“We had been together a little over six years and by that time already parents of a little daughter, when we decided to marry. We got engaged in the spring and got married in the beginning of August. 

At first we planned on going to the Vital Statistics Department by ourselves. Then we decided we will invite our two best friends. But how can you invite just two, when there are a lot more good friends? And then my best friend told me that her relative’s spouse is a wedding planner. This is how we met Merily and Taago and we are very happy about it!

We had a quite unusual wedding. Only friends, no relatives. The whole engagement and wedding itself were carefully kept secret. We were afraid that after the wedding our relatives would feel offended, but in reality they were very understanding. The groom’s family lives in Canada and it would have been complicated to fly them all here. And to not be unfair to the groom’s family, we decided to keep it a secret from the bride’s family as well. 

From the beginning we had a vision that some part of the wedding has to happen on the sea, on a yacht and the party should also take place somewhere by the sea. The sea is so us and without it we couldn’t imagine this important day. 

We made our wedding invitations ourselves. We wanted them to be a bit more interesting than just a plain invitation in an envelope. We wrote the story of how we met on a paper and folded little origami boats. We turned the papers into rolls and put them into bottles, filled with sand and seashells. The bottle, origami boats and the story of us meeting went to the guests in boxes that were chosen for them personally so that they could keep using them later. In addition the guests got a task to fold a similar origami boat and bring it to the wedding. In the wedding they found out they had to write some good wishes and put them in a treasure chest. We opened the treasure chest on our first anniversary. 

On the invitations we also wrote what to give as a gift. We didn’t want anything for ourselves, but we thought it would be great to support those who are in need. As a gift we asked our guests to make a donation to Estonian Association of Parents of Children with Cancer.

As for the wedding, we dreamed that the ceremony would take place in Tallinn bay and on an old wooden sailing ship. And that’s exactly what we got. The wedding planner very quickly found a suitable yacht for us and there wasn’t much more to organize anymore. Just kidding! Actually there was a lot of work to do, but Taago and Merily did the most of it. 

After the ceremony we headed from the Seaplane Harbour by an old-fashioned wedding car and unicum-bus (the guests were on the bus) to restaurant Paat in Viimsi, where the wedding party took place. We got our wish for the wedding by the sea!

The MC of our wedding was magician Meelis Kubo, who luckily didn’t make the pride disappear or cut her in half. However, he somehow made the forks melt in his hand and did so many more tricks that most of the guests probably haven’t figured out yet. 

On the yacht as well as in the restaurant a band consisting of three brothers – Trio Comodo – played for us. They were able to perform both classical music and dance music. We considered several different options who to invite to play at the wedding. We are so pleased that we finally stayed with Trio Comodo.

The yacht Hoppet and the restaurant Paat were very tastefully decorated with green plants, cornflowers and gypsophilas. Some seashells here and there. Seasalt. Old-fashioned candle holders. Candles everywhere, little bows, light chains on the balcony. There was nothing too much or too little. All together adorable and romantic. Ahti Lyra and Merily knew exactly, what would fit where. By ourselves we never could have decorated the places like that. 

When planning the wedding you might think that, oh why would I need this or that. Lets save this money. But don’t! All those minor details, what purpose you maybe don’t get at first, but the wedding planners recommend, play a huge role in the big picture. People who organize weddings have learned it all and hopefully your wedding is not their first one. Trust them!

There may and certainly will be unexpected situations on the wedding day that need to be solved urgently. When you have involved the wedding planners then you don’t have to deal with those problems yourself. Any obstacles that come up, the wedding planners will roll out of the way so that you will have only a wonderful memory of your wedding and the gray hair will be on someone else’s head.