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makelifehappen

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  1. About Humanism:) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanism Hello! My apologies for any delay in getting back here, thanks for prompting!! Our world is quite mad with children, work, etc, but we are so pleased to know that people were interested enough to want more:) Hm...where to begin? We were featured on a website for offbeat brides shortly after our return: http://offbeatbride.com/2008/10/woodland-gypsy-european-wedding If you click any of the photo's it will take you to our flickr photostream where you will find many more. We arrived to Nebias extremely late (or should I say early??!) one morning after 12 hours of driving and a terrible GPS detour from Paris! We had no idea we were high up in the mountains and were mystified with all the beauty when we woke a few hours later! We got up and headed out in search of fresh baked breads, cheese and milk. Took millions of photo's! (they we  have yet to add to our flickr account!) We drove into Carcassonne and spent the day walking around the Cite's walls in search of the perfect wedding location and photo opportunities. Enjoyed all the sights, smells, foods and sounds. What a beautiful Cite! It wasn't until we were there, in the Cite that we were able to fully appreciate how unique this experience would be and decided to cancel our reservations for our more upscale meal at a restaurant outside of the walls and reserved a meal on the terrace in the Cite! The next day we spent in Limoux. It was market day and we later enjoyed dinner in the town square! Once we left Canada, we left all of our planning thoughts behind and decided that whatever will be, will be. We didn't make any special efforts whilst in Europe to arrange anything wedding related and packed all of our DIY wedding bits and pieces to accompany us. The florist did not return our emails or calls, and while I loved them so...I opted to make a feather wand instead. We uploaded all of our wedding music (I walked down the aisle aka the ledge along the medieval wall to La Valse D'Amelie from one of my favourite films!) and brought along an ipod player. We were unable to connect with a hairdresser before we headed over either, so I spent days reviewing utube video's and was almost convinced that I would be able to pull it off on my own...until the morning of when every strand of hair stood on edge with frizz and my lovely (now) husband went searching the streets of Nebias for a hairdresser that could help. Turns out there is a lovely English woman that lives in the town and was kind enough to put off her housework to assist from home! Her home overlooked the pyrenees! The forecast called for rain and it was fairly dark and dim looking that morning (hence the frizz!), but we were fortunate enough to have an offer to use this hairdresser's home, if we wanted/needed for the wedding! What an amazing woman! We arrived to the Cite, with our wedding attire and goodies in hand and walked through the Cite to find yet another amazing woman/dressmaker who happened to offer out the common area of her guest home to prepare for our wedding at no cost to us and we too happy to purchase one of her hand made dresses for our 2 year old! We quickly found a shop selling local wine to use in the "Wine Box Ceremony" (that we wrote into our wedding ceremony) and hammered the box shut until our 25th Anniversary where we will share this wine together. I strolled through the Cite in my wedding gown to the location we chose on a grassy bit between the 2 walls and awaited the "go ahead" from the Officiant to begin walking down the aisle! Whilst I waited, there were lovely children that stood around whispering "princess" and some families that asked for photo's with me as if I were hired by the cite. Afterall, I was stood just inside the draw bridge and it was very busy with tourists. We packed bamboo mats and coloured tulle that we bunched and sat upon during the entire ceremony. The Officiant stood before us calling people to gather 'round. After the ceremony we took photo's all around the Cite, with a simple point and shoot digital camera that our friend held! We opted to have a professional post- wedding photoshoot here in Canada at a waterfalls location instead of hiring someone abroad. We quickly realized it would be alot of work scoping out vendors etc and I was pleased to do away with researching much more than I had here on complete France! We had a very casual, yet elegant meal and invited our Irish Officiant along for the evening. When we finished up, we strolled the Cite, checked out some shops and well, ate crepes from the street vendor of course! Can't have a wedding in France without crepes! :) We had purchased enough tokens to enjoy a carousel ride to end of our wedding day bliss, but were too late, as it had closed before we were ready to call it a night. Oh well, we now have little tokens for my scrapbooks, I suppose:) All in all it was the most incredible (though "fly by the seat of our pants") experience. I wish I could live in such beauty day in and day out. I am truly appreciative of all the support I received here on completefrance! and hope that you enjoy our tales/photo's! if anyone is interested in names/places, I will dig them out when I am not so pressed for time. Happy New Year!
  2. 40 days....*sigh* But you can elect to have a quiet civil signing in your home country and a humanist celebrant for your france ceremony as we are doing on the 23rd of this month in Carcassonne. We both live in Canada currently, but H2B is from the UK and that is what we had to do. Which is quite fine, as we would have opted for a Humanist ceremony here in Canada as well. We wanted a religious free wedding that we could plan (we wrote our ceremony) and was strictly about celebrating our union and all things wonderful:) The officiant we have hired is from Ireland and we are flying her over to Carcassonne where she will stay with friends. She is a lovely woman and very easy to work with. We found her on the British Humanist Association website, but I would be quite happy to provide an email address for her if you are interested in taking this route. Just send me a private message and it will prompt my email account to look at these messages, otherwise I may forget (we are leaving to Brighton tomorrow)...      
  3. Thanks for the information. We located a photographer here in Canada that we are going to have shoot our post wedding photo's and invested in some lessons and a new SLR camera for our travels, instead. If interested to see what we were after, here is a link to her flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ravengirlstudios/          
  4. Thank you very much for all the information. I have been madly planning and preparing. We are headed out tomorrow and arrive in Brighton, England. Will be in Carcassonne next week Wednesday. You are right, that florist is incredible. I absolutely loved all of it, but sadly every attempt I made to connect with them was met by no response. I couldn't risk it and wait until we arrived, so I had to get crafty and created a feather wand/bouquet instead. I had little luck finding a photographer that we liked the style of and opted to buy an SLR camera for our Euro-trip/wedding and hired someone in Canada that was more suitable for a photo shoot at a ruin site. Appreciate all of your support:)  xx        
  5. Lovely! Thank you so much! We bought a fairly decent SLR camera for these photo's, so wish us luck...leaving tomorrow for England and marrying the following Sat. :) xx
  6. Wedding Photographs indeed!! Thank you so much for your insight! I am going to make sure to head straight there when we arrive! Appreciate the info!! Awesome!
  7. Sally:) Thank you. Yes. It seems that the 2 of us do "get around"... :D Though I have not been to trip advisor in a while...I just stumbled across a blogspot of yours (by complete accident while searching images:) that led me straight into something I posted here earlier today. I am shocked and almost giddy with excitement...hopeful that you  will help. So, your husband does wine tours? Do tell... I am looking for a Vineyard that overlooks the medieval wall lined city for a good photo spot/place to have our ceremony.,,, do you have any suggestions? I have had a sneak peek of this car you speak of, also....hmmm....  
  8. I am on an endless search for picturesque areas that overlook the Medieval wall lined city in Carcassonne, but as I have never been there...I am having an incredibly difficult time locating what I am looking for through online searches. Any suggestions?
  9. Thank you for all of your responses. Been pretty hectic here, but we are back on the ball;) Will let you know how we make out!  
  10. Incredible information everyone. Thank you. We have been very busy with a move and returning from holidays, but are now becoming more settled and looking into this again. I will look into this and let you know how I make out. Amazing:)
  11. Thank you for your response. Yes, indeed. Those are all in studio with modification...but the style is quite cool. I like the idea of keeping it fun, light and airy. I like a more artist approach, rather than the more classic wedding style photographer's tend to stick to. Not that I am opposed to wedding photographer's, per se, but would be more interested in someone that has a unique artist flair for the outdoor wedding in the South of France...:)
  12. Looks lovely. I am sending an email as we speak. Thanks for the info:) I did try the yellow pages and I had very little luck navigating them. I appreciate your response to that query, though I am still on the hunt for those things. Anything more people have to offer would be greatly appreciated:)
  13. Any clues as to what the restaurant may be called or how I might find them?
  14. Hi there, Been poking around a bit at what photography is available in the South of France for my wedding. I have noticed that alot of the wedding photographer's are the photojournalist type. This is neither my style or my interest. I am having a small, intimate affair and have no need for 12-15 hours of photography and while I would love to have photo's taken in a small french village, in a vineyard or outside of the medieval wall lined city of Carcassonne, I would like something more this style: http://www.thisisventure.co.uk/images.aspx?cat=4 Have you any idea where I might find something like this in the South of France?
  15. Hi there, I have posted a lengthly thread regarding my plans to marry in France. So to begin, please know that we are aware of the legalities, etc involved in a marriage ceremony in France and have this sorted. However, what we are interested in is finding some local markets, florists, hair salons, photographers, eateries etc in Carcassonne. If you are interested in reading my thread about our wedding thoughts/plans, please brace yourselves and click the link below: http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/1213634/ShowPost.aspx In addition to this post, I have asked about local restaurants: http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/1213674/ShowPost.aspx#1213674 Any suggestions to set us off in the right direction would be incredibly helpful and much appreciated. Thanks. Melissa
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