Nathan and Laura's wedding

It's was two years we'd been thinking about this and both me and Alex were dead excited. Alex was best man, and as soon as Ben sat down after his speech at Daniel and Rachel's wedding Alex said " it's me next"!!! The hotel's wedding coordinator said it was one of the best he'd heard and we were all impressed. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll post the pictures at a later stage (don't grumble, uploading pictures takes ages!).

The hen do took place on the saturday. We met at Poppy Red in the Arcadian for some drinks then we went over to the nearby comedy club, the Glee Club. After some irritating shenanigans they managed to seat us all together and it was good fun. We saw 3 comedians, each was worse than the last but the first one and the compere were dead funny! I can only assume their strategy was to assume we'd all be too drunk to realise the third comedian wasn't funny but I obviously had not drunk enough!

We had a dance afterwards then went back to Poppy Red. I like Laura, but I like her all the more for banning any horns, wings, halos, fancy dress or other ridiculous items! She is a girl after my own heart! Lisa, Danielle, Hannah; take note!

Anyway the boys had squeezed in two stag do's so it was only fair to extend the girls do too. We all met up at Laura's parents house (dad Richard had been sent away to his mothers!) for a buffet and a massage. My massage lady Libby Miskin is great and had offered to do mini treatments for everyone at the hen do for a fiver. Most people there were completely new to massages, but it was a real hit. Nathan's mum Bernadette had said she'd marry her and have her babies if it had gone on for much longer! It was a great chance for a chinwag, and Emma got to see all her nearest and dearest and as usual was a complete star! I think she thought it was her birthday again!

Then last week Alex got a cold and of course I was next. On the Friday morning, the day before the wedding I woke up feeling rotten. I struggled through the day and coughed my way through the night. We drove to Bewdley, just outside of kidderminster http://www.bewdley.org.uk/ and it is gorgeous. A river runs through this quaint, very hilly, georgian village and we stayed at the Ramada Jarvis just outside the centre. At 7.00am Laura and Emma who I was sharing the room with woke up to get their hair done and I knew I needed drugs to get me through the day. Usually I don't take pills or medicine and rely on rest and that's fine but that day was the exception. I dosed myself up to the eyeballs, carried out 'operation SOS' on my nose to hide the red patches where I'd blown my nose about 5000 times in the previous 24 hours, and concentrated on having a good time. I also squeezed in an hour and a half's kip when no one was noticing after lunch which was great.

So Laura and her bridesmaids Emma and Vanessa went to the hairdressers on site to get their hair and make up done. Then we all gathered back in the room to get that dress on Laura. It was big and white, the traditional wedding frock, but I still got all emotional on seeing her all done up - she was beautiful!

The plan was that baby Emma would be walked up the aisle by the bridesmaids followed by Laura and her dad. We all congregated and waited for the bridal party, with Nathan and Alex down the front - Nathan looking like he'd just swallowed something bulky. Then the bridesmaids walked down the aisle but no baby Emma. Then Laura and her dad walked down the aisle and I did a bit of a double take. In her arms and clinging to her neck, sat the very gorgeous Emma, who was holding her bouquet! Once they got down the front Emma contributed to the ceremony by hitting her mum over the head with the beautiful arrangement of flowers she had in her hand! It was so funny, and so perfect! Because they are not just 2 anymore and the ceremony was as much involving Emma as possible!

Afterwards came the lunch followed by the SPEECH. Try and imaging Alex speeking it in his brummy voice.