyprus, you can check him out on his UK website DC Photographic. All the photos in this blog post were taken by him.

And best of all, the one best thing we did on our wedding day, was hire Laura, our videographer. Laura is also a photographer and works in the UK and in Cyprus, you can check out her UK website at Dream Wedding Photographer.

Our wedding DVD captures every secret smile, every ounce of romance, friendship, love and beauty from our wedding day and makes the most emotional movie, you’ve ever seen. I even made a complete stranger cry with happiness after watching our wedding video once! These are memories frozen in time, that we can watch over and over (and we do), long after our own memories start to fade. I love photos, but there’s just something wonderful about having our special day on DVD.

So to my darling husband…

Two years ago today, we got married. It was the perfect day we always dreamed of and since then, you have given me another two beautiful daughters and held my hand through both HELLP Syndrome and Cancer. I love you so much and I always will. Happy Anniversary Babe. xxx