The Final Countdown

It’s hard to believe that we first met our real Dubai bride contributor, Amy Cowin, all the way back in May last year. At the time, Amy’s wedding still seemed to be a fair way off, and yet here we are today with her final diary entry as a Dubai bride-to-be.

Opting to have her wedding at the stunning Al Qasr in March, we have thoroughly enjoyed following Amy’s journey, from her Hen party in France to her beautiful engagement shoot with BCME vendor Lizelle Goussard. We hope you have enjoyed it too. Keep an eye out for Amy’s wedding on BCME soon!

I can’t believe it, there are actually only three weeks to go and after months of planning, I will finally be walking down the aisle at our most favourite place in Dubai, the Al Qasr Hotel. I feel like I’m in some kind of organised chaos at the moment, juggling work, the actual wedding, planning events for our guests, exercising, dieting, vet trips for our diabetic cat and, worst of all, dealing with last-minute dropouts for the wedding – resulting in table plan nightmares (aaaagh) and a few tears before bedtime.

My final dress fitting went extremely well. The finished veil is amazing and I am so happy with it. I think I will want to wear my dress every day, not just once.  Transporting the dress back from the UK to Dubai was a breeze; the bridal shop packed my dress into a soft chest which I carried on as hand luggage. I cannot wait to wear it, or for Nik and all my family and friends to finally see it.

I’ve been really focusing on looking my best for the big day, and whilst Nik was away in the UK I started to use a meal prep service called Eat Clean, Be Strong, just to help me stay on track for the next month up until the wedding. I love not having to think about what to cook for each meal, it’s all just there at 6am on the doorstep!

Whilst Nik has been away I’ve used it as an opportunity to start organising all the little things for the big day. I went to Ikea (on a Thursday night…what was I thinking?!?!) to buy clear boxes to categorise all the props and bits and pieces for the wedding to transport them to the venue. I have boxes for the candy buffet, guest book table, memory wall, etc etc, and I’ve labelled them all with an itemised list inside which will help Nancy and Lucile (the wedding planners) on the day.

Nik arrived back in the UK to find around 6kg worth of sweets waiting for him to transport back to Dubai. It’s so much more cost effective to buy sweets in bulk online. I’ve also been busy putting together some ‘party favour boxes’ to entertain our younger guests during the wedding dinner. I’ve included things like stickers, colouring books and crayons, bubble blowers and mini toys.

On reflection, I’m glad we’ve had 14 months to plan and organise our wedding. It has given us the time we needed to really do all the things we’ve wanted to do without becoming seriously overwhelmed. We’ve had to cross some things off the list along the way due to the budget (which more than doubled by the way) but I know all the personal touches we’ve added to the wedding will really make it our day. I am so excited to share everything we’ve planned with our friends and family and I just know it’s going to be the best day ever.

It’s not long now until our friends and family start arriving in Dubai, so it’s all really starting to feel very real. We’ve organised a BBQ and drinks get together on the beach a couple of nights before the wedding to allow people to meet each other before the big day. Before that, I’ve got my Dubai hen do next weekend…watch out Dubai!

I hope you’ve enjoyed following my journey from Miss to Mrs.

Love, the new Mrs Kalsi xx

xX Amy Xx

Amy’s real wedding will be featured on BCME in a couple of months. Thank you, Amy, and all the best for your big day!