After the prep, the travelling to the church, the marriage, now comes the party! Following on in my ‘Mr and Mrs’ series we are at the Wedding Reception!
Our venue was the stunning Swancar Farm Country House in Trowell, Nottingham. After leaving the church as Mr and Mrs we had a 45 minute car journey to take in our gorgeous ceremony. Dan was also telling me off for keeping such a big surprise from him! (The Camper van!)
With it’s gorgeous winding lane through the farm yards, Swancar was the perfect idyllic location. The 16th Century Country House is exclusive use wedding reception. It provided a romantic, elegant backdrop for our special day. We did worry that the rain would spoil our day, and the photos outside. But we were lucky that it held off, even though it did rain whilst we on our way there.
When we arrived at Swancar, we waited at the bottom of the lane to make sure that Wayne was ready to take some photos as we drove up. Photos were taken outside whilst our guests were arriving and having welcome drinks and sweet treats.
Camper Van Candy Van
The Little Blue Bay provided the most adorable Candy Van complete with lollies and sweets. It was a massive hit with everyone, even if it was mainly for the kids, the big kids seemed to enjoy it the most!
After enjoying a lolly pop and a sweet or two, don’t judge me I was hungry, we made our way through Swancar to greet our guests before our evening meal. We were welcomed into The Oak Hall where the room had been set up by Swancar staff and my amazing Maid of Honour. It was adorable and I particularly loved the Fox sign on the fireplace above the top table!
Wedding Breakfast
We are not fancy people and we struggled when deciding what we were going to do for our “Wedding breakfast”. Don’t get me started on why it’s called a wedding breakfast when we were eating at tea time! We then found out that Swancar did a Hog Roast buffet with lots of go with its and decided that was much more us. It would be perfect for a cold March day!
We had a full hog roast including batches, potatoes, pasta and salad. The food was scrumptious and it went down a treat! I didn’t plan it too well though because it is definitely food you’d normally eat with your fingers. However not whilst wearing a white dress…
Cake Cutting
A friend from Church was a baker and agreed to make our cake. It was exactly what we asked for and even tastier than we expected. We had two tiers of fruit cake and two tiers of sponge cake. I am a big lover of fruit cake, but, with lots of children at our wedding, a tier of sponge was a must. Therefore it’s good to have a mixture and keep everybody happy. It was SO yummy!
We have saved two tiers and they are currently in our freezer waiting for the next special occasion for us to use it.
Speeches
I knew from the very beginning of wedding planning that I didn’t want to do a speech. Dan was lucky that I was happy to say our wedding vows in front of everyone! So there was no chance I was doing one. I’d asked my dad, as Father of the Bride, to do a speech, Dan, as the groom and Matt, the Best Man.
My Dad welcomed Dan into the family “officially” and told everyone how proud he was. Dan thanked everyone who had helped our day to be so perfect. Our bridesmaids, the groomsmen, our parents, our friends who had made the cake, bought the flowers and helped make our invitations.
The boy did well. Their speeches were perfect!
Matt’s speech was very touching, but hilariously funny. He spoke about how Dan was an amazing teacher and dad and how he was also going to be an amazing husband. He made Dan cry!
Dancing and Drinking!
After our speeches the Swancar staff turned the Oak Hall around to clear tables and make space for a dancefloor. We had a DJ that had a play list to get people up and dancing following our first dance.
For those of you that know me well you’ll know that I don’t dance. I would probably go as far to say as I can’t think of anything worse. Yet I had to have a first dance with my husband and everybody watching us. Luckily I realised that all I had to do was dance with Dan and enjoy being with him and I quickly forgot that everybody was watching.
Dancing was over and done with (yes I mean it) so everybody got their dancing shoes on and had a good dance!
Our wedding day was one of the most amazing days of my life and it was over in a flash. I wish we could do it all over again and I could take in every little detail. I’m so thankful to everybody that came and made our day special, we love you all lots.
Mrs Fox xx
