Alexander-Smith.co.uk

Blog

Journal

Pictures

Games

My Stuff

Tosca

Links

Posts Tagged ‘Wedding’

Called back to wedding hotel

Friday, December 17th, 2010

We’ve been called by Brandon Hall hotel to come back and have a look around a couple of their other rooms. It turns out after all this time (and multiple visits) that the room we have always been shown for the evening dinner and celebrations will likely be too large for us and the hotel ‘strongly recommends against that room’. They are instead interested in hosting us either in the dining room or in the Brandon Hall Suite. Now we have seen the dining room and the Brandon Hall Suite on previous visits (the Suite – because it is where the ceremony would be held) however we’ve never looked at it with a view to using it as a wedding breakfast room before, and I’m slightly nervous about it, as I recall the room being a kind of T shape, and I’m not sure how well that would be for the meal and the speeches. Still – we are due to go back next week to have another look around the rooms and be convinced, in the meantime the hotel has reserved all function rooms for us on that date until we have made up our minds.

Most of our Christmas and birthday presents have now arrived with the exception of my father’s Christmas present which is still winging its way to us through the post and is making me nervous as the delivery date is between 19-22 December and I cannot afford to receive it after the 22nd. 21st is almost too late, 22nd most certainly is the last possible moment.

Vienna

Wednesday, November 17th, 2010

Well its only a few days now until we set off to Vienna. Which has kind of snuck up on me a little thanks to all the wedding stuff and venue hunting. Although we now have confirmed a venue and date. Brandon Hall Hotel on 7/7/12. I wouldn’t google it if I were you to see pictures none of the photos on their website are correct anymore as they have been undergoing a big refurbishment (which makes the place look a lot better) but all the pictures of the rooms and public areas on their site are old and incorrect now. – We took parents to see the venue last weekend and both parents loved the place (which is handy) so we’ve put down a deposit now and are fully set to a wedding there.

Anyway, I digress, Vienna….THIS Saturday! I really need to start packing to be honest. Helpfully we dont need any vaccinations either, as I only just remembered to check that today, which would have left us with no time to be vaccinated if we had needed anything :-S  We are off out to Merry Hill this evening to pick up any extra things we need (I need a belt and 2 new shirts really, Sar is going for a few extra things). We are also enjoying spending some of the Argos vouchers we have been given as a very generous gift from Sarah’s parents (due to them suddenly coming into quite a large number of them). So Sarah has bought me a digital grand piano for Christmas (which is very helpful to us, and I had pretty much written off actually being able to buy due to cost). We are also looking at a surround sound kit, but it would appear that if you want anything 800W or above in a 5.1 surround sound system for less than £200, and despite argos having about 7 systems that fall into this category, absolutely none are in stock in: Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester, Bradford, London… So we are now probably going to wait until the new year and see what offers appear in the January sales. See if we can get hold of one of the £200+ systems for less than £200. However in the meantime I would like to say ‘Thanks for screwing us around Argos. If you dont have something in stock at all then you shouldnt continue to list it on your website’. <- We found a particuarly good system that we were tempted by, so emailed argos to ask where had it in stock and if we could order it to be delivered to a local store, however apparently the item has been discontinued and they completely ignored my question of where they had it in stock. So why then, was it still on the website you may ask? I can only assume to draw in customers to well priced systems, then irritate them all when they find argos is ‘out of stock’ of all well priced systems but have a lot of rip-you-off systems available if you’d be interested.

Wedding Venues

Monday, October 25th, 2010

Hey everyone,

Well its been a busy couple of weeks. Sar and I have been going through lots and lots of wedding brochures and shortlisting several venues as possible places based on what we think of the look of the place, how much it would cost, and what services they offer. We’ve currently got it down to a list of around 10-11 venues, and we have been to visit 2 of them. Unfortunately both places were not what we were expecting. Credit to the photographer doing a good job, but one of the places (the Manor Hotel – Solihull) was one of the lead runners for us with the brochure looking to have ample ground and a beautiful building. The building was indeed very attractive, however the venue only had a tiny garden, was right upon a main road, the reception bar felt (to me) like an old gentleman’s club with a brass rail around the edge of the bar, and the ceremony room was the main restaurant which they would set up for the civil ceremony however was so large it would make us feel like we were only a tiny group and feel very cold – and we are planning around 80 people for the ceremony, which I didnt think was a small number. Another place (Curridine Barns) was a lovely building with lots of ground around the venue, however only a small courtyard for the pictures, with the owners house as one of the walls of the courtyard. The venue was very expensive for what was on offer compared to several of the other places we have shortlisted, and I didnt really like the self-catered apartment style room the bride and groom get offered, so no breakfast service in the morning. Just make yourself a bowl of cerial and use the knee-high microwave :-S Plus the room was just up some stairs from the evening ceremony room with little to prevent anyone who wanted to ‘decorate’ the bedroom for us from doing so.

We’ve also been to the NEC National Wedding Show, which gave us quite a few ideas for decorations, cakes, etc and was quite a helpful day out. We didn’t go with the intention of booking anything then and there (we dont even have a definate date at this stage) but merely went to get some design ideas, and we came away with quite a few. If we still have anything left to organise this time next year we could always go again with a view to buying / booking some things :-)

We also had a Birmingham celebration drinks this weekend with friends here in Brum :-) It was a lovely night out and lots of our friends who were available attended. I know we had several other friends who would loved to have been there if they could have been too. All in all a great night out though, which is the best we could have asked for. I believe Sar took a few pictures so I shall try to add these to the website as soon as I can. :-)

ENGAGED

Sunday, September 26th, 2010

Sarah and I got engaged this weekend whilst at Wroxall Abbey Estate :-)

We’re both very happy and are really looking forward to our future together.

I love you Sarah

xxx

The moment I proposed