The Boy and the Bridesmaid – (the Meet Cute series) Katey Lovell

The Boy and the Bridesmaid is the last short story to be published in the ‘Meet Cute’ series. I’ve enjoyed every single one and I think this is one of the best and a fitting way to to end the series.  I’m delighted to welcome Katey back to the blog to talk about her wedding memories. I hope you enjoy her post.

* * *

Wedding fever’s all around at this time of year, arriving with the cherry blossom and lingering until the clocks go back in autumn. The wedding in The Boy and the Bridesmaid takes place in the summer too, but I’ve always been particularly enamoured by winter weddings.

I’d hoped to get married on Christmas Eve because I thought it’d be wonderfully romantic to wake on Christmas morning as a newly-wed. In the end my husband and I actually got married on December 23rd 2005, not quite Christmas Eve, but almost (there were a few reasons for this – firstly David and I first got together on 23rd so there was a nice symmetry to using that date, secondly my sister in law’s birthday is December 24th and we didn’t want to spoil her day, and thirdly when we thought about it practically we didn’t want to wait to go on our honeymoon or travel on Christmas Day itself.)

Our wedding day was cold but dry, and although it didn’t snow like I’d dreamed it would we did get a few flakes of the white stuff on our honeymoon in New York. It was a beautiful day surrounded by our loved ones. It wasn’t flashy or showy, but it was us putting the seal on our relationship.

Fast forward to 2012 and we’d made the decision to have a wedding blessing – exactly six years and six months after our wedding, on June 23rd. Our wedding had taken place in a register office and I’d always hoped to have a church service too, plus it seemed a nice idea to be able to involve our son, Zachary – a real opportunity to celebrate our family unit. We didn’t have a big ‘do’ for the blessing, the service was a simple exchange of vows with just the three of us and the vicar, and we read Guess How Much I Love You sat on the steps at the altar. Afterwards we ate at a Turkish restaurant with a friend of ours and had photos taken in a local park, all very low key but absolutely lovely. I probably enjoyed our blessing day more than our actual wedding day (and there was rain, despite it being ‘summer’!)

One winter wedding, one summer blessing – two wonderful, happy days.

Katey Lovell is the author of The Boy and the Bridesmaid, part of the Meet Cute series. It was published on June 16th by Harper Impulse.

About the book:

A gorgeously romantic short story, part of The Meet Cute series.

There’s nothing as wonderful as a wedding, especially when it’s your sister getting married. But for Maria, who struggles with social anxiety, being a bridesmaid is a struggle as well as an honour and when she finds herself overawed the person by her side is the last person she’d expect to understand…