Dorothea & Jack - Karoo Farm Wedding

Dorothea & Jack - Karoo Farm Wedding - 13 Junie 2015

From the moment we drove up to the farm I knew that this was going to be a special wedding! Everywhere you looked, there was something special that was done just for the wedding . (Remind yourself that this is a working farm and that this is the first and probably only wedding that will ever be held here...)I only met Jack and Dorothea the day before the wedding since they live in Johannesburg and only came down to Beaufort West to get married. As soon as I met Dorothea for the first time I saw the excitement in her eyes and that got me really excited too.Everybody pitched in to make Jack and Dorothea's day extra special and almost everything was DIY!On the day of the wedding, everything went according to plan. The weather played along for the most part except for a fairly strong breeze but that was no problem at all.The wedding car was Dorothea's father's first car and it just had to be part of the wedding.Dorothea had some special areas in mind for the couple shoot. Since she grew up o the farm I trusted that she knew what she was doing and it paid off...BIG TIME!! We all got into Jack's Fortuner and off we went, stopping here and there. Just as the light was beginning to fade, Dorothea said that she wanted to go to a certain hill overlooking the farm and when we got there I wondered if we were going to be able to pull it off, since there was nothing else but the hill but when we got to the top the clouds opened up just a little bit to let the last sunlight through and what an epic view it was!! Just to put the cherry on top; Dorothea's horses showed up and one more of her dreams for her wedding day came true, to get some photos with her horses!When we got back to the farm yard for the reception everybody gathered outside the "stoor" for the lighting of the bonfire. Jack and Dorothea didn't cut the cake as usual, they lit the fire, which was very unique and a first for me.We had the best time at the reception and we were treated like family and not for one moment did we feel like service providers.Thank you very much Jack and Dorothea and both your families! -Tertius

The couple were on Dorothea's family farm for December holidays and had to give the lambs milk every afternoon. Jack asked that they should get going... " afterwards, by the dam at the camp where the tame lambs were, he asked me if he could see the fish? We walked to the dam and I even told him that you can’t see the fish with the dirty water and that we should rather take a selfie with the windmill in the background and then, instead of taking out his phone, he took out the box with the ring in it and went down on one knee...

Jack and Dorothea met on a blind date at Ed's Diner: "He came all the way from Johannesburg to Pretoria to meet me! Not something he would usually do. I phoned him to find out how I would know its him and he told me that he would be wearing a red, heart shaped tie. I almost turned around in the parking lot. But we met and after that he could stop phoning me."

" I went to look at dresses with one of my bridesmaids, Natasha. We went to a very expensive dress shop that imports their dresses from overseas, because I saw the dress I like on their website the day before. I must have fitted 20 dresses and Natasha cried with every second one! When I fitted the one that I wore on my wedding day I knew it was too expensive for me to afford." Dorothea's friend was able to make her the dress from a picture.

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue? "My cousins came to see me the morning of our wedding, Mari, Henriette, Talita and Matilda, they had a whole gift bag of things and I ended up borrowing my one cousin's purse that she had at her wedding. My something new was my pearl bracelets, my something blue was in my garter and something old was my mother's pearl earings."

How did the wedding reflect your personality as a couple? "It definitely reflected what we loved most; the farm and the outdoors. We wanted to be close to nature and down to earth. Both of us aren't very worried about what is modern and we wanted the rustic farm feel on our special day."

"The bridesmaids did the table settings, the boards on the way to the chapel, almost everything on the farm was DIY thanks to Rietjie, Wyand Snr, Wynand Jnr, Natasha, Margo, Nicci, Rudolph and the guys from Jacks work!"

Any hints for other brides on how to keep your wedding budget friendly? "Always remember; it is still only one day of your life and you can get married in a black plastic bag and it still won’t matter as the groom will always think you are the most beautiful on that day! The music, food and a big enough dance floor is usually far more important to have a good party than the table settings and flowers. And enjoy the day!"