Rebecca & Benjamin

NUMBER OF GUESTS: 24

Our love story began…

Ben and I met on a Contiki trip in New Zealand. I had already been on the tour for a week when Ben joined our group and we had an instant connection. We spent every moment we could getting to know each other until the final week of the trip was over. I’m from South Australia and Ben is from Queensland so once I returned home he messaged me and it quickly became a long-distance relationship with us flying to see each other every chance we could until I made the move to Queensland to be with him.

 The proposal was…

Like any other day Ben got up to go to work early but about half an hour later he came back to bed and said he wasn’t going in to work today. Once I had woken up properly he got out of bed quickly so I followed him. As I walked out our bedroom I found a trail of rose petals leading from the bedroom to our lounge room and that’s where I found him on one knee with the words spelt out in rose petals “will you marry me”. I instantly started crying and of course said YES!

 We wanted our wedding to be…

For our Wedding Venue we chose the Mooloolaba Surf Club. We had been looking around for a while and we knew we wanted a venue that we could have both our Ceremony and Reception at. When we visited the Surf Club we fell in love with the venues space and the big beautiful window that showcased the gorgeous Mooloolaba beach. It was perfect! As we had my whole family travelling up from South Australia the Sunshine Coast was a perfect destination to make travel easy and not so costly for them which was a bonus. We wanted our wedding to be an intimate family celebration so only our immediate family were in attendance. It was perfect because it was so intimate and was truly a day we will treasure.

My dress was…

I first saw my dress on the Luv Bridal website and instantly fell in love with it. I looked at many other dresses but my mind kept running back to Carris! I showed my mum a few pictures of dresses that I liked and she picked Carris as her favorite. That’s when I knew I had to have it! I made an appointment at the Luv Bridal store in Maroochydore and took my mother in law with me. We facetimed my mum while I was trying on a few dresses which were beautiful but once I had Carris on my mother in law had tears in her eyes and I had found my dress. On my wedding day I felt so beautiful! My eldest sister laced me into my dress and it’s a moment we will cherish. When it came time for me to walk down the aisle the look on Ben’s face reassured me that I had made the right decision and I had never felt more beautiful.

The best moment of the day…

While I was standing up the front with Ben during our ceremony I took a moment to look at everyone seated and the looks they were giving us and the tears of joy they were expressing warmed my heart so much and made me think how lucky we are to have such a fantastic family and how I could feel the love in the room!

The soundtrack to our big day was…

The song I walked down the aisle to was Ed Sheeran – Hearts Don’t Break Around Here, I knew I wanted an Ed Sheeran song in our ceremony because he is a genius at love songs and I listened to all his songs and this is the one that made me tear up.

Vance Joy holds a special place in our hearts, he is our favorite artist and three of his songs made it on our wedding soundtrack. We had “Alone with me” and “Fire and the Flood” in our Ceremony playlist and we had “Im With You” as our first dance song. He is so special to us because our first concert we went to as a couple was Vance Joy and it was just perfect!

We also had Passenger – Heart’s on Fire, Sam Smith – Latch (acoustic), Troy Sivan – My My My and Gabrielle Aplin – Waking up slow (piano) in our ceremony playlist. These are songs we regularly listen to and make our hearts sing when we listen to them!

We’d like to give a special mention to…

Our Celebrant Brooke Carlyon went above and beyond for us! I’m a very nervous person and as soon as I met Brooke I knew she would be the perfect person to marry us. She made it so easy for us and had everything under control which made the whole experience stress free.

The love quote that resonates most with us as a couple is…

Lyrics from our first dance song Vance Joy – I’m With You

If you need a light
I’ll be the match to your candle
My darling, I’m ready, to burst into flames for you

One unusual thing about our big day was…

We decided to have a Wednesday wedding. It was perfect as we got some good deals and all our suppliers were available at short notice. Our wedding was essentially one big family holiday.

As a married couple we most look forward to…

We most look forward to all the adventures ahead and starting a family.

The best advice we can give to other couples about to get married is…

I found that looking into the recommendations your venue gives you for wedding suppliers was the way to go. As we weren’t from the Sunshine Coast we relied heavily on recommendations and I’m so glad we did! All our suppliers were fantastic and our wedding day went so smoothly! I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect day.