Luxembourg Wedding (a LOT of photos!)

We got married!  It was a wonderful occasion with some of our close family and friends.

The ceremony was in Bettembourg Castle, which is where the registry office is based.  As the rain was holding off, we had a couple of pre-ceremony photos. 

It was a simple but moving event lead by Mr Graas who, amazingly, had been taught English by JC's Dad.  The ceremony was in English (I had insisted) and he was putting his english lessons into good practice!  

We exchanged rings and signed the paperwork.  My wedding ring is my mother's gold band with a tourmaline stone addition.  The diamond from her engagement ring is set in white gold ring.  Of course, neither she or Dad were at the wedding, but at least I now carry Mum close.  

We'd taken helium balloons to decorate the room, but JC's friends also rocked up with wonderful "J, R and a ring" balloons which were fun.  Of course, R is for Riona...

For 16 EUR the municipality of Bettembourg provides a marriage service including not only officiant/registrar but use of a room and a drinks reception afterwards.  They also gave us a couple of local books which was a lovely touch.  

Mr Graas caught up with his teacher.

Lovely hallway for a photo.  Mark kindly moved the giant of Luxembourg out of our way.

Afterwards we had photos in the courtyard.  As we didn't descend to the grass area, we weren't able to use any confetti - sorry to Caitlin who had prepared beautifully wrapped small pockets of rose petals to throw. 

 

Marc and JC set up the camera for the group shot.

We meandered to the local Italian restaurant, La Celula, where we'd reserved a small private room.  The girls had been scheming, as I suspected, and we were entertained by a portfolio of Ruth and JC photos, of which the cannon camera featured 6 times ;-).  There were heart table decorations, heart straws and, best ever, glow stick glasses (see later).

We had a wonderful time eating, drinking, chilling and generally enjoying ourselves.  The table plan was organised according to languages: myself, the girls and Mark were on the English speaking side, JC and his parents in the 'English to Luxembourgish' portion, and, turning the corner, was the German/Luxembourgish patch, before rounding back to Luxembourgish/English speakers again.  

We had a traditional Luxembourg celebration cake, Baamkuch.  A real treat for all in the room - we'd added a few Ruth/JC touches too.  It's a ring-shaped  cake and you cut super thin slices which show the numerous layers which make up the ring (it's sometimes known as 'tree cake' for this reason).

 It was time to activate the glasses, which we got up and running and sent them around the table.

Michael had popped out when the glasses first passed his spot.

Irmine and Camille rocked the glasses.

It was a truly special day with family and friends - lots of laughter and cherished moments.  Riona and Mark had taken numerous polaroid photos during the day and we found a pile of them on our bed when we turned in that night.  

We popped the glasses on the window sill and fell asleep with the glow of the hearts.