Kineta Booker

If there’s one elopement that really stands out for me, it was Melanie + Mike’s Friday the 13th sunrise ceremony at the top of Mt Sunday, Ashburton Lakes.

This Lord of the Rings-loving couple travelled from the States to elope away with us – Robin + Andie as their photographer, videographer (and their two witnesses!), and me as their celebrant and package coordinator.

We all met at dawn in the Mt Sunday carpark, grabbed some selfies as the sun started to rise, and then set out on our adventure up the hill (hiking boots not a necessity!) Oh what a glorious, blustery morning! But memories were made and M + M were hitched!

Want to know more? Flick me a message and let’s see if this is the perfect elope for the two of you.

Check these images by Robin + Andie who I work with exclusively on our Mt Sunday Elopements x

LET’S CONNECT!

Andrea Zoe Photography and I have teamed up with South Eyre Sunflowers to bring you a golden elopement package for a good cause.

Not only will you have an epic elopement in a field of blooming sunflowers, but we will be donating a large portion of your elopement fee to I AM HOPE, a charity close to all our hearts.

So, not only will you be eloping away with your life’s greatest love in a field of gold, but you’ll be part of the reason that I AM HOPE can continue their incredible work within the community. Our team will be donating $500 from each and every elopement we have among the sunflowers. How cool is that!

I AM HOPE has one goal – positive societal attitudinal change. “We know our youth struggle with distressing self-talk and overthinking, leaving them feeling isolated and alone. When we show them these thoughts are universal, we can give our kids a better life.” (iamhope.org.nz)

The South Eyre Sunflower team donates towards this amazing cause every year and these elopements will be the only ones available on this field.

THE DETAILS:

• elopements are for the two of you and up to 10 guests
• a personalised ceremony (I’ll help you write your vows)
• elopement certificate with your witnesses signatures on it
• photos during ceremony
• up to 1 hour of photos onsite (this includes the ceremony)
• a sneak-peek of images within two business days of your elopement
• full online gallery with free downloads of your elopement images
• if it’s a rainy day, there is a shed onsite for the ceremony – or we could just roll with light rain under clear umbrellas
• bookings being taken for any day/time of the week from end of January 2025 through February 2025

Price: South Eyre Sunflowers Elopement $1599* (+GST where applicable)

*THE FINE PRINT:

• the elopement is $1599 (+GST if applicable). Vendor mileage is included in this rate
• GST will be added by any vendor who is not GST exempt
• we offer only Elopements for this package (up to 10 guests)
• The price does not include your official marriage licence/certificate
• There is a $300 non-refundable deposit to book your elopement with us
• The $500 fee to I AM HOPE will be donated at the end of the South Eyre Sunflower season
• There’s a four-week turnaround for receiving your online gallery of images

LET’S CHAT!

Join us again this year as we open our doors and introduce you to the finest wedding vendors North Canterbury has to offer.

We make planning your wedding easy!

All Things Wedding North Canterbury

Sunday 24 September, 2023, 11am – 2pm

Bramble Grove, Old North Road, Kaiapoi

ENTRY: gold coin donation. (This year we’ve decided to help raise funds for the restoration of our beautiful historic North Canterbury venue – registered charity, the Ashley Community Church. It needs a new roof! So your donation is going to help that. Thanks so much in advance!)

Click here to find out more.

Lipstick lovers throughout the land are rejoicing at the news that masks will no longer be required from midnight tonight.

Although it’s become borderline normal for us to wear masks on the daily, we can finally breathe freely – they’re gone! It’s just one of the great things that came out of the post-Cabinet meeting at parliament today.

It’s been a tough three years enduring covid – and all the government requirements that came along with it, but finally the traffic light system is gone, masks are gone (for most work places), and mandates are gone.

However, in some cases they will still be worn. PM Jacinda Ardern said, “Some places, such as workplaces, special events, or marae may ask you to wear a mask, but this will be at their discretion and no longer a Government requirement. Please respect those who choose to keep wearing masks as a form of protection.”

For more info see: Covid-19 website.

---

On a personal note, and maybe you can relate – today’s announcement has come at the perfect time! No more ‘maskne’, the tip of my nose will no longer be subjected to an exfoliation every time a rough face mask is anywhere near it – and my beautiful lipsticks are back in hot demand! What a great day indeed.

In 1947, the then 21-year-old Princess Elizabeth’s wedding to Prince Philip was the first big celebration of the post-war era – and her Norman Hartnell dress was something everyone wanted to see.

Did you know her gown – which featured a heart-shaped neckline, low v-pointed waist and floor-length panelled skirt was inspired by a painting? Hartnell based the ivory silk dress on Botticelli’s painting – Primavera, which symbolises the coming of spring. HRH also wore a 4.5m train embroidered in pearl and crystal.

Imagine this: 350 people worked on the design, which Hartnell called “the most beautiful dress I ever made”. Betty Foster, one of the 350 seamstresses, said Hartnell allowed every person at the workshop to place one small stitch in the exquisite gown before it was delivered to Buckingham Palace “just so that they could say they had worked on the wedding dress”.

How absolutely beautiful is that.

IMAGE Hulton-Deutsch Collection

WARNING: video may cause dizziness. (I can hardly see straight anymore…)

---

How high would you go for love? Four-hundred feet? that’s over 120m in the air!

An adventure-seeking duo were hitched on a spacenet over “Fruit Bowls” a canyon near Moab, Utah in the United States.

A spacenet is described as the ‘world’s biggest and highest hammock‘, and it is suspended high above the ground.

The Florida couple, Ryan Jenks and Kim Weglin, are professional slackliners – so it seems natural that they’d grab their two best mates, celebrant, and photographer to get high with them – 400 feet high in the sky – to say I DO!

So, would you?

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by ecards (@sarcasm_only)

---

IMAGES: The Hearns Adventure Photography

Be inspired by local vendors for your upcoming wedding ♡

---

WHAT: North Canterbury Weddings‘ OPEN DAY!

WHEN: Sunday 28 August, 11am – 2pm

WHERE: Darjon Vineyard, Swannanoa

EVENT DETAILS: CLICK HERE

Pop the date in your diary now!

More info to come x

---

Your wedding cake is a reception masterpiece and sometimes it goes even further than that and becomes a statement through its topper.

Australian caker Kerri from Quintessential Cakes creates pieces that ‘WOW your guests’ and one of her latest cakes is currently making quite an impact on social media with, at the time of writing, attracting 3.1K comments over just one weekend.

It seems the statement topper has hit the funny bone of other couples waiting in the wings to get married. Some commenters are tagging their significant other and saying things like, ‘I’ve found our wedding cake topper!!;’ ‘..if we ever get there, these two words will be plastered everywhere lol;’ ‘…this could be us. But you still haven’t even proposed.’  

Caker Kerri said in a follow-up post, ‘It seems this cake topper has caused quite the stir and I’m not the only one that thought it would have been perfect for me.’

There’s nothing better than a gorgeous cake-topper, but oh, to know the story behind this f-bomb cake topper!

So, what would your statement cake-topper say?

Call me crazy but when I see these three words together, ‘black wedding dress,’ I swoon. Yes, please!

Is it because I adore wearing black? Or because I like the thought of bucking the Western ‘white wedding dress’ trend? Maybe because I could repurpose and wear it again?

All relevant thoughts but I think my love for the idea of wearing black might come down to the archaic meaning behind the white gown – purity.

Some research suggests it was Queen Victoria who started the trend in 1840 when she wore a white gown at her wedding to Prince Albert. In fact, aristocrats apparently baulked at the colour because white traditionally symbolised mourning, and red was the typical colour of wedding dresses at that time.

Within a decade, it seems all was forgiven, and white started to become more popular, with an article in 1849 saying, ‘Custom has decided, from the earliest ages, that white is the most fitting hue … It is an emblem of the purity and innocence of girlhood and the unsullied heart she now yields to the chosen one.’

However, Queen Vic may not have been the first, with another article I read, dating the practice of wearing white to more than 2000 years ago, to Rome, when brides were dressed in a white tunic. ‘The color white represented purity, symbolizing both a woman’s chastity and her transition to a married Roman matron,’ the article says.

So, although the founding date of the whole white wedding dress trend isn’t certain, the one thing they both have in common is that the colour represents a moral, which seems incredibly outdated.

I say – wear whichever colour you like for any reason you like! That’s 21st Century liberation for you.

“We’ve been sent good weather!” – The Handmaid’s Tale.

What a blessed day, with great weather, indeed! Hello ORANGE!

The Orange Light setting is quite different to Orange last time. Remember that numbers were capped if guests didn’t have a My Vaccine Pass? Those days are gone.

Bye-bye RED with your big ol’ rain clouds. No limits, no worries. But leave ya mask on!! x