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Over the festive period I’ll be recapping some of my very favourite Real Weddings from the last 12 months on the wedding blog. It’s been a tough choice! In true Brides Up North style, each wedding featured on these pages is unique, beautiful and gorgeously personal. It’s been an exceptionally fabulous year! Enjoy…

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Time for something bright and beautiful.  This intimate Yorkshire wedding sent to me by Brides Up North reader Vanessa may be unconventional, but it packs a massive punch in the style stakes.  One of my very favourites to date.  I hope you love it too.  Be inspired!  With images by Dan Jones Photography, Kendal. 

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Vanessa says: Craig proposed at Helme Chase Maternity Unit, Kendal, Cumbria on the 29th July 2010, two days after the birth of our son. He gave me a present for Joel which was a small mouse toy in a box, there in the mouse’s apron pocket was the ring I had chosen weeks earlier but he’d said it was unavailable. Craig got down on one knee next to my bed and I was so surprised I just said "thank you".  I wrote about it over at my own personal blog. 

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We were married on 19th May 2012.  It all happened in Kendal. We were married at the Registry Office, with Champagne toast at Burgundy’s Brewhouse Winebar followed by a vintage double decker bus ride to Skelsmergh Community Hall (just a stone’s throw from where we live) for our reception and night do shindig!

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We wanted a really relaxed and local feel to our wedding so the walk through town to Burgundy’s was great with plenty of photo opportunities along the way. I carried a bunch of bright yellow heart shaped balloons to lead the way for our guests. The wine bar is one of our favourite drinking places, it’s small and intimate and was in a great position for the bus picking us all up on the high street. The village hall is exquisitely set against a backdrop of Cumbria’s rolling hills, it was the perfect size for our party of 72 guests. Outside caterers and a mobile bar (Dicky Doodles) did us proud on the day and we only had to decorate the place ourselves.

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Our theme was a mixture of village fete, retro, brightly coloured, florals, nostalgia, low key, DIY, with a nod to vintage!

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I ran to the registry office with the maids from one of their houses in town, it was a pleasant route along the River Kent (if a little fraught due to delays in the wake of a false eyelash trauma)! We walked through town to our first reception and then hoped on a vintage double decker bus form Cumbria Classic Coaches up to the hall for our big do.

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I tried hard to find genuine vintage dress but they are incredibly small but never fear Alexandra King of Make Me A Dress worked her magic on the designs for me and our two bridesmaids. I wore a grey tulle knee length dress, dotted with coral rhinestones and a coral belt and bow (Alexandra’s signature item) with a matching three layer underskirt with vintage gold trim to the hem. Her trademark pouffy underskirts added even more wow factor to our fabulous frocks.

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Two matching bridesmaids were my walking bouquet in Alexandra King full circle knee length dresses made from a bright yellow floral printed Amy Butler fabric (actually intended for quilting) from the States.

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We all wore Rachel Simpson shoes.

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I carried a home made posy of orange, peach and pink ranunculus tied tightly with crochet lace trim from my own personal stash of goodies. The maids carried tightly tied pom poms of pink gypsophila, tied with vintage pink lace. 

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Jules B was where we found Craig’s jacket and shoes and shopped at Nigel Hall for his trousers and Gibson for his waistcoat (wow he looked great)!

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My very favourite part of the day was dashing round Kendal doing a fun photo shoot on bridges, benches, fun fairs and cobbled streets with our photographer while our guests all drank champagne in our honour and got to know each other.

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We used The North Pom for all our decorations (our guests were stunned by how amazing the venue looked).

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A friend brewed and bottled a beer especially for us, Craig designed (that’s his business) labels for them so each guest had a commemorative beer. He also designed beer mats featuring us as kids. We set up an old suitcase with wooden printers letters spelling out CARDS as a drop off point for our guests well wishes. I spent two years collecting vintage china for each place setting and family table linens completed the look.

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We are real pudding fans, it’s our thing (no doubt why all the vintage frocks were too small on me!) so after failing miserably to narrow it down to one cake we opted for a whole table of them! There was umpteen trifles, numerous big fat prize winning cakes, pretty stacks of dainty cakes. We dubbed the table “The Darling Puds Of May”.

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One of our bridesmaid’s dad DJ Pete Balmer has many years DJing under his belt so we chose him for our evening entertainment. He was fantastic and even came to our house a month before the wedding and we went over absolute musts and definite no no’s. He was brilliant and we all danced non stop!

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After the wedding we had a good old British Honeymoon by the sea in Dorset followed by a stay in the wonderfully ancient city of Bath.

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My top tip for other Brides Up North would be to beg, borrow and make! Oh and don’t be afraid to ask for money rather than presents, nobody minds and ours paid for our honeymoon including spends!

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Congratulations Vanessa & Craig

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Have you recently said I do?  Contact Brides Up North to share your Real Wedding memories with us!

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Brides Up North UK Wedding Blog – Images © 2012 Dan Jones Photography

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