Back
Our 50th Wedding Anniversary
Celebrating our 50th wedding anniversary is a wonderful achievement and as such I wanted to surprise my bride of 50 years past with a party. This wasn't going to be easy, trying to sort out lists of people to invite, then making and sending the invitations, just two of the initial problems. Trying to produce the invitations and to make them personal to us, without Pam seeing them, in the making and being printed was a task and an half. Constantly having an ear cocked to pick up if she was coming near, quickly changing the computer screen to some other program. When it came to printing and posting I had to wait until Pam, either went to the shops, or out with friends.
Above: The first invitation that I sent out, not knowing at that stage where the venue would be, possibly because I hadn't at that time started looking.
I did have a couple of venues in mind, but quickly found out that the current negative response from companies to emails is spreading. Having sent out three enquiries, not one responded! How do they hope to keep in business? My first choice of venue was the "Punch Bowl" on Porchester Road, the venue of Kirsty and Richards wedding reception. I rang to arrange to visit, as they had the date free, but sadly found the approach to the upstairs room to be bitterly disapointing, untidy, poorly maintained and drab. The room very much as I remember from the wedding reception, but once more dull and in desperate need of decoration. I provisionally booked the room, with hope that I could find something better, and quickly. Next stop on my tour, all this being done without the knowledge of my good lady, was to our actual destination at the "Poppy & Pint". I visited here with Joanne & Kirsty, and both instantly approved. Venue thankfully booked and room hire payment made. All I needed to do now, as far as the room was concerned, was organise the food selection and notify those people who said they could attend, where they were meant to be and at what time.
Above: Our chosen venue for Pam's surprise party, using the upstairs function room.
With the venue decided I then had to set about printing cards detailing the venue and the time that I would like people to arrive at, earlier, please, than Pam & I, in order to complete the surprise. In addition, as Pam & I found the venue difficult to locate, we would need a map to help those less familiar with the area. Ben, came to the rescue on the production of the latter, using his incredible skills on the computer to produce a detailed map, with directions from both east and west of the city. Another task now for Kirsty in following up the responses, with posting the venue and time details. All this time Joanne and I have been scheming on the room decoration, with Joanne organising the flower arrangements for the tables, the gift boxes and mints for inside, for each table. She had also picked up on my wish to present the bridesmaid and page boy,that we had invited, with a gift, and came up with brilliant wine bottle holders that could have the various names and roles that they played on the day, printed onto the bag. An excellent idea this turned out to be. Between us we would prepare banners, with me printing appropriate sized and decorated banners and Jo applying these to the bunting we used for Pams 70th birthday party, which I had carefully saved. In addition Jo was to organise balloons for the room and tables, which on the day all looked superb.
I very much wanted the party to be a surprise and special in every way possible. To achieve this I needed the help of someone who back in July last year made a promise to Pam regarding the use of a limousine. Whilst at Pat & Vics wedding, waiting for them to return to the reception, Pam got talking to the driver, and mentioned the fiasco with her wedding car. We had ordered and paid for a wedding car, but what turned up was an ordinary taxi, much to Pams, her Father and my dissapointment. She happened to mention this to Nigel, the driver, who instantly said that he would be glad to provide us with a car to take us for a meal or just for a run out at no expense. Pam and I were shocked at Nigels generosity. I wished now to contact him, to see if the offer was still available and if so could he be avaialble to pick us up from home and take us to the venue on the day of our anniversary. I obtained his details from Pat Winters and then secretly started to make contact with him. Our attempts at secret emails and phone calls would have suited the pages of a "Le Carre" novel, but thankfully all came together and on the morning of our anniversary, with us just about dressed to go, the door bell rang, which I got Pam to answer. Her surprise was as I had expected, shear delight to see the car outside, bedecked in white ribbons and Nigel standing there equally well turned out, to chaffeur us to the party. Tears immediately erupted, of joy, at the site of the car. Just the start I had hoped for, of one surprise, hopefully, after another.
Above: Pam & I standing next to our transport, which was to take us, to our party, with the family. Photo taken by Nigel, our chaffeur.
I had invited around 50 of our friends and family and, as an additional surprise, two of our bridesmaids, from way back in 1967. One was my cousin Jane, the other a work friend of Pams at the time, Josie. Pam in passing conversation, some weeks earlier, when I furtively got onto the subject of our wedding, mentioned that Gill Blood, her long time friend from Alvaston, a Derby school pal, who she meets up with, had contact or knowledge of Josie. Gill was contacted, once again in true "Le Carre" style, with a number of clandestine phone calls and messages. Eventually, Gill gave me the contact details I needed and off went a letter to both Jane and Josie asking if they could attend, stressing the secrecy of the invitation and how pleasing it would be if both they and their respective partners could attend. Having issued the list to Kirsty, of those invited, so that she could record the responses, she refused to detail who had actually responded, saying this was to be a surprise for me as much as it hopefully would be for Pam.
In the end 42 people were waiting in the room to greet Pam & I as we made our entry. The surprise was complete, Pam had no idea what she was going to be greeted with as she climb the stairs and swept through the doors, which seconds previously had been screened, most effectively by Kirsty and her out-stretched arms, thus blocking the glass windows in the door, through which the assembled friends could be seen.
Pams genuine look of surprise, my second surprise had been accomplished, one very happy bride.
My surprise had worked and for which I am grateful to the people in the room who had helped me achieve my goal. Time now to relax, enjoy the company and the food about to be served
PICTURE 1: Shows Eddie & Josie Lacy (Josie was one of Pams bridesmaids), Gil, Cath, Val, Rose & Lynn, who are Pams Derby girls, all friends from school days.
PICTURE 2: Shows our square dance friends, seated left to right is Barry, Kay, Christine, Phil, Janet, Pat, Vic and Annie and standing, Ted (La La) and Irene.
PICTURE 3: Shows Family and friends. Dorothy, our very best neighbour, (Grenville is at the bar), then Andrew (Page Boy back in March 67), Donna, Les, Brenda (chief bridesmaid in 67), Jane my cousin (Bridesmaid in 67) and Phil - Janes hubby.
PICTURE 4: Shows our dear friends, Tom and Joyce, Jan & Geoff and Pat. (Dave is taking the picture)
PICTURE 5: Shows work colleagues of Pam from the University, with the addition of another of our dear friends Trish. From left to right, should have been Carolyn, who was another at the bar, Angela, then Trish, Janet and hubby Stuart. In the background is Rachel talking to Mr Balloon head, alias Jacob. Kirsty is disappearing through the door and Joanne heading for the bar!
Other people as important who were there was Joanne, Jo and Rachel, Kirsty, Jacob and Ben, but sadly no Richard who couldn't attend due to his leg injury.
An amazing way that we were able to celebrate, our 50th,was by being able to bring together a number of participants from the very day, to take us back to the 25th March 1967. Of the 5 bridesmaid and page boy, I was able to bring together again 3 of the bridesmaid and the page boy. Wendy, Pams sister, was unable to attend as Neville her hubby is not well and Wendy likes to spend as much time with him as possible, Janine the little page girl I was just unable to trace. The first picture above shows Jane, Brenda, Andrew, Yours truly, Pam, Josie, little Janine and Wendy on the day. The second picture shows in the same order Jane, Brenda, Andrew, me and Pam and Josie 50 years later. It was an honour to be able to bring the group of people back for this special occasion. I hope that they enjoyed the day as much as Pam and I most certainly did. As a memento of the day, Pam & I had presented them each with a bottle of wine, in specially produced bags, showing their names, the fact that they were either Chief bridesmaid, bridesmaid or page boy and the date 25th March 1967.
Family photos from the day. The first a group shot, sadly missing Emma, who living in Plymouth, obviously found it difficult to make the journey there and back over the weekend. The second with our two gals who had helped so much to make the day special for us both. Without their input the day most certainly wouldn't have run so smoothly. And last but by no means least with our grand children, Jacob - towering over Pam, then Ben, virtually at the same height as Pam, and still growing, and Rachel, sadly no Emma.
The cake, that I had taken a gamble on, by not using Marks & Spencer, but instead going to a firm out at Ollerton. Ordering blind over the internet could have been a disastrophe, but thankfully worked out excellent in the end. Beautifully made and decorated and adorned with the picture I had supplied, again over the internet, and once cut eagerly and happilly devoured by our guests. I even got a piece, which I can't recal having acheived back in March 1967.