What does a focal point look like?

Focal points come in all styles. Shape-wise, we humans seem to prefer arches and rectangles, which are basically squared-off arches anyway. When you look at an event venue, whether it’s a castle, hotel, church, theatre or barn, you will nearly always see these shapes. The rest of the focal point could be a raised area like a stage, somewhere set apart such as a gazebo, something high like a garden pergola or a balcony.

These places all share a sense of separateness, which also helps to direct our attention and makes us feel that something special is going to happen there.

Focal points aren’t new. The Romans loved arches and using them to create a bit of drama.

And Nature can create the perfect backdrop without even trying. This is Dorset’s Durdle Door.

Wonderful wedding focal points

At a wedding, the focal point should always be the couple getting married. Looking at the pictures below, it might look as if the main feature of the focal point is the strategically-placed table! In my view, that space should be strictly reserved for the wedding couple. I don’t want it filled with a registrar, or a celebrant and certainly not a table. And I always make sure the couple are either facing out towards their guests or facing each other, depending on what’s being said. It may be traditional to look at a couple’s backs but tradition is only worth it when it works well.

Focal points can be grand, or minimal, subtle or full-on. Here are a few examples of different scenes and styles.

A beautiful, natural scene benefits from being framed by a simple curtain, billowing in the breeze. 

A garden space such as an orangery or pergola offers a wonderful mix of structural and natural features.

 I really love these contrasting colours and the natural aisle created by the hedge and stone path.

Inside venues capitalise on their style and character. This sleek, modern space suits an elegant  contemporary style.

 The fireplace is the ideal backdrop for an intimate wedding or renewal of vows. 

Barn weddings are really popular and their relaxed vibe allows you to get really creative.

This is full-on rustic drama. NB the central table is once again stealing the attention.

Indulge in the Gothic drama of an English country home. Just perfect – without the table.

To me, a double rainbow is the perfect focal point. It doesn’t matter how many rainbows I see in my life, I will still be amazed by one. If I could produce a rainbow at the perfect point in a  ceremony, that would be my ideal scenario!

Find your favourite focal point

If you’re looking for slightly more achievable options for focal points, I’ve put a few of my favourites on Pinterest

And if you’re planning a wedding (congratulations!), there are brilliant stylists such as www.fundooweddings.co.uk, who will create a show-stopping backdrop for you. Alternatively, if you’re crafty, the inspiration and know-how is all out there, ready to be plundered.

Your ceremony space can be as simple or as OTT as you want. I hope you have a lovely time making it just right.

And don’t hesitate to get in touch if you’d like a bespoke ceremony to match!

The post Why every ceremony needs a focal point appeared first on Beautiful Day Celebrant.

You’ve organised your wedding down to the last detail, made all the decisions about the ceremony and reception. Now you can stop worrying, relax and be happy, right?

If that’s you – hooray, excellent, carry on! If it’s not you and you’re still feeling really stressed about your wedding, this blog post is for you.

As a celebrant, I see lots of excitement and quite a bit of stress from couples. Both are perfectly natural; your wedding is one of the biggest days of your life and you want it to be just right. But after you’ve planned everything so carefully, WHY is it so hard to relax?

This is the way I see it. There are gnomes that get inside our heads, bothering us with insecurities and anxieties. Some of these relate to our own self-confidence and about managing a big occasion; others come from the world outside, including opinions from other people and the media.

Here are a few examples of wedding gnome thoughts:

• What if the speeches are really embarrassing?
• What if someone gets ill or has an accident?
• Is there enough space at the venue?
• What if it’s too hot / cold / wet / foggy / snowy?
• Will we offend someone by not inviting them?
• Will our grandparents hate it?
• Have we got enough food and booze?
• I feel sick with nerves

Sound familiar? Look at the gnome swinging happily back and forth. He’s having a lovely time.

This blog is all about blitzing and putting pre-wedding worries into perspective. I think almost everyone has some of these worries. Before I say more, there are two truths we need to acknowledge.

First truth: everyone has an opinion on weddings

As you may have already discovered, every last individual on the planet (or so it seems) has an opinion or a story about weddings: what makes a good one and horror stories about ones that went wrong. If people thought about it first, they probably wouldn’t regale you but hey-ho, we’re British and we love a story.

Here’s a tip. Whenever you hear the words: “I once went to a wedding and ….” put your mental force-field on maximum power. None of this relates to you. However, if there is a crumb of useful advice in there, grab it and ignore the rest.

Second truth: the world of weddings can be bad for you

Weddings online, wow! The sheer volume of ideas, products and advice is mind-boggling! It’s brilliant, it’s useful and it’s really scary – all at once. After a sesh looking at weddings online, even I start to feel a bit insecure. And I’m not even getting married!

All those beautiful websites are powerful and enticing. Unfortunately, their aim is not to make you feel good about your wedding. Quite the reverse. They want to sell a fresh idea to you. If they could, they would persuade you to upgrade your partner to Premium Partner X series, limited edition with extra blingy bits.

With this kind of marketing pressure, it’s not surprising that your head is like a free party for wedding gnomes.

Here are some common gnomes and how to banish them:

“Their wedding looks amazing. Ours could never be as beautiful as that.”

The ‘Compared to Other Weddings on Instagram’ gnome is probably the most annoying. It plants the fear in your mind that your wedding (which has been absolutely perfect until you saw That Image) might not now be perfect enough.
Social media is an infinity of stunning, real-life weddings, tailored for your personal enjoyment / torment, depending on how you are feeling.

My advice is to unfollow, unsubscribe un-everything wedding-related and go into your own happy place in the run up to your big day. Your wedding is real, it’s you and therefore it’s perfect. No one else’s can ever be the same. No one else’s can compare to it, or top it because it’s yours.

“We really need that incredible bar, stocked with every kind of craft beer brewed in the British Isles.”

This ‘Just One More Wow-Factor’ gnome will always make you feel like you should have some other extra thing you hadn’t thought of before. The mindset it wants you to adopt is that more = more perfection. Sometimes though, as we know, more = more hassle (and the same amount of perfection).

Ask yourself honestly, what is a) a must-have b) nice to have c) fabulous and overpriced d) cute but ridiculous? Weddings can turn into 10 Christmases rolled into one. Sticking to a budget is important for most couples. Even if money isn’t an issue, there comes a point when you might just be overdoing it and giving yourself more stress.

If you discover cocktail stirrers that sing like Beyonce, there will probably always be an occasion in future for them. Your first wedding anniversary maybe.

I don’t think those cocktail stirrers actually exist but they should.

“We’re bound to upset someone because X hates Y; A split up with B and C,D,E,F,G will all want to sit together.”

One thing guaranteed to wind you up is the ‘Keeping Family and Friends Happy’ gnome. It makes Brexit look like a picnic. After you’ve done your best to please everyone and seat the right people together, you’re ready for a top job at the United Nations.

I guess the question is whether it’s really up to you to sort out other people’s problems on your wedding day. Hopefully, the answer is no. Just do the seating plan and stay out of everything else. Otherwise, you could easily end up booking people’s B&Bs, sending them train times, picking them up at the station etc etc.

It can easily get too much – so don’t be anyone’s family therapist, PA or travel manager.

“I’m worried I’ll fluff my lines”

Fluffing your lines can be cute. Almost as cute as fluffy ducklings.

Spontaneous moments break the tension, get a laugh and (if your photographer’s alert), make a great picture. Recently, I said that the groom had ‘massaged’ the bride instead of ‘messaged’ her. Of course, everyone found it funny. I wished I’d thought of it before!

Try to think of your wedding ceremony as a celebration and a gift to you. It isn’t a test, a performance or a competition. With a bespoke ceremony, the words have no legal weight, so it doesn’t matter if you make a mistake. If it is a legal ceremony, you can just say a line again if you get it wrong. Registrars are generally very nice like that.

The main thing to remember is that everyone else, will be on your side.

“I’m sooo nervous!”

The ‘Fear of Being in the Spotlight’ gnome can sneak up on you – usually at night – reminding you that you hate being the centre of attention and speaking in public. This can easily spoil your excitement and hype up your stress levels.

I would encourage you to talk things through, rather than bottling them up or sweeping them under the carpet. We can make sure your ceremony works for you. For example, if you don’t want to walk up the aisle, don’t. Have a rehearsal. Have two rehearsals. I will help you write and deliver a wedding speech that you will look forward to delivering.

Of course, there is another reason why you might be nervous. You’re about to make a beautiful, lifelong commitment to your soulmate. That is a big deal and honestly, it’s well worth feeling a bit nervous about.

“What if everything goes wrong?”

The ‘Doom, Disaster and Acts of God’ gnome can have a field day with a wedding. Sure, something may go wrong but realistically not everything will go wrong. Having planned events as well as ceremonies throughout my career, I’ve learnt to use this kind of gnome to my advantage. When planning a wedding ceremony, it’s really important to think through any glitches and work out contingencies, just in case. My top tip is never to rely on technology. It has a mind of its own. Bluetooth will work fine one day, not the next. CDs will play perfectly on one player and jump like a kangaroo on another. It always pays to have back-ups.

The trick is knowing when to stop with your glitches. I really need to stop worrying about a worldwide Prosecco drought.

And finally…

There may be other worries I haven’t mentioned. I can’t promise that if you choose me as your celebrant, you’ll never have a moment’s stress about your wedding. However, I know you’ll have confidence in the ceremony and the decisions we make together. You’ll be more relaxed because you know me and there will be plenty of laughs along the way.

If you’re looking for a celebrant or would like to know more about how a bespoke wedding is different from a registry office wedding, do get in touch.

Happy wedding planning![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

The post How to stay happy with your wedding and stop worrying appeared first on Beautiful Day Celebrant.

Knowing what to say, or what not to say to someone who is grieving isn’t easy. Words are often hard to find, hence the expression ‘I don’t know what to say’. As a celebrant, sometimes I meet several bereaved families each week, so getting this right is really important to me.

Our instinct is always to make things better, not worse, for someone who’s grieving. But many of us aren’t at all confident that we will help, or that we won’t make things worse, so sometimes we get stuck, not knowing what to do or say for the best.

If you’ve been bereaved, you are probably tuned in to what is helpful. If you haven’t but would like to be a good friend or relative, I hope this blog post will help you. It’s based purely on my observations and my personal and professional experience.

These are the two most common ways people communicate with someone who’s been bereaved.

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1. Give them space

OK, obviously not that much space. It’s very natural and perfectly understandable to back off or to stay quiet. We might think that someone really wants space to grieve. However, unless we ask, how will we know for sure? Maybe we’re jumping to conclusions, following some code we’ve heard, or basing our decision on our own experience.

When we say nothing, it’s logical to think there’s no risk of upsetting someone, or saying the wrong thing. However, as Julie Andrews said in The Sound of Music: ‘nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could.’

Our fear of making a mistake, of ‘not knowing what to say’ could actually be hurtful. Silence can easily be misinterpreted as not caring, which is precisely the opposite of what we want to achieve.

AND, deep-down we might also suspect that doing nothing helps us to dodge our own personal discomfort with death and loss. And that doesn’t feel good either.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row css_animation=”” row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” angled_section=”no” text_align=”left” background_image_as_pattern=”without_pattern” css=”.vc_custom_1561717587736{margin-bottom: 25px !important;}” z_index=””][vc_column][vc_column_text]

2. Do Something Lovely (And Give Them Space)

Another common response is to write a card or send flowers, which is undoubtedly a kind, generous act of care and concern. We might spend a lot of time choosing a card and planning carefully what we’re going to say. We reason that we won’t be disturbing or distressing anyone by ringing their doorbell or phoning them at the wrong time. This seems like the perfect, most sensitive approach. Or, is it?

We might still have that niggling thought though. Is this just another, slightly kinder cop-out?

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Is there an alternative? Yes, there is.

After a death, people can feel shocked, bewildered, numb, sad, low, confused and tired. With all that going on, they usually need more human contact, not less.

Practically, they might need help with things like shopping, gardening or driving to appointments. Has anyone ever refused a homemade cake or casserole? I don’t think so. Certainly not in my house.

Emotionally, many bereaved people appreciate the reassurance of having others around them and feeling that they are still important, while they are adjusting to their new circumstances. This process of adjustment can take as long as the proverbial bit of string. If you were to draw a graph of emotions during grief, the line would go up and down like a rollercoaster. They don’t generally follow a neat, straight line like a baby’s growth chart. Emotions are not very well-organised.

When it comes to talking to someone who is sad, our normal everyday chat is often handy. Phrases like: “how are things/ lovely day isn’t it/can you believe this traffic?” allow us to either briefly pass the time of day, or introduce a more personal chat.

When illness, death and grief come along, often in quick succession, these phrases don’t feel quite adequate. We want to say more, but how?[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row css_animation=”” row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” angled_section=”no” text_align=”left” background_image_as_pattern=”without_pattern” css=”.vc_custom_1561717587736{margin-bottom: 25px !important;}” z_index=””][vc_column][vc_column_text]

3: Everyone: be normal

I suggest we steamroller our worries and awkwardness and take the decision that being interested and compassionate is good enough.

As Winston Churchill famously said: KBO – Keep Buggering On. We need to treat someone who’s been bereaved, as we would normally do. Well, almost. Yes, we need to be extra-mindful of their feelings but we need to be ourselves, with all our capacity for flaws and blunders.

If we say something tactless, an immediate and sincere sorry is all that’s needed. Try not to take offence either if they don’t want to talk or are easily irritated. It’s a classic case of needing to put yourself in their shoes.

The worst thing if you’re feeling really sad and alone is people going into ‘sympathy-mode’ when they talk to you. The nodding head, sing-song voice and Bambi eyes – it’s just plain weird.

By behaving normally, we give the message that death and loss are tough but not terrifying, hard to talk about but not taboo.

We don’t need to direct the conversation towards or away from someone’s loss. We can chat about stuff like the weather, gardening, or a new TV series.

Some people crave general conversation when they’re grieving, which gives them a rest from their sadness. Others really want to talk about the person they’ve lost. We’re all different.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row css_animation=”” row_type=”row” use_row_as_full_screen_section=”no” type=”full_width” angled_section=”no” text_align=”left” background_image_as_pattern=”without_pattern” css=”.vc_custom_1561717587736{margin-bottom: 25px !important;}” z_index=””][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Is there anything we shouldn’t say to someone who’s grieving?

Here are 4 pitfalls which are potentially difficult or hurtful.

1. “How are you?” can be a tough question to answer. Someone might feel they need to be brave to avoid embarrassing you, when they’re feeling terrible inside. If you want someone to feel they can express their emotions honestly, try saying: “How has this week been?” or “How are you feeling today?”. These are easier questions to answer honestly.

2. Details of a death are very private. Don’t ask questions about that unless the bereaved person has brought the subject up and, in that way, given you permission.

3. ‘At least’ may be followed by a false positive that a grieving person can’t relate to. It might point to a subconscious wish on our part to ‘tidy up death’ in our own minds. I frequently remind myself, it’s not for me to judge what seems like a good death. Here are 3 common ‘at leasts’:

• ‘At least he didn’t suffer’ – but maybe the family never got to say goodbye.
• ‘At least he had a good innings’ – but when someone is old, they have been loved for longer
• ‘At least you were there at the end’ – death is not always peaceful; being in a 999 situation can be very distressing

4. ‘Time heals’ and ‘life goes on’ are phrases that should stay in our heads. As a guideline, I think anything that might appear on a fridge magnet is probably hard to believe or annoying, especially in the early stages of grief.

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Don’t say anything, just listen

We get fixated on the right words but often it’s not what we say that matters but what we don’t say. Listening can be even more powerful that talking, with none of the pitfalls.

Listening is the kindest thing we can do for someone who is sad. It says a lot. Listening with our whole attention, without interrupting or wanting to rush off, is a gift. Listening helps people to talk freely and express their emotions. It helps them to feel understood and we all love being understood. Someone may want to talk a lot or hardly at all. Either way, we can listen. If there’s a silence, it doesn’t matter.

The quality we need a lot of is empathy, when we put our own feelings aside in the effort to really understand another person. We don’t need to distract them, direct them, try to carry their load or fix anything for them. We just need to listen.

When we are truly empathetic with someone who is grieving, I’m confident that all of us are highly skilled in knowing what to say and what not to say. Maybe we don’t realise it yet.

And finally, never ever underestimate the healing power of a simple cup of tea.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

The post What to say – or not say – to someone who is grieving appeared first on Beautiful Day Celebrant.

Around 75% of us say that public speaking is our Number One Fear. Before I became a celebrant, I was a public speaking coach. I coached hundreds of people in business who were petrified of making a speech. The most extreme example was a man who was so scared of presenting, that he felt he was going to have a heart attack. To begin with, he gave his talk sitting down. By the end of the day he could stand and he went on to give a great, relaxed presentation.

Making a wedding speech isn’t easy, nor should it be. A good speech stands out when you can hear the effort that’s gone into it. It doesn’t have to be perfect; it just needs to be your own words – not Google’s. It takes time and effort to plan what you want to say and some skills in how to look and sound confident.

So, for starters, here are my top 5 Do’s and Don’ts of public speaking, based on years of watching hundreds of speeches and presentations, on very many diverse topics!

Top 5 don’ts of public speaking

The first on the list is by far the biggest offender!

1. Don’t procrastinate

Here’s the bad news: your wedding speech will not come to you by magic, hand-delivered by The Speech Fairy. Lots of us justify procrastination, saying that we are waiting for inspiration, or planning the speech in our head. In truth, all we are doing is putting off the inevitable business of getting started. This strategy really ramps up the pressure on ourselves. Time starts to fritter away and before we know it, the wedding day has dawned and our speech feels rushed and unfinished – like it’s been written in the pub the night before. Erm, funny that …! So please just start, even if it feels rubbish to begin with.

2. Don’t tell smutty or mean stories

There is a line over which you may not step in your wedding speech. The risks to your personal health and of ruining the day are completely real. Stories that came out at hen and stag nights are not fair game for wedding speeches. Also, Mums & Dads, think carefully about the stories you share about your child’s early years. Weddings are beautiful, highly-charged occasions and no one wants to a) be humiliated or b) hear something cringey about themselves or someone they love. That’s not to say you can’t tell jokes at the happy couple’s expense. No – that would be terrible. Just ask yourself: is it clean, is it funny and is it kind? Ok, kind-of kind. If you’re not sure where the line is, ask the most empathetic, sensible person you know.

Also, remember that you’re probably on camera, so whatever you say will play back to you at some point.

3. Don’t PANIC!!!

When we feel nervous, we produce adrenaline which can feel very uncomfortable. Often the symptoms (blushing, sweating, trembling etc) kick in exactly when we want to look calm and confident.

My tips are to avoid too much caffeine or alcohol; they are not your public-speaking friends. One coffee will perk you up but more could make you feel more anxious. Similarly with alcohol. A drunk speech is the ultimate no-no – unless you enjoy being mocked and/or chastised by your family and friends forever and ever.

4. Don’t use paper notes

When we feel nervous, our hands often shake. When our hands shake, so do the paper notes in our hands. It actually feels like paper notes have an extra-special way of shaking loudly and visibly, almost as if they want to make us feel more self-conscious.

I advise using cards or an ipad, with plenty of charge.  Powerpoint – unless it’s done ironically – is a bit naff because it will probably remind your audience of work. Also, with Powerpoint, it’s tempting to talk to the screen, which everyone will have already skim-read ahead of you anyway.

5. Don’t overthink

Yes, it’s a big moment and quite rightly, you want to do your best but actually your job is to make your audience feel good. Try to put your focus squarely on them and take the pressure off yourself as a performer. Your friends and family are primed to enjoy your speech. They’re happy, probably slightly squiffy and genuinely keen to laugh at any of your jokes.

Imagine being Boris Johnson at the EU Parliament. That is genuinely terrifying. Be ready to laugh at yourself with a daft line such as: ‘Did I actually just say that?’ or ‘I knew I shouldn’t have let my father in law/baby/dog write this speech.’

So, enough with the Don’ts, how can you smash your wedding speech? These are some of my favourite tips.

How to make a great wedding speech: the top 5 do’s

1. Begin early

It always shows when you’ve spent time on your speech, which in turn is a great compliment to your audience. To use a cookery metaphor: a good speech is a slow roast, not a stir fry. Get ahead, preferably weeks not days or hours beforehand. Jot down ideas and stories when they pop into your head. Your brain will reward you with a theme or an order to your ideas, as if by magic! Use mind-mapping to organise your thoughts and help you ditch ideas that won’t work or you don’t have time for.  This is a simple video description of mind-mapping for a speech on YouTube.

2. Share the stage

Create a double act – with someone you like! It makes great entertainment and can really boost your confidence. You’ll have someone to bounce ideas off, plus you get a breather when it’s not your turn to speak. The right person for your double act is someone who’s rock-solid reliable and a good complement to your character.

3. Learn to control your nerves

When nerves kick in, sometimes they rev up for hours (even days) ahead. That can be totally exhausting, so you need be able to control them. Nerves are caused by adrenaline, which centres on your brain and stomach, where it tends to cause the most trouble. To disperse adrenaline and feel more relaxed, take a brisk walk, run, sing, laugh, jump up. Take a few deep breaths in and out – with a very slow breath on the ‘out’ breath. Practice saying a positive affirmation to yourself eg my speech is great, it’s funny and heartfelt and I’m going to give it 100% – to boost your confidence.

4. Use good notes

It’s a lovely idea (but seriously misguided) to learn your speech by heart and expect to deliver it faultlessly on the day. Who needs the pressure?! It’s only legends like Jeremy Paxman and Stephen Fry who get away without notes. But I bet they have them somewhere ….

I really recommend you have legible notes that don’t depend on WiFi. Work from abbreviated notes, as opposed to a full script, which encourages you to stare at your notes. You can also easily lose your place in a full script. You need to know your speech really well, so you can look up at the audience and make eye contact, which looks super-confident.

5. Learn how to tell a joke

If there’s one thing you need to learn to make a great wedding speech, it’s how to tell a joke. Some people think they naturally can’t tell a joke but I know from experience that everyone can. If you watch comedians on YouTube, you’ll see the different ways they set up the joke. Pace, pauses, speaking clearly, eye contact and avoiding deviation, repetition and hesitation are all important. The most vital thing is to land the punchline and not garble or throw it away by looking at your notes. There’s a lot more I can tell you but watching the great comics is a good place to start.

Next steps

You can become really good at giving speeches and enjoy it, even if you hate it now. I am living proof! I used to dread standing up in front of people, now I love it. I would love to help you too. I will give you techniques including: how to organise your speech, how to tell a good story or joke and how to hit the right note  with your audience. I’ll tell you about body language and voice skills, which make you look confident – even before you feel it. Most importantly, I will show you how to speak confidently as your genuine self.

If you need help with a speech, or you’d like to be a better public speaker, please contact me. You will  be really impressed by the changes that you can achieve. The skills you learn will give you techniques and lasting self-confidence, to help you with the first of many brilliant speeches and talks.

If you’re still tempted to procrastinate, remember that there really is no Speech Fairy.

The post How to make a great wedding speech appeared first on Beautiful Day Celebrant.

There are 3 things that magnolia can never be a) memorable b) individual or c) inspiring. Nobody wants a magnolia wedding ceremony and yet, with civil ceremonies, it’s the same basic script every time. You have options A, B or C for the vows and personal promises, which most people would regard as the most special part of the ceremony. There are more choices of coffee in the average coffee shop!

It could be a lot better. It could be a lot more like you.

Civil ceremonies conducted by registrars, however lovely, are restricted by rules, standardisation and time. If you had the choice, wouldn’t you like to ditch all that and make every aspect of your wedding ceremony as special as the rest of your day? Well you can.

Enter the wedding celebrant! However you want your wedding ceremony to be, I will lavish time and creativity on it, to ensure it’s colourful, memorable and personal. It won’t be bland, that’s a guarantee.

You might hanker for relaxation – shades of ice creams and beach huts. You might wish for old romance in dove greys, chalky pinks and lavenders. Perhaps you’re after a shot of energy with the brights – the cobalt blues and emerald greens, or the luxuriant reds, plums and golds. You get the picture.

I love colour from the palest neutrals to the inkiest charcoals and if you do too, here are 10 ways to make sure your wedding is anything but magnolia. As one groom Dave said to me recently, “Your ideas are amazing!” He meant it in a good way (!) and I hope you feel inspired.

10 colour pops for your wedding ceremony

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• Does the venue have colours you love? Highlight those. Is it a blank canvas? Get creative! It’s worth considering your colour scheme at the enquiry stage, because depending on how much time and money you have to spend, what’s already there might be a big help – or not.
• Good lighting makes a big impact – a little neon goes a long way and can look really cool as do all the amazing string lights out there.
• Bring your favourite colours into extra rituals such as ribbons for a handfasting, unity candle, or a cocktail ceremony.
• Create a rainbow of promises, with every colour as special quality you wish to bring into your marriage. Traditional interpretations are red for energy; orange for creativity; yellow for happiness, green for growth, blue for trust, indigo for spirituality and violet for wisdom but why not just make up your own.
• Choose a colourful song that everyone can sing along to. Here’s just a few that work brilliantly: 99 Red Balloons by Nena; Raspberry Beret by Prince; Yellow Submarine by The Beatles; Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison; Mr Blue Sky by ELO.
• Create a colourful tree for guests to write their wish for your new life. There are many examples on Pinterest – search for ‘tree of wishes’ or ‘thankful tree’ which is for Thanksgiving actually but has lovely ideas.
• Link the senses and match your colours to lovely scents such as lavender, rose, mint, citrus, sandalwood – to make your colour palette work on an extra level.
• Colourpop your favours – macarons come in amazing colours and also vintage sweets, for example.
• On a purely visual level, darker and paler versions of the same colour work well as contrasts and stop your scheme getting too much. You can use a paint chart for inspiration.
• Add a shot of colour into your outfit: shoes, nail colour or hair jewellery are great candidates. Or go the whole way. One of my favourite examples was the bride who wore an emerald green sheer cloak over a blue velvet dress. It was stunning.

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Contact me

Whatever you decide, have what you want and I hope it’s a beautiful day!

If you’d like to discuss your wedding ceremony with me, please contact me for more information and to find out my availability.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

The post Colour-pop your wedding with a bespoke ceremony appeared first on Beautiful Day Celebrant.

It’s the relationships and stories that star in the ceremonies I lead – be it a large, formal wedding or a small, intimate funeral. In the end, we are always celebrating Love and re-connecting with each other through ceremony, which is so vital in our fast-paced world. So, what can you expect from me as your wedding or funeral celebrant? A beautiful, bespoke ceremony, created by me in collaboration with you, delivered with warmth and professionalism. Every single ceremony is special and unique to me. It may be simple but never basic; elaborate but never excessive; creative but never glib.

The big days in our lives don’t come along very often, so it’s unusual for anyone to be 100% clear about what kind of ceremony they would like. I help you with that. Knowing what works and having an instinct for the flow of a ceremony all come from experience. Sometimes I find it hard to put into words why one reading feels better first or second. It’s usually to do with the flow and meaning of the ceremony. Sometimes it just feels better that way!

Whenever possible, I like to meet people in person before writing any kind of ceremony. By the end of that first meeting, I hope that you will have confidence in me – that I’ve understood what you want and that I’ll create a personal, memorable ceremony for you.

HOW TO CHOOSE A CELEBRANT

When you choose a celebrant, getting on well together and trusting them with your special day is so important. Celebrants come in all shapes and sizes but their personality and values are the x-factor.

I’m very calm and I’d like to help you feel calm, so you can be ‘in the moment’ on the day of the ceremony. I have a good sense of humour – in keeping with the occasion. Tuning into people’s feelings is an essential quality of an experienced celebrant. Whatever you’re feeling: excited, nervous, happy or sad – I will lead the ceremony we’ve planned and created together, exactly as you hoped.

Credit: Dawn Potter

I’m very grateful to get this kind of feedback:

“Thank you most sincerely for the beautiful service you gave for Jim on Friday. Everyone has said how lovely it was. You fulfilled my wishes completely making it all about him with humour and sensitivity. I was very sad but I know he would have been very happy with everything.”

“We just wanted to say a bit thank you for the way you conducted our wedding. You kept us all giggling and created a wonderful and relaxed ceremony and atmosphere which was exactly what we both wanted. Thank you for helping to make our day so very special.”

Kind words like this make me very happy.

For more information on the ceremonies I lead, please look at the pages on my website for weddings or renewals of vows or funerals

It would be a huge privilege to be your celebrant. Please Contact me if you’d like to talk about a special day that’s coming up for you.

The post What to expect from me as your celebrant appeared first on Beautiful Day Celebrant.