Your North East Wedding - May/June 2020 (Issue 38)

REAL WEDDINGS 21  L ove can enter our lives at any moment and take us completely by surprise, while sometimes old romances gets rekindled – and this is exactly what happened for Daniel and Katie. Around the age of 14, the pair dated but lost contact as time went on. Fast forward to 2011, they started talking again after Dan contacted Katie while he was in Australia. After a date to T-in the Park, the love birds have been together ever since. After that moment their love for one another grew, Katie says: “Dan proposed while we were travelling in Australia, we were on the beach at Hervey Bay in Queensland after a morning of meeting and feeding wild dolphins when he got down on one knee in the sea. It was a huge surprise, especially when we’d been in Australia for three weeks and I have no idea how he kept the ring hidden from me all that time!” SETTING THE SCENE The date was set for August 2019 and it was time to begin the exciting planning stage. When it came to find the perfect venue, the couple knew straight away that Fig House Middleton Lodge was perfect. Even though the building work hadn’t been completed, the grounds stole their hearts. Inside the venue, everything looked perfect. Katie comments: “My sister insisted on making chocolate brownies in little boxes with our initials on for favours – they went down very well!” It was important to the pair that the decorations and centrepieces were not over the top as the venue’s setting was already so beautiful. Instead, they went with green foliage and candles in glass cylinders and foliage and lanterns down the aisle. For flowers, they needed to tie in with the colours pinks, purples and blues, which matched perfectly with the big day. The table plan was wooden with matching engraved place names for guests to find their seats. Loved ones then enjoyed a three- course sit-down meal, which consisted of king prawns, lamb finished with sticky toffee pudding and ice cream. In the evening, sausage and halloumi buns were offered. The cake looked stunning, Katie says: “We chose a three-tiered cake with lemon, chocolate caramel and vanilla sponges. We had the top and bottom tier in pink with iced white beading detail and the middle had silver sparkles with fondant flowers.” LOOKING THE PART The bride looked stunning in the Maggie Sottero, Eden in ivory, which featured a lace- up back, illusion cap sleeves and Swarovski crystal beaded bodice. Katie says: “It was the first dress I tried on and loved, however,