stephengardener.com » Wedding

Wedding Photos

stega — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 08:30:10 +0000

Lots of photos from our wedding are making their way online.
The official set, taken by Graham Wyles our photographer, can be found here. You can buy prints from him if you are interested (the online versions are deliberately tiny, but you get the general idea).

There are also a load taken by friends. Most of these are on Facebook, so you would need to have a facebook account and add Ollie or myself as a friend to see those. Otherwise you can find some photos taken by Dave Powell here.

We will compile the best photos from everyone and put them in the photos section this site at some stage. Till then, enjoy the photos

EDIT: The photos can now be found on this site – go here to see them

A Moon of Honey

stega — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 04:45:51 +0000

Just got back from our honeymoon – a weeks liveaboard diving in the Red Sea. It was bloody excellent – we were on the Royal Evolution, a fantastic boat that took us out to the Brothers, Daedalus & Elphonstone reefs. Got to dive with a school of 15+ hammerhead sharks, eat good food and generally have an excellent time.
It was so excellent, in fact, that while sat on the top deck of the boat in the shade, enjoying the warmth and view out to sea, it made me realise how miserable I’ve been living in the UK recently. Its not just the weather (although I am definitely happier in the sun). Ive spent the previous 10 years living in places with easy access to nature/wilderness.
In Thailand, Indonesia, Norway and New Zealand we lived by the sea, and had mountains and forests near by. Watford on the other hand has.. erm.. Cassiobury Park. So I’m thinking it might be time to bugger off again soon.
A big thanks goes out to Yasser and my brother Simon for organising the trip for us, as well as to all the crew for making it a brilliant honeymoon. Simon also made us a really cool DVD, so we can now sit at home and watch our underwater explorations on the telly, which is great cos its just like real diving except you don’t have to put all that heavy equipment on and get wet. Probably.

Married!!!! :)

stega — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 06:16:40 +0000

I am now a married man!
Not a great deal has changed, to be honest. Except that a large amount of money has gone missing from our bank accounts. Oh, and we are both very tired. Other than that, things are pretty much the same i.e. we are both massively happy and hugely in love.
The wedding was brilliant. Best thing I’ve ever done! Loads of our friends turned up from all over the world. The castle was very castley, the weather was actually nice and sunny, and the whole day went swimmingly.
For the weekend we all buggered off up to Bwlch in the Black Mountains, where it pissed down for pretty much the whole weekend (except for Friday evening, which was gorgeous). Good times
Ta to everyone for coming! Ta to all those that traveled long or short distances, ta to those that took time off work or otherwise made the effort to come and celebrate with us. Ta for all the toilets, llamas, condoms, school dinners, teachers and other stuff that we got through the post from Oxfam, and ta to Leif and Astrid, and Sigs and Marie for the trip to the North Pole! Ta to Alex for being an excellent knight and supurb best man, ta to Dave, Matt & Alex for organising and playing the gig in the evening, and of course a huge ta to Ollie for actually turning up and marrying me in the first place.
Hope everyone had a great time!
Right, off to email the wife.

Countdown!!

stega — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 05:54:35 +0000

Ok, 3 days and counting. Now I’m getting nervous. Its a big thing, getting married. Even when you love the person you are getting married to with all your heart. Even when you know with certainty that you want to spend the rest of your life with that person, and you just couldn’t imagine life apart. Its still fucking scary.
Just spent a couple of weekends in Wales sorting out a few odds and sods with the registry office and the castle. Still some stuff to do, but nothing too major. Alex had his appointment at the National Theatre this week to get his suit of armour, Vibeke, Ollies maid of honour has got her medieval dress, and I have got my viking war helmet, so we are mostly set.
And all our friends from New Zealand are now here – Shaun, Keith & Adrienne and Ann & Colin (we had seven people staying over in our wee flat last night). And more will be coming over from Norway over the course of this week.
Band practice tonight, then off back to Wales tomorrow.
D-day on Thursday.
No going back now…

Wedding plans and weekends away

stega — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 05:11:39 +0000

Wedding plans are all going to.. er.. plan so far. This is one of the main reasons we chose to get married in Caldicot Castle (apart from the fact that it is a castle, of course) – theres not really a great deal for us to do as they organise pretty much everything. We had the rings made in NZ, Ollie had her dress made there too, and I had my suit made in Thailand, the venue sorts out the ceremony, food, etc, our friends are providing the music.. what else is there? Guests, I suppose, but so far they have all done a reasonable job of replying to our invitations (generally in the positive).
So without a great deal to organise for the wedding, we spend our time going away for weekends We were in Norway last weekend. Had a brilliant time – really miss the place. Spent Saturday getting pissed with Martin and Jorgen in Oslo, then Sunday skiing in the mountains. Hangover wasn’t too bad, and the fact that it was 22′C meant we were skiing in t-shirts
The weekend before Norway was spent in Cambridge, to celebrate Ollie’s birthday, and our ‘engagement anniversary’ (our anniversary list keeps growing – by the end of this year, we will have three of the buggers – a ‘getting together’ anniversary, an engagement one, plus the obvious wedding one). Still, always good to have an excuse to go away for the weekend (not that we need one). Cambridge was excellent. As it was Ollie’s birthday, her colleagues at work had bought her a couple of bottles of champagne, which we dutifully polished off in a wee Indian restaurant that evening. Cambridge is a lovely town, although I was surprised at how small it was. Lots of nice places to go out and eat and drink, lots of parks to wander through, a river to wander along.
Off to Wales this weekend with Alex and his girlfriend. Haven’t seen Alex since we were in a band together in Oslo back in 2001, so will be cool to catch up. More curries, beer and walks in the countryside planned

Big News

stega — Thu, 30 Mar 2006 10:11:00 +0000

Last weekend on the 25th of March, Ollie and Stephen went for a weekend break to Great Barrier Island. When they came back the following Monday they were engaged to be married – and just slightly hungover. They are both rather pleased with themselves, and hope that all of their friends and family will feel the same way. The dirty deed was done on Tryphena beach during a sunset just slightly obscured by heavy, black and pendulous storm clouds. Once the correct answer was received, the celebrations began in earnest with great food and rather a lot of champagne, tequilas and other assorted alcoholic beverages, and were allowed to continue an extra day due to a slightly off course tropical cyclone which the ferries took a dislike to.
The marriage is likely to happen in Wales, probably during a summer (not that that will make much difference), and probably in the next year or so. Our plans at the moment are for a rather small affair with just close friends and family, and hopefully a big curry and possibly some rotten fish…
Hope everyone is alive and well ??? looking forward to hearing from you all!
Ollie and Stephen