Today I get to share with you the gorgeous outdoor wedding that took place at the Bon-Amis Bloemendal Wine Estate in Durbanville in Cape Town, South Africa from the fabulous Heline Bekker Photography.

Roxie & Shaun’s story started seven years before their wedding day where they met online and when they eventually met, Shaun won Roxie over with how romantically adorable he was. 

He bought me a teddy rose from the nearest toy store and even ordered a kiddies meal from McDonalds just so he could give me the toy spider that came with it! (Let me just add that I LOVE spiders!)

He proposed to me 2 days before my birthday whilst we were away for the weekend. He proclaimed his love for me one evening as we stood on the balcony of the guest house with the ocean waves crashing in the background as well as roses and champagne to the side. He went down on one knee and asked me to be his wife. Queue DROOL!

The fact that I was unable to help with the decorating of the venue the morning of the wedding meant that Shaun and his best man had to do EVERYTHING! All the tree decorations, table set up and décor. Absolutely everything. So when I saw how perfect our little wedding looked when I eventually arrived, I couldn’t help but feel so proud of what my man did! With the help of my brother, nephews and the best man, the highlight was seeing how perfectly executed our planning turned out.

The hand fasting and tree reading that was incorporated into our non-religious ceremony were two of the thing that represented us as a couple. We are both nature lovers as well as enjoy traditional Celtic traditions that compliment my Wiccan beliefs, and having a ceremony that was fully designed to represent us was so special and made things less nerve wrecking.

Shaun also surprised me by pinning pictures of our pet rats and cats on the trees that we stood in front of. He knew how important they are to me and how I would have loved them there.

I can honestly say that 95% of our wedding was DIY. All the table décor was planned and executed by Shaun and myself. My maid of honour and I spent hours the day before the wedding cutting flower stems. Shaun and I had countless late nights doing table mock-ups to make sure we loved what we were planning. Months before the big day we were collecting glass jars (my mum helped a great deal with that!) and found awesome hessian placemats from a craft store for dirt cheap. For confetti we made popcorn and printed out special CORNFETTI signs so the guests would understand it was not to be eaten.

I made all of the wedding stationary including “Bride” and “Groom” signs, save the dates, wedding invites, Guest favour notes and seating names. We made windmills out of scrapbook paper and glued them to kebab sticks for my bridesmaid and maid of honour to hold as well as put them down the aisle with cardboard cut-out hearts painted white, for decoration. We also made paper bunting attached to rope to hang from the roof of the reception venue. I think for me, the most fun yet most stressful part was the table décor.

“It took ages for us to come up with an idea of what we liked and the outcome was absolutely perfect for us.”

“Our tattoos are a huge part of our lifestyle and showing who we truly are in our wedding photographs was very important to us. We did not want to look like completely different people on the most important day of our lives. I wanted to marry my Viking with his visible tattoos and he felt the same for me.”

How awesome are Roxie & Shaun? Thank you to them both for sharing their awesome story and photos with Marry Me Ink today! Be sure to leave them both and photographer Heline Bekker some love!