Well this is just lovely. Rachel looks so elegant in her fishtail lace gown and the spring blooms are to die for, I love the mix of orange and yellow tulips in particular. You've also got to hand it to a bride who can't resist a bargain, dedicating her budget to the things that matter and making clever savings in areas that are less important.

Did I mention this is one of the greatest table plans I have seen in a long time? such a fun film theme - and so well put together. The cake also deserves a mention, simple yet sophisticated and ties in beautifully with the rustic decor and feminine colour scheme.

Enjoy lovelies!

Rachel The Bride: Our venue was Eastington Park, we chose it as it provided a really beautiful blank canvas, and was quite centrally located between both of our families. The venue has it all; accommodation for guests, lounge rooms for people to relax in and a large, beautiful ceremony room and separate Ballroom (which we used for the Wedding Breakfast and then the evening do). The bridal suite, with huge bedroom, dressing room and bathroom were also stunning. To top it off, the venue is beautiful grounds which a terrace area for drinks and plenty of scope for outdoor photos.

My dress was from Perfection in Cardiff , Justin Alexander (style 8596); a fish tail style lace gown with a satin band detail around the waist and bateau neckline. It had a sheer lace panel to the back, with lots of detail.

I didn't want to wear too much jewellery or a veil as there was a lot of detail on my dress that I didn't want to hide. My nan had passed on to my mum a beautiful pearl necklace that she wore at her wedding. My mum wore it at her wedding also. As my dress didn't lend itself well to a necklace, I wore the pearls as a bracelet instead!

I bought simple court shoes with a lace overlay detail and a bow on the back. They were from Rainbow Club's 'Else' range of bridal shoes and when I ordered them they were part of the brand new range that hadn't been released. I found them for a few quid less than other stockists at Crystal Bridal.

I am a real lover of a bargain and as I had blown most of my budget on my dress I wanted to be thrifty with my accessories. I borrowed a beaded head band from a friend, which I understand was a primark buy! It was exactly what I was after and looked simple and vintage style.

Our flowers were done by Amy of Lavender's Blue Floristry. I knew as soon as I walked into Amy's shop that whatever she created for us would be wonderful as the shop had the exact relaxed, vintage feel as I wanted to create! Amy was very instinctive and we had so many comments on the beautiful flowers. We went for what was described by Amy as a spring 'riot of colour'. As the rest of our décor was quite neutral we wanted to go for vibrant flowers.

We went with a vintage/country type theme. The venue is a really beautiful blank canvas with a lot of cream and white, so you could really turn it into anything. We used burlap and lace detail for table runners (hand made by Dave's sister Helen) and we placed wicker hearts in the trees up the drive to the venue, and on the ends of the aisles in the ceremony room. A lot of the decorations were home made, which were really simple and centred around collecting hundreds of jam jars! I used lace, hessian string and detailed ribbon to decorate jars which were used for candles and flowers. We bought lots of white lanterns from Ikea (£2 each!) which were placed around the venue. As we met in Wales and live in Wales, and got married on St David's day, we wanted to include a few Welsh features to our day! We therefore chose white chocolate and raspberry Welsh Cakes for our favours, made by a colleague who runs a little boutique bakery. We had a really simple cake made by Aunt Julie's Bakery and decorated with hessian bands, which our florist then added fresh flowers too.

Our caterer was Berry Blue and our wedding breakfast consisted of a puff pastry tartlet of seasonal vegetables, slow braised shin of beef in a red wine jus with goats cheese dauphinoise potatoes and chocolate silk (mousse cake) or Tart au citron (Dave and I just could not agree on one so we went with 2 options!)

I had 4 Bridesmaids; My 2 cousins, Hannah and Kirstie, my best friend from University Jodie Llewllyn and Dave's sister, Helen. The bridesmaids wore dresses from Coast, the style was called Lorri Lee. I chose to have Helen and Jodie in full length maxi dresses and Hannah and Kirstie in the shorter versions of the same dress. The dresses were £150 for the long versions and £125 for the short ones. As we were buying 4 I asked for a discount and was given 30% off in Coast.!

We made all the stationery ourselves; Save the Dates, Invitations, Table Place Names etc. This was probably the most tedious element of the preparations, as we spent many evenings of frustration trying to get card to go through our home printer! It was however, one of the most satisfying elements, when we could look at our finished items and feel proud of them!

For the first hour of the evening do we had a Barn Dance! We really wanted the evening to be fun and relaxed and get people to mingle, and this was a good way to do it! This was followed by a really great band called Hard to Handle, who played a range of music from 1960s- current hits and nearly everyone got on the dance floor. I would definitely say if people are pondering between a band and a DJ, if you can stretch to the extra money on a band, do it, as it really made our evening do!

Kate and Jon Gray of ' Kate Gray Photography ' captured our day. We spent ages looking at websites in our hunt for a photographer. We are both fairly camera shy and wanted to find someone with a relaxed style. Although Kate was not local to us, she was happy to make arrangements to travel and she took loads of time and effort to make sure we felt comfortable. We were so glad we chose her and are delighted with the pictures.

Photography
Kate Gray Photography
Gown Justin Alexander from Perfection | Blooms Lavender Blue Floristry | Venue Eastington Park | Cake Aunt Julie's Bakery | Caterer Berry Blue| Barn Dance Life Of Riley | Band Hard To Handle