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Slightly Bonkers, Sorrento, Italy
Wedding Report from Slightly Bonkers
Well fellow missies, it’s been a while since you have heard from Slightly Bonkers. That’s “MRS” Slightly Bonkers to you now!!
The wedding is over, the honeymoon is over, I am back in work after 5 glorious weeks off and the dream is over. The team at mrs2be have asked me to give my last and final update – post wedding, so I am happy to linger in the happy place once more! After initially being delayed flying out to Sorrento because of the volcanic ash, we were lucky to get a flight from Dublin to Naples on Wednesday two days later than scheduled, with our wedding taking place on Saturday. Panic stations for 2 days praying we would make it but all worked out in the end.
What a really amazing day we had in Positano and Sorrento – the sun was out, the rain held off and we celebrated in style with our family, close relatives and friends. The wedding ceremony was beautiful, the church was decorated with white roses and looked wonderful, and the setting beside the sea made it perfect. We took lots of lovely photos outside of the church and on the beach. We had to walk through the narrow cobble stone streets on our way to the church with my Dad and the bridesmaids and on the way back as a married couple. All of the locals and tourists who were out and about were clapping and congratulating us in Italian (“Auguri, Auguri”), it was really unusual and funny!
The reception in Villa Le Palme worked out brilliantly. It is difficult to find a venue in Sorrento that will let you play music and party after 12 o’clock unless you have a private villa or restaurant and that was an important factor for us. We had loads of nibbles for starters with prosecco & mimosa (prosecco with fruit juice) when all the guests arrived.
Our tables were nicely laid out and we had famous race horses as our table names, with jockey jackets on our table plan for everyone’s names (lots of racing fans in the audience appreciated this). The chair covers had ribbons to match the bridesmaid dresses too. The meal itself was scrumptious (melon & parma ham and bruschetta, Neapolitan lasagne, sea bass or steak, and fruit flan for desert. Needless to say our guests had full bellies afterwards. We had dinner downstairs in the villa, and then moved upstairs after dinner where we had use of the terrace and the room inside for dancing.
The DJ played a great playlist too which had everybody up dancing.We danced and drank till around 2.00pm in the Villa before all getting on the bus back to the hotel where we had arranged for the bar to be open to finish off the night. Believe it or not it was practically 7am when the groom and I headed to bed, we were having such a good night chatting to everyone. Everyone was in great spirits; it really was an exciting and enjoyable day. Our celebrations started on Wednesday and lasted till we flew home on Monday morning! 
The honeymoon was brilliant too; we started off in Vegas (cleaned up on blackjack), hired a convertible then and drove to San Francisco for a couple of nights where I got to catch up with my aunt too. Then we headed down the West coast Highway 1 – a stunning costal drive along the Pacific Coast. We stopped off in Monterey, Pebble Beach, Santa Barbara, Hollywood, LA, Long Beach, San Diego and then finished up for a few nights in New York. It was the trip of a lifetime!!
For all you budding Sorrento brides out there, I will put up a post soon on everything I learned about getting married in Sorrento/Positano so watch this space. In the meantime sadly I am forced to go back and do some work. Good Luck!
Final blog post as a single woman!
Well Missies here I am on the final countdown (que music du, du, du, du) to my wedding day – early next week we will be in Sorrento (hopefully by non-ash infested airways and not by ferry and 24 trains!!). As well as ourselves and all our guests, one of my bridesmaids is studying at the moment and has an exam the day before the wedding so she is flying out to Naples the evening before. We cannot afford any disruptions at all. Someone else in my position could be already needing the defibrillators but I’m not freaking out yet – I’m really trying not to worry about what is out of my control (aaahhhh!)…..
Seriously though I can’t believe the time is upon us already after a year and a half of planning, we thought the day would never come. Sadly this will my last Mrs2be blog as I will be doing all my final preparations this week (waxing, exfoliating, packing…you ladies know the drill) 
I have to put a big thanks out to my future sister in law who has been helping me beautify over the last few months – how lucky am I that she is a beauty therapist so I have been spoilt with facials, manicures and pedicures. She is looking after my make up do on the day.
I collected my dress on Saturday, luggage in tow, they wrapped it up nicely and put it into the suitcase for me with my shoes – “carry on” of course (can you imagine that screaming conniption in lost luggage!). Mr.M and all the lads have collected their suits and are all raring to go. That was of course after a funny incident in the suit shop where during alterations they cut seven and half inches off the my hubby2be’s suit in error – he came out of the changing room looking like a clown, it was hilarious! (obviously laughing after the cold sweat had subsided and we confirmed we could get another pair in time!). As for something old (watch), something new (dress), something borrowed (pearls from my sister in law) and something blue (garter) I couldn’t be more ready.
I’ve been finalising the table plan this week which as you all know is great fun. We have 60 guests so it is definitely not as difficult as a lot of bigger weddings would be, but there is always someone sitting somewhere less than ideal. Sure we will only be sitting for a while before the dancing. We have named our tables after famous horses as my groom loves the racing as do a lot of our guests.
I still have not collected our rings due to the fact the jeweller himself went off to get married, but no panic, we are collecting them this week. I don’t mind about that as not having it at home prevents the temptation of wanting to constantly try it on… this way it will be still sparkling on the big day :-0
I can’t wait to have a few days to relax by the pool before the big day and a get definite bit of tanage. We are planning a day on a boat trip to Capri as well so I am really looking forward to that. Here’s hoping for a fantastic week in Sorrento with our family and friends, followed by a really great honeymoon on the West Coast of the US. The next post from SlightlyBonkers will be as a married woman!
I wish all Mrs2Be brides to be good luck on their exciting journeys and with all wedding plans over the next year!
My Wedding in Italy – less than 4 weeks to go!
Greetings fellow missies or should I say Buon Giorno! I’ve been blogging less and less as the big day approaches, this day four weeks (Saturday) I will be a married woman.
I am writing this blog from the beautiful hills of Sorrento, on the last reccie trip to make sure everything is in place for our celebrations. As you can imagine with the Icelandic volcano I have been lucky to dodge the ash and make it here at all. The scenery in Sorrento is so beautiful we are overlooking the Bay of Naples and we can see Mount Vesuvius in the distance, just keeping our fingers crossed its one volcano that is not planning on waking up anytime soon, otherwise we would have to elope to Vegas!
Everything is almost in place for our wedding, firstly this weekend we had the opportnity to meet with the priest again in Positano to firm up the cermony. What a beautiful setting, also known as ‘The jewel of the Amalfi Coast’, the scenery is nothing short of breathtaking. I learned today that Flavio Gioia, the inventor of the compass, was from Positano! After the cermony it is traditional to walk the pretty cobble stone streets in celebration. The Priest has been most welcoming and the cermony is very similar to that at home. All that is left to do is mass booklet making fun at home, I will round up the bridesmaids to do some folding and stapling!
Our local wedding planners in Sorrento have been brilliant in helping us getting everything organised. We are using Sorrento Wedding in Style, two lovely ladies Emilia and Raeffaella, they have been most pleasant and helpful to deal with and have made me feel that no part of our planning has been to much (and trust me being an event manager I have tendancies towards being fussy!). We saw so many different venue options they have great knowledge of the area. I will have to encourage them to sign up as a supplier on Mrs2be.ie!
Our reception venue should look very tasteful when all set up. We got to see it prepared for a wedding today. Included in the menu we have welcome cocktails and a starter buffet with lots of nibbles including some Italian specials. That should keep the guests happy till dinner time. We have chair covers, table flower arrangements, outdoor flowers and our wedding cake all included in the price so it is a good deal all round. I want the day to be here already! Maybe I will load some photos afterwards
That is about all I can manage for now, there is a glass of prosecco on the balcony calling me ….Arriveferci!
8 Weeks to go to my wedding in Sorrento, Italy
Greetings fellow missies
Welcome back to my blog, you will have to excuse my absence as I was travelling to Las Vegas for my job (it’s a hard life for some of us). The plus side of this was I managed to pick up my wedding shoes in one of Vegas’s many super outlet shops. Really happy with my strappy sandals
Believe it or not, this time tomorrow 8 weeks I will be a married woman! I can hardly believe it is coming around so fast. I still have a lot of preparations to do!! I will be in Sorrento for all the last minute planning the weekend of 23rd April so I am really looking forward to that now. We will be making final decisions on how our tables are going to be laid out in the restaurant, picking out some nice spots along the Amalfi Coast where we can take some wedding photos and of course the all important food and wine tasting.
As I mentioned before, our wedding reception is in an Italian restaurant down by the sea. The menu will have some typical Italian dishes – probably Potato Gnocchetti made in the Sorrento style for the first course, and of course a bit of a regular main course to keep all our guests happy. We are still waiting to hear back from one or two guests so cannot finalise our table plan just yet – I guess we will be still messing around with that a few days before the wedding.
At the moment I am trying to think of some nifty ideas of how to keep the guests amused at the tables while the meal is being served. All I can come up with so far is a card called “What tree did you fall from?”. I am planning on printing on these as cards for the tables – its just something small for the guests to read and start chatting about.
I’m open to ideas here, given the fact we are in Italy our resources a little more limited. I haven’t even got around to thinking of table names yet! What are you fellow brides doing? If anyone has any funky suggestions please let me know.
I’ve been checking out the Martha Stewart website also – she has some great ideas for favours and table settings etc. I am doing without favours (wedding budget is big enough already!). I’m hoping to home-make the name cards and menu cards myself something like this. Blue Peter watch out! (I’m all for saving a few pennies that we can then spend on our 4 week honeymoon in the US of A!
In my last blog entry I told you I had started the women’s only FITT Bootcamp. What an eye opener as to how unfit I was! We did a series of 4 weeks, 3 classes a week. This was a combination of 2 indoor classes and an outdoor class on Saturdays in the Phoenix Park. The 1 hour class was a combination of warm up running, press ups (half press ups for us weakling ladies), squats, lunges, burbpies (if don’t know what this is trust me you don’t want to), abs workout, arms workout. I couldn’t move my arms or legs after. It’s a really good class, some of the exercises are quite difficult if you are a beginner but you know what they say about plenty of practice. I’m just sorry its over for me 
. I will have to resort to doing my very own bootcamp in the field!
Well that’s it from me for today – plan on and stay stress free missies
Got the bridesmaids dresses, table plan, wedding rings and FITT Bootcamp
Greetings fellow missies! Hope all your wedding preparations are coming along well, its now 11 weeks to my big day and I am starting to get very excited. We finally got our pre-nuptial enquiry completed with the Priest, that was straight-forward enough. Just a note to be aware of – you need to get a NEW baptismal cert before meeting the Priest – the one issued after your baptism is no-good, it has to be a recent issue. Lesson learned for me. And I am almost at the end of the paperwork, Halleluiah!
I told you about my bridesmaid dress shopping in my last update, and I am glad to say we have the dresses picked. The dresses are from Coast, it is a really lovely dress. I tried shopping around on the internet for a more economical version but couldn’t find anything as nice as this so I succumbed. Check it out – http://www.coast-stores.com/SYMPHONY-MAXI-DRESS/Maxi-Dresses/coast/fcp-product/2224682912. The girls are delighted – hopefully it is a dress that will be worn again to another big event (but obviously not as big or exciting as my big day ha ha!!)
We are ordering our rings this weekend too. My engagement ring is a marquee shape so I want my wedding ring to sit properly into the engagement ring. I have seen some lovely samples, it will be almost like a wishbone wedding ring. They are not as expensive as I imagined, probably hitting around €600 for a nice white gold ring with a an added bit of bling (a must!) The men’s rings are reasonable starting upward of €300 for a plain white gold ring. I know people who have gone up the North to purchase their rings and saved a small bit, but I am happy enough with these prices and it will be with a reputable supplier. I am not looking forward to leaving my engagement ring in in order to have the wedding ring made – I will be without it for 3-4 weeks, I imagine my hand will feel very naked! (sniff sniff!)
Mr. M and the lads have booked their stag weekend – lucky suckers are heading off to Malaga for 2 days sun, sand and sangria! (and that is all I have to say about that). I have just decided I am definitely going to need to buy a new dress to wear on my hen night – more dosh gone from the bank account – ouch!
In other news I am starting exercise Bootcamp this week in Blanchardstown – 3 days a week for 6 weeks. If a bit of “Drill Sergeant” won’t whip me into shape then nothing will! Check out www.fittpt.com. I will let you know how I get on (after the pain has subsided of course!)
The next exciting item on my agenda is I’ve booked flights to go to Sorrento for a few days a month before our wedding takes place. This will be a perfect time to confirm our menu and wine choices, decide on the layout of our tables in the venue, meet the photographer to discuss what photos we want on the day and also double check the DJ’s playlist. And hopefully catch a ray or two of sun while we are there too
I am actually looking forward to doing the table plan (remember Monica in Friends with all her blue and red pins!). For any of you IT savvy ladies – there is a nifty bit of software called Perfect Table Plan. I use this in work for working out table plans for big gala dinners so I am taking advantage and using it for the wedding table plan too. You can put in little rules to say “Auntie Mags should never sit beside Uncle Tommy” and visa versa! It works wonders and saves lots of time. It costs only €20.00 and if you are an organising nerd like me it also provides hours of fun!! Download from http://www.perfecttableplan.com/
Well that’s it from me for today – plan on and stay stress free missies
