Once restrictions had lifted a little, and we could get out of London, we found ourselves regularly escaping to the Surrey Hills. We love wine, so the fact that Denbies Wine Estate was a vineyard was a plus. It just felt like the perfect fit. We also wanted a space that would feel comfortable with 150 people, and Denbies Wine Estate offered an amazing outdoor location as well as beautiful indoor spaces. For our favours, we chose personalised shot glasses and a bottle of Limoncello for each table. We do like a party, so shots were inevitable, but I did a speech at the end of the meal explaining the significance of the drink being partly due to our engagement in Italy but also due to the time my dad kept topping up Greg’s drink, and he was too polite to tell him to stop – so ended up drinking three tumblers of it! We repurposed the lanterns from our ceremony and used them as our centrepieces. We had natural blooms in keeping with our countryside theme from Cathey’s Flowers. I decided on a sunflower bouquet to mark a special friend who sadly couldn’t be there. We also had some blossom trees at the end of our top table. Greg and I went from having no cake to a full treat table. The South East Cakery in Dulwich just made it too hard to choose. We went for a chocolate explosion cake, with six types of brownies with flavours ranging from peanut butter and white chocolate to Rolo rocky road. Our tables names included pictures of us as children. It was great fun choosing the photos, and we were happy for everyone to have a laugh at our expense! 38
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