Pink Wedding Days | Gay Marriage and Civil Partnerships Blog

Our recent post “When Should We Have Our Wedding or Civil Partnership? ” looked at the best time of the year to have a wedding or civil ceremony. The date you choose will depend on a number of things: When you and your partner are available The budget you have The time of year that you'd prefer We looked at the flowers available, too. Flowers often form an important element within a ceremony and are often carried through in the reception, too. Complimenting a colour scheme, they help to tie together a theme that is often repeated by the clothing, the tables and the decor.  Once you've set your date, check which flowers are in season. Even if you don't commit to a colour or type, it's important to know what's available. Check with a local florist to see what's in bloom when you need it.  In the meantime, we've listed some of the flowers available during the year. We've tried to include different colours for each month, but many are i...

Happy Sunday, everyone! Perhaps you've noticed (meh, you probably haven't) that there's only been the one blog post this week. You would, of course, be correct.  Sort of. We were very kindly asked by Pink Lobster Dating to contribute a piece to their website. And we have. You can find it here . It's all about lesbian marriage.   We've got a semi-regular gig there now, and we'll be writing each month on issues to do with lesbian marriage. Don't worry though, we're still here. There will be two posts this week, too. Normal service is being resumed. You lucky, lucky things. We'd also like to remind everyone that you can find us on Twitter and Facebook . Our Facebook page in particular is looking a little lonely, and we'd love it if more people would stop by and give us a like. What if I was to promise more videos of Kate Bush and Kittens? Come on. Come onnnnnnnnnnn. You know you want to.

We've been having a nose through our directory again, and we have some fantastic photographers that we'd like to showcase in this week's post.  Choosing a photographer that you trust is vital for any couple,  and establishing a relationship with them before the big day is key.  Whoever you choose, ensure that they understand what you expect of them throughout the day. Give them a list of the photographs that you'd like, but equally, allow them to be creative and spontaneous. Some of the best wedding pictures are the ones that aren't planned... You spend months planning your perfect day. You sink your wages into it. You spend your weekends picking out colour schemes and you lose weight, you gain weight, you lose weight. You have more files and folders than SOE accumulated in the war. You've been  an interior designer,  a fashion house,  a florist a conflict negotiator  and a stationer. You promise y...

On Saturday April 13th 2014, partners, Jan Tipper and Barb Burden, made history. They hadn't intended to. They just wanted to be married, in front of family and friends, in the church they'd attended for the last 15 years. But they did make history:  they became  the first same-sex couple, in the UK, to marry in a church.  The sky didn't fall in. Rivers didn't run with blood. There were no horsemen galloping down the Bournemouth seafront. Two people, each in love with the other, had their wedding in a church. They were married by the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC) in Bournemouth. A church with strong roots in equality and diversity. At a time when other main stream denominations are pushing back against social change, the MCC is kicking down its doors to embrace it. The open-for-all ethos of the MCC might seem progressive but it’s important to remember the humble beginnings of the Christian Church. Adopted by the Roman Empire in the second...

S o, you’re engaged. When are you getting married ? It’s a simple question but one that  doesn't  always have an easy answer. A wedding is all about making choices, and some choices are easier than others. You could say that choosing the time of year to have your wedding or civil partnership is complicated by the UK's unpredictable weather. You'd be correct. The UK's weather is notoriously difficult to forecast accurately . It makes picking the perfect date for a wedding difficult, too.  So, what do you do when you can’t guarantee against summer downpours or autumn gales or spring snow flurries or dreary winter days. Prepare for the worst. Imagine for the best. Your first consideration should be working out when you’re free to get married. Some jobs don’t allow time off during certain periods of the year. Close family members may have holidays booked, celebrations to attend or plans already in motion. Take a calendar and, through a pr...

 CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by-sa/3.0/)],  via Wikimedia Commons Now that equal marriage is legal (in England and Wales at least), we wanted to share with you a selection of offerings from our wedding and civil ceremony directory. All the venues, vendors and services listed in our directory are pink friendly, and, over the next few months, we’ll be showcasing a small selection of them. Remember to visit our website where you’ll find even more choice. We cover the whole of the UK, and our directory is totally free to use. In this first post, we’re featuring four of the more unique venues featured on the site. These  aren't  chain hotels, conference halls or regular country homes but  stand-out , statement venues offering a lick of something different for your wedding or civil partnership. In West Lothian , Scotland is the Vu Water Lily . This superb venue, surrounded by the Bathgate Hills, sits in the midd...

By Wouterhagens (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)],  via Wikimedia Commons When can I convert my civil partnership to marriage? It's a good question. It's a very good question, because it's one that nobody knows the answer to yet. The delay is because the Government currently lacks the framework to process them: updating computer systems, training staff etc. They need more time. There's nothing like a bureaucracy created by government. You can imagine how many papers need to be pushed, filed and expensed before it will all be ready. The important thing is that it's coming . What's annoyed campaigners however, is the lack of an official time scale. The Government has not been able to offer any specific date beyond 'sometime later in the year'.  It's super vague, and it probably means December. Fortunately, once it does come into effect it, it will be a simple process of signing a form...

William Hogarth [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons Saturday 29 th   March 2014 saw the first gay weddings in   England  and   Wales, and h aving enjoyed the build up to equal marriage, we have to ask:  What now? So, cake and confetti-less, we’re struggling a bit this Wednesday, but we’ve decided to banish those start-of-the-week blues and re-live some of the magic of last weekend. If you were too busy celebrating, playing in the sunshine or enjoying Mother's Day,  then here are some things you might have missed. London   played host to a number of events; the biggest was Stonewall’s party at G-A-Y. Ben & Jerry’s were there, too, celebrating with new ice cream flavour ‘Appely Ever After’. Which sounds amazing by the way if anyone wants to send any to   Pink   Towers … The rainbow flag was flying over   Westminster  on Saturday. Its multi-coloured pennant, symbolic of the gay rights movements, ...