Scott and Jolly

We met when Scott was coaching my hockey team, we became friends at first and then developed a secret crush on each other. We finally got our acts together on a club night out with the help of a little dutch courage while dancing to Danger zone by Kenny Loggins.

As soon as we got engaged we wanted to make sure our wedding day reflected us. We wanted a relaxed day to enjoy celebrating our marriage with our closest friends and family.

My dress was from Alfred Angelo. I was pretty sure that I didn’t want to wear a veil, so when I found my spotty headpiece from Viktoria Novak, I knew it was meant to be, it tied all of the polka dot theme together. I’ve always wanted to wear red shoes on my wedding day and I finally found the perfect pair a week out from the wedding. They were wedges so they were comfortable and made it easy to walk on any surface – although I still did change into red havianas once the reception started!

The bridesmaids also wore red shoes and we all wore red lipstick to add some colour to the day. I found the bridesmaid dresses when I was looking for dresses for myself and after thinking about the dress all weekend I thought it would make a great bridesmaid dress! When I first told the girls that they would be wearing polka dot dresses I think they thought I was crazy, especially when I told them they are ‘classy polka dots’ but once they saw the dresses they could see what I was talking about!

Again tying in with the relaxed theme of the day, Scott never wanted to wear a full suit, so he decided that the he and the groomsmen would wear vests instead of jackets. He also loves to wear a flat-cap and thought it would tie in nicely with the vests and theme of the day.

We were lucky enough to have the fabulous Dan O’Day photograph our wedding. When we first started looking we loved his style and thought it suited us and our day perfectly. We then met Dan and fell in love with him and his photo’s even more, he made us feel relaxed and in super safe hands for our wedding day. On the day when Dan rocked up, I was amazed to see he had brought along Kelly Tunney, who is an amazing photographer in her own right, as the second shooter. I recognised Kelly who had photographed a few of our friends weddings and was very excited. They kept us relaxed throughout the day and we ended up with a variety of photos that told the stories of our day.

We chose to have a first look and the majority of our photos prior to the ceremony. It meant less waiting time for our guest between the ceremony and reception, and allowed our bridal party to spend some more time with their partners and friends. So we could sneak off for some alone time and a few more photos after the ceremony, we set up lawn games, a lemonade stand and wood fire pizzas for our guests to enjoy. We were then able to mingle with them and join in the fun on our return before entering the reception.

We fell in love with Lake George Winery as soon as we saw it. We wanted a venue that could host the ceremony and reception so that our guests didn’t have to travel or have a long waiting time in between. The beautiful oak tree was a perfect place to get married. Both my parents walked me down the aisle as I felt that they both raised me equally. I was quite adamant that I didn’t want to be given away, although we did include both of our parents in the ceremony as we asked them both to give us their blessing.

We wanted the ceremony to reflect our personalities and to not be too serious, without taking away any of the meaning or formalities. Our celebrant MaryAnn O’Sullivan made sure it was both of these. As mentioned I wore red lipstick, which looked great on Scott after our first kiss! Prior to the wedding we wrote a letter to each other, outlining our love for each other and our hopes and dreams for the marriage. At the end of the ceremony we put these letters into a box containing two bottles of wine (from Lake George Winery of course) and symbolically hammered it shut. We then promised if our marriage ever endures serious hardship that we would sit down together, drink the wine and read the letters that reminded us of how much we love each.

Music was a big part of the day for us, we chose songs that reflected our tastes and that meant a lot to us. Scott chose the song that I walked down the aisle to, “First Day of My Life” by Bright Eyes. We walked into our reception to Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins as it was a big part of us getting together. And our first dance was “Stand by Me” by Pennywise, Scott is a big punk fan and I loved that we could represent that with a traditional song. The song starts off slow and then builds into a punk finish, which saw the bridal party and us jumping around and having fun!

With the reception room being beautiful its own right we didn’t want to over-do the decorations. I wanted to do something other than flowers on the tables so after much discussion we made the choice to make planter boxes and plant succulents in them. Handmaking the boxes added a nice personal touch, Scott put the boxes together, while I stained them, and then friends helped us to plant the succulents. We tied the spotty theme in with polka dot table runners.

Scott is a graphic designer so he designed all of the stationery including save the date cards, invitations, menus, thank you cards and signs for our wishing well and the lemonade stand. He also handwrote all of the guest’s nametags, which we attached to our bonbonniere, this was a special touch, and our guests really appreciated the individual thought that went into each of them.

At our engagement party my Dad served some of his home-made tomato relish on the food and the guests loved it, so much so that they wouldn’t stop talking about it. After hearing this, we asked if he would make some more for us to gift as our bonbonniere. We sourced little jars that were the perfect size for the relish, we added labels that said “Ray’s Relish”, and finished them off with the guests nametags.

Our beautiful cake was made by one of Scott’s groomsmen. It was two tiered – white chocolate cake with chocolate ganache and chocolate cake with white chocolate ganache. It was then covered in red and blue peanut better macarons! Instead of the traditional bridal couple on top of the cake we chose to have a Buzz Lightyear figurine – we have always said we love each other ‘buzz’ (to infinity and beyond)! It was very us to have him on top of our cake.

I don’t think we would change a thing from our wedding day we were super relaxed and enjoyed sharing our special day with our closest friends and family.

 

Ms Gingham says: There’s so much to love about this wedding… the photography, the red shoes, the Buzz Lightyear cake… but what I love the most is Jolly’s Dad’s polka dot tie in perfect theme!! A stunning Lake George winery wedding.

Jolly says: “I am a no fuss girl from Canberra. When planning our wedding my husband and I wanted a day that reflected us and was fun and relaxing for our guests. We made sure we remember that getting married was for a lifetime not just a wedding day!”