Em & Jonny

Royal national park wedding

Holy hell what a day.

Em and Jonny met online and Em was impressed when Jonny dropped a Kitchen Cabinet reference on the first date without blinking an eye (obscure ABC political show). Things weren't set in stone until, on their third date, Jonny took Em to an RSPCA animal shelter to play with and feed and look after the rescue animals. Shortly thereafter, Em, the ultimate overachiever (she gained a scholarship to Oxford to study law and was then headhunted to move to Hong Kong to practice, and Jonny commented that he had never seen someone who could study so hard, or for so long, or retain such inordinate amounts of information so quickly), mused to one of her friends that being love sick was terrible for productivity, and they've been together ever since. 

They are both highly intelligent, and loyal, with a strong sense of social justice. I was someone taken aback when the ceremony guide showed a US court ruling as one of the readings, only to realise it was excerpts from a Supreme Court Justice opinion on the ruling to legalise same sex marriage in Massachusetts.

From they way they spoke about each other it's clear that they not just love the best parts of one another, but they embrace the more difficult aspects of the other too. 

This was a textbook example of doing things your own way, of eschewing tradition and embracing the aspects of a wedding day that mean something to you. Both living in Hong Kong, they don't get a chance to see all the people they care about all that often and so they decided to do a first look and get a bunch of the photos done early before hanging out with their guests, drinking champagne and eating canapes for half an hour with everyone before gathering for the ceremony. Far from detracting from the big moment of everyone seeing Em for the first time walking down the aisle, or lessening the impact of the big emotive embraces that came after they were formally declared husband and wife, it simply served to highlight that the two of them valued the people around them more than they valued tradition for its own sake. It showed that hey wanted to wring every last moment of face to face contact, of touches on the arm, of laughs you hadn't heard in person for too long, on catching up on the minutiae of everyday life that seems so oddly important when it's coming from someone you deeply care about but that is so hard to keep up with when you live an ocean and a few thousand km's away. It was a beautiful gesture.

A few things to keep an eye out for 

- Em's reaction to Jonny's self written vows

- A ludicrous winter sunset

- A bunch of bridesmaids dancing with dessert bowls cause both the tunes and the ice cream cake were too good to just partake of one at a time

- Many hands making light work of Em getting dressed

Enjoy

Dane

Venue - Audley Dance Hall

HMU - Niki Simpson

Flowers - Cronulla Florist

Em's dress - Marchesa Notte

Band - Baker Boys