Chapter 5
‘Hello, you must be Ellie Newton from All Things Love. I’m Jackson. Lovely to meet you.’ Jackson stood up from the table closest to the oven and held his hand out towards her.
‘Hi, great to meet you too.’ Shifting the folder into the crook of one arm, Ellie shook his hand. ‘I’ve just been telling Laura that I’m no longer working with Melissa at All Things Love, actually.’
‘Ellie’s starting up her own wedding planning business, Forever Thyme.’ Laura placed the foraging basket on the work surface before joining them at the table. ‘What can I get you to go with your cake? Tea, coffee? A cold drink?’
‘Umm, coffee would be amazing, please?’ Ellie stood awkwardly beside the table, her feet suddenly rooted to the spot.
What was wrong with her? She was always professional when working, but she could almost feel her confidence evaporating.
Laura and Jackson’s wedding meant so much.
Of course, to them it did, and the couples were always of paramount importance when she organised their big day, but this was different.
This would be the first wedding she’d be organising under her own name.
The buck literally stopped with her. Not that it hadn’t when she’d been working with Melissa, but that had felt different, at least she’d had someone to discuss things with, someone to reassure her that what she was doing, what she was planning, would be perfect.
She wouldn’t have that now. She’d only have herself. Just her.
‘I’ll get them.’ Jackson gently placed his hand on Laura’s shoulder. ‘I’ll let Laura get all the notes and mood boards out.’
‘Haha, I do have a fair bit to show you, I’m afraid.’ Laura slipped onto the bench next to the spot Jackson had vacated and indicated for Ellie to take a chair opposite her. ‘Please tell me if it’s too much, though.’
Sitting down, Ellie placed her folder down and slipped out of her thick chunky cardigan and tugged the creases from her shirt once again before taking a pen and notebook from her bag. ‘I love it when a client knows what they want, so I’m sure what you have won’t be too much.’
‘You’ve not seen it yet.’ Jackson glanced over his shoulder and chuckled. ‘Between the both of us, I think we have enough notes and ideas for a hundred weddings.’
‘I’m afraid he’s right. That’s why we need some help.’ Laura pulled a huge stack of notebooks, magazines and sketchbooks towards her. ‘We’ve just got so completely overwhelmed with it all and need someone to help us figure out what we want and how to make it happen.’
Ellie smiled at Laura’s enthusiasm. ‘That’s my job.’
‘Thank you.’ Laura shifted her pile slightly as Jackson placed a tray of coffee mugs on the table before handing out the drinks and putting a milk jug and a small pot of sugar cubes between them before sitting down next to his fiancée.
‘Thanks.’ Ellie popped a sugar cube in the mug Jackson had just passed her and stirred until the crystals had dissolved before picking up her pen again. ‘So, let’s start by covering the basics and then we can take a look at your ideas.’
‘Okay, great.’ Pulling her own mug towards her, Laura wrapped her hands around the hot ceramic before locking eyes with Jackson. ‘The most important thing – after actually getting married, of course! – is that we want to incorporate Pennycress into the day as much as we can.’
‘Yes, the inn is such a huge part of our lives now and the very reason we got together in the first place.’ Jackson took Laura’s hand in his.
‘We can definitely do that. Are you thinking of holding just the reception here or the ceremony too?’ Ellie wrote the words, Location – Pennycress Inn, at the top of a page in her notebook before underlining it twice.
Turning to Jackson, Laura widened her eyes before switching her attention back to Ellie. ‘The ceremony? You really think we could actually get married here? Have the ceremony at the inn?’
Ellie nodded. ‘It’s completely possible. Of course, we’d need to apply for a special licence and find a celebrant, but it’s certainly achievable.’
‘Wow, I hadn’t even thought about doing that!’ Laura shifted on the bench. ‘Well, I had, but I just assumed it was a dream too far. I didn’t actually think it might really be possible.’
‘It is.’ Ellie flicked back a page towards the notes she’d taken down when Melissa had given her the details of Laura and Jackson’s wedding, her heart sinking as she read the proposed date of the wedding.
No wonder Melissa had agreed to let her keep the job.
‘I’ve got it written in my notes that you’d like the wedding to be at the end of August? This year?’
‘Yes, that’s right. We did want it sooner. Like as soon as possible, but what with everything’ – Laura swung her hand around in the air, indicating the inn – ‘here being so busy, we decided to push it back to August.’
‘Even then, we know it’s tight.’ Jackson took a sip of his coffee.
‘It’s not too tight, is it?’ Laura began fidgeting with her engagement ring. ‘We’ve still got time to get everything prepared, haven’t we? I mean, I’d happily rock up in jeans and a T-shirt just so I could marry Jackson tomorrow, but I don’t think my parents would ever forgive me.’
‘Haha, you mean they wouldn’t forgive me.’ Jackson chuckled.
Laura shrugged as she laughed. ‘Well, yes, they wouldn’t forgive either of us.’
‘Okay, so that’s decided then. No jeans.
’ Ellie smiled before taking a bite of her slice of fruitcake.
She had a feeling she was going to enjoy working with Laura and Jackson.
They’d both put her at ease and were clearly in love.
Which Ellie had always assumed was a given when people decided to plan their weddings, but the number of couples she’d worked with over the years who had made her just want to shout at them and ask them why on earth they were promising the rest of their lives to each other was shocking.
Still, she was excited to plan Laura and Jackson’s big day.
‘Yep, no jeans. I have seen a few dresses in my magazines but haven’t actually tried anything on yet.’ Laura patted the pile of paperwork in front of her.
Ellie nodded slowly. The wedding day would be at the end of August, and it was now the beginning of June.
They had just under three months to pull this off.
Which was fine. Tight but doable, especially considering they planned to have the reception here in the inn so wouldn’t need to find an available venue.
Securing a licence to marry on the premises might be a little more tricky, but she had a couple of contacts and was confident that, with a little grovelling and promising to pay them back the favour in the future, she might just be able to get one in time.
The dress, though? Nowadays, most wedding dress suppliers encouraged their customers to order a year in advance.
At least. Yes, Laura’s disclosure might be a little problem.
More like a white-knuckle ride, but that was something she could speak to her about alone.
Ellie looked across the table towards her.
Laura was positively glowing with excitement.
The dress topic would be a difficult conversation but one she’d need to have with her.
Later though. Not now, and not in front of Jackson.
‘I’ll give you some time to discuss the possibility of having the ceremony here, but, for now, I’d like to hear more about your vision for the reception. ’
Shifting excitedly on the bench, Laura pulled out two large sketchbooks from the stack of paperwork in front of her. ‘We’ve got a few ideas.’
‘Now that’s an understatement.’ Jackson took one of the sketchbooks from his fiancée’s hand and began riffling through it before laying it down on the table, open on a double-page spread.
‘It is. I mean, we’ve been talking about this for months now, haven’t we?
’ Laura glanced across at Jackson, who nodded.
‘And we’ve also had input from friends and family.
To be honest, that’s one of the reasons we decided to get some help from yourself.
Time is an issue as we’ve both just been run off our feet here at Pennycress and Jackson also has his chef job at the pub some evenings… ’
‘Not that we’re complaining. It’s amazing how booked up we are here now, with our guests as well as private functions, such as birthday parties and the like,’ Jackson chimed in.
‘Exactly. We’re not complaining.’ Laura shook her head.
‘Not at all. But yes, the time issue was one reason we decided to get a professional wedding planner involved. The other is this…’ She laid another sketchbook open on a double-page spread next to the first. ‘We’ve just got so many ideas and we’re really struggling to see what we want. ’
‘Okay.’
‘That doesn’t make sense, does it?’ Laura rubbed at her temples as she leaned her elbows on the surface of the table. ‘I mean, we’d be happy with all of these ideas, any of them, so how do we sort them out and decide which ones to actually use?’
Ellie pulled the sketchbooks towards her and perused the open pages before glancing at Laura and Jackson. ‘Can I have a flick through?’
‘Yes, yes. Of course.’ Laura nodded.
As she turned the pages, she realised Laura and Jackson hadn’t been exaggerating, they literally did have hundreds of ideas.
The only problem was everything was such a jumble, pictures cut out from magazines of pastel-coloured whimsical bunting and shabby-chic table centres were stuck between sketches of glamorous tall vases holding long-stemmed lilies and elegant candlesticks.
It was going to take quite some work to create a theme and style which was both cohesive and incorporated their favourite elements from their extensive research as well as fitting in with the décor of the inn.