wedding cafe new zealand

The thought of formality, which is what wedding vows are about, can scare people.

This “scaring” is something that Auckland celebrant Ross Johnson is concerned about and he finds writing your own wedding vows can help put such fears to rest.

“A wedding should be a fun occasion and the only starchy, rigid part is often the vows,” he says. “I often ask people, ‘Do you want a wedding with laughter or a formal one?’”

Ross has conducted 100 weddings and at all of them the …

Want to stretch the drinks budget, encourage some alcohol-free drinking and still pack a punch?
Well, this punch recipe below will do all of the above, with the added bonus that teens often think it’s alcoholic, though it isn’t. The ginger ale gives it a bit of bite that the less alcohol-savvy can mistake for the real thing. It tastes nice too and has been lapped up at every party we’ve ever served it up at, by grown-ups and kids alike.
It’s also cheap when compared with …

When it comes to weddings, it seems a little simplicity can go a long way. Too posh can mean no fun, and even no memories
Of course, you want your wedding day to be a truly memorable day, but it’s also easy to get carried away. The trouble is a too-grand wedding has its drawbacks. Relationship Services counsellor Gilbert McMillan says he’s come across many couples who say they don’t remember much about their wedding day. “It was too formal, too grand, and they couldn’t …

It’s all about people.
Of course you knew that. But the trick is in managing them to see their needs don’t over-shadow yours on what should be your day. Fortunately, there are ways of negotiating such difficulties. We spoke to Gilbert McMillan, long-time counsellor from Relationship Services.
Contrary to what you might think, Gilbert’s job isn’t just to be the ambulance that picks the pieces up at the bottom of the relationship cliff. It’s also about helping people negotiate the intricacies of normal relationships …

There’s an art to giving a good wedding speech and it’s not too hard, especially if you follow a few simple rules. The main one is: don’t embarrass the bride.
This often happens because it tends to be the men of the wedding party who give speeches. And, despite having rarely given one, they think they’ll wing it. They’ll tell a few jokes and ‘she’ll be right’.
Bruce Byers, whose business is coaching people to give speeches, says they can end up upsetting guests as …

Once upon a time, a bride’s parents paid the wedding bill. However, this is often not the case now. In these more egalitarian times, about two-thirds of couples now pay for their own wedding.
While this means, as the bride and groom, you can call the shots on what you do and don’t want, it also means you might be feeling squeezed as we crawl out of the recession.
People are still getting married. More 22,000 weddings will be held in New Zealand this year …