our day to show our personalities to make the day more personal. I had been building up to going wedding dress shopping for a few months while also working on getting my three bridesmaids in one place at the same time to make a day of dress shopping. Book bridal appointments in plenty of time as it can be hard to get Saturday appointments at the
By Grainne O’Sullivan I had the dream engagement at Adare Manor, a fantastic celebration with friends and family over Christmas, then it was down to the business of planning the biggest (most expensive) day of your lives, no pressure – right?! My friends and family have been amazing with plenty of ideas and suggestions but it’s down to you and your fiancé to make some tough but exciting decisions. I had always wanted a winter wedding at home and thankfully Gerard Barrett did too, so it made it easy to pick the date of January 2, 2016 in our hometown of Listowel, giving us over 12 months to plan everything. We are lucky to have our great friend Fr. Pat Moore doing the honours on the day for us. Six months later and I can’t believe how quickly time has flown! As an organised person I would have thought that I would have had everything set in stone by now but the truth is I was having way too much how overwhelming the wedding market can be when dresses, cakes, bands, invitations, decorations, entertainment etc. The list seems endless and Pinterest can seem like your friend or your greatest enemy at times! We love all things vintage so we decided to incorporate that into our wedding day and make it our general theme. The Listowel Arms has some amazing vintage accessories also so we are working those in with our own DIY decorations that my amazing bridesmaids Joanne, Leeann and Lisa are working on. With Gerard working in the film industry we will have a few ‘Old Hollywood’ touches incorporated into the day too. There are so
of what my dream dress would look like. I was secretly worried what if I don’t find ‘the dream dress’ like everyone describes while also wishing I hadn’t left it five months to start trying dresses on. As most dresses can take four to five months from the date of order to the delivery day so it’s a good thing I found my dress quickly! One tip I would give from my experience is to listen to the experts in the bridal boutique. I initially picked out a few dresses that I liked to get things started (very few of which suited my body shape unless I was able to grow another six inches by January) but as I walked out of the dressing room toward my bridesmaids after trying on the first dress that the boutique owner had suggested, I could tell from their eyes that I had found something special even before I got to the mirror to see for myself. As cheesy as it may sound it is a very special moment and now I do feel that you know when you have found ‘the’ dress! With five months to go I am now armed with a timeline which I vow to stick to (almost) completely to avoid any stress and any chance of me turning into a dreaded Bridezilla! For us it’s now down to getting to work on the guest list. We have always known we would be having a large wedding but I’m secretly glad that the Arms Hotel has a max number of 350 guests before things get really out of hand (they can really take 370 but sussh don’t tell Gerard that just in case he keeps adding to the list!) I’ve left him in charge of doing all the paperwork and booking the marriage course to make sure it’s legal to drool over travel agent brochures of top honeymoon destination, it’s tough work! Happy Wedding Planning! x Grainne O’Sullivan and Gerard Barrett’s wedding is taking place on January 2, 2016 in St. Mary’s Church Listowel followed by reception in the Listowel Arms Hotel.