Our wedding is going to be a family affair, how can it not be with us having Esther and William, so K in my wedding alphabet is for kids, for children.

I am going to talk about children in three parts: Our Children, Invited Children and our theme of Children’s Literature.

Our Children
Yesterday I had my first dress fitting for my wedding dress. I got quite emotional. I was on my own and I realised that although I am a mother and I love my children dearly for our wedding I want to be a bride. I want the excitement of getting ready with my bridesmaids and having a quiet moment with my Dad before walking up the aisle to meet my almost husband. I want all of that without Esther and William pulling at my hair and hanging off my dress. For a long time I have given everything to my two beautiful babies but on this day I just want some of it to be for me and, of course, for David. David has been saying this all along but I have just not been ready to accept that I can do other things and still be a good Mummy. Now as our wedding day approaches and the babies are getting older, bigger and stronger I realise that I can. I also know that at some point I have to trust others to care for Esther and William and people have been waiting patiently for me to allow them to do so.

So last night we booked the Chilston Park Hotel where my best friend, Michele, and I will stay on the Friday night and David and I will stay on the Saturday for our first night as husband and wife!! How exciting is that? And I will miss Esther and William so much, I know that David will too, they are our children, but this one night is for us, celebrating our love. The love and commitment that made Esther and William possible in the first place. I am and always will be so thankful for that.

Invited Children
We have lots of children coming to the wedding, many of them under the age of five. I want to make the day a good experience for them and for their parents, our family and friends.

To do this we are going to create a special baby change area, a baby sleeping zone and a soft play area. We are also going to give all the children musical instruments to accompany the hymn singing in the church.

During the day we are having afternoon tea and a barn dance in a marquee beside the hall where we will have dinner and dancing in the evening. The barn dance will finish an hour or so before the dinner begins to allow people to feed their children (Baby Tea) and settle their children to sleep in prams, buggies etc in the marquee which for the evening will become the baby sleeping zone and adult chill out area. A place to be quiet away from the loud Indie Rock music that will come after the meal!! It will be a haven of peace for our little ones to be. I know that trying to keep to routine is important to us and to other parents so I hope that we can go some way to helping people achieve this with our special wedding day baby bits. For older children there will be special presents, balloons and games to play. I hope they will have fun and their parents too.

Children’s Literature Theme
The theme for our evening reception is classic children’s books. Each table will be named after a book and there will be quotations around from some of our favourites. Later in the evening there will be a cake and sweet buffet and we are going to ask people to bring with them something sweet that reminds them of a favourite childhood book. A gingerbread house, gingerbread men, cherry cake, pop biscuits, gobstoppers, owl ice cream, ginger beer … The list goes on and on.
Our wedding favours will include Wonka Bars complete with Golden Tickets with which the lucky recipients will win a prize. I am so so so excited about this. I am wishing the days away until the 10th of September and our wedding day.

During the week of the wedding I am going to run a giveaway on the blog. So why not follow me now to keep up to date with our plans and so that you do not miss the chance to enter the wedding giveaway when it comes?!

K is for Kids, they are wonderful, especially mine, and I could not imagine our wedding day without them.

Here are some photos from my Hen and Chicks Day that we had on Saturday with some of the Mums and Babies who will share in our big day.