The Secret of the Rain Doll! An English Wedding at Yaxley Hall

The other, which you may not have heard of before today, is to hang a teru teru bozu doll out­side your win­dow on the wed­ding day. They’re known as weather dolls and you can either make one, like Haruna’s mom did, or buy them on Etsy.com! So on Paul and Haruna’s wed­ding day, this lit­tle guy made the rain go away and they had a beau­ti­ful Eng­lish wed­ding at Yax­ley Hall.

I must say thank you to wed­ding pho­tog­ra­pher Jes­sica Roberts for sub­mit­ting such a quin­tes­sen­tially Eng­lish wed­ding for the blog today. I do hope you love it! My con­grat­u­la­tions to the gor­geous cou­ple Haruna and Paul, and thank you so much for shar­ing the details of your day with us all.

Claire xxx

Haruna and Paul’s beau­ti­ful Eng­lish wed­ding at Yax­ley Hall in Suffolk

Wed­ding venue: Yax­ley Hall, Suf­folk www.yaxleyhall.com

Wed­ding pho­tog­ra­pher: Jes­sica Roberts http://photosbyjessica.co.uk

How would you describe your wed­ding style?

Pretty, pink, sophis­ti­cated, tra­di­tional English.

A lit­tle about the wed­ding ceremony:

Wed­ding read­ings were “What is love” (author unknown)

and “A wed­ding Bless­ing” by James Dil­let Free­man (see below)

May your mar­riage bring you all the exquis­ite
excite­ment mar­riage should bring,
and may life grant you also patience,
tol­er­ance, and under­stand­ing.
May you always need one another -
not so much to fill your empti­ness
as to help you to know your full­ness.
A moun­tain needs a val­ley to be com­plete;
the val­ley does not make
the moun­tain less, but more;
and the val­ley is more a val­ley because
it has a moun­tain tow­er­ing over it.
May you need one another, but not out of weak­ness.
May you want one another, but not out of lack.
May you entice one another, but not com­pel one another.
May you embrace one another, but not out encir­cle one another.
May you suc­ceed in all impor­tant ways with one another,
and not fail in the lit­tle graces.
May you look for things to praise, often say, “I love you!“
and take no notice of small faults.
If you have quar­rels that push you apart,
may both of you hope to have
good sense enough to take the first step back.
May you enter into the mys­tery which is
the aware­ness of one another’s
pres­ence — no more phys­i­cal than spir­i­tual,
warm and near when you are
side by side, and warm and near when
you are in sep­a­rate rooms
or even dis­tant cities.
May you have hap­pi­ness,
and may you find it mak­ing one another happy.
May you have love, and may you find it lov­ing one another.

Tell us a lit­tle about your wed­ding venue styling and details:

We planned the wed­ding from Japan and Yax­ley Hall really put every­thing together. We wanted an inti­mate pretty occa­sion. Jes­sica Roberts (http://photosbyjessica.co.uk/) and Vicki Strowger (http://www.victoriastrowgerflowers.co.uk/) really helped with this. Vicki with her amaz­ing vision was able to cre­ate a spec­tac­u­lar dis­play of flow­ers and Jes­sica cap­tured it.

Invi­ta­tions and recep­tion stationery:

A com­bi­na­tion of Winged Wheel sta­tionery in Shin­saibashi, home-made, and Yax­ley Hall’s own.

Wed­ding music and entertainment:

Voigt Quar­tet (live) / John Coltrane playlist.

What did you wear?

Bride: Wed­ding dress from Light in the Box. Gold shoes from Straw­berry Fields. Cus­tom made pearl neck­lace and ear­rings. Bou­quet by Vicki Strowger.

Groom: Tai­lored suit and shirt bought in Hon­machi. Match­ing ties for groom, best man and groom’s father bought in Umeda.

Mem­o­rable wed­ding day moments:

First look. Bridal pro­ces­sion. Speeches.

Wed­ding day advice:

Get the right help from the right people!

Rec­om­mended wed­ding suppliers:

• Pho­tos by Jessica
• Vic­to­ria Strowger flowers
• Voigt Quar­tet
• Yax­ley Hall for venue and catering.