We were asked over and over again why we chose dinosaurs as our wedding theme. And I’ll begin answering that question by saying, why on Earth not eh?

There is just something about dinosaurs that Joe and I have always liked. It really is that simple. After hinting for months that we should go and see ‘Stan’ the T-Rex on display at Manchester Museum one weekend, ‘one day’ became a reality on 28th April 2012 – little did I know that it was Joe buttering me up as he prepared to propose to me!

It wasn’t until we had booked our civil ceremony and were thinking about reading ideas that we really decided to go for the dinosaur theme. After a wander around in Waterstone’s, I found A Lovely Love Story by Edward Monkton – a story of two dinosaurs in love who grow old together. We bought the book, and decided then and there that it would be a reading at our wedding and would kick off the theme – It was beautifully read by Joe’s sister Sam and the book we bought went on display on the cake table.

The rest just came as it was planned. Here is what we had:

Aisle Music:

I had this idea in my head that I’d love to walk down the aisle to the Jurassic Park original score. I think when I said this out loud I scared people a little, but trust me when I say it’s classical and really not overbearing. The bridesmaids walked into A Tree For My Bed, and I walked down the aisle to My Friend, The Brachiosaurus. Joe and I walked back down the aisle to Journey to the Island (below) – Click on the links to have a listen and let me know what you think!

Seating Plan

We named each table after a dinosaur, and of course, the head table was Tyrannosaurus Rex! Everyone really got into it and the Brontosaurus table in particular popped a load of pictures on Instagram imitating their nominated dinosaur name – I love this!

Favours

As favours, Joe and I used lime green and black organza bags and filled them with natural dinosaur jelly sweets. I hear they went down a treat – I particularly liked making these as I got to eat the leftovers. It’s the little things…

Stationery

A dinosaur logo, designed by our good friend Boozy was used on our wedding invitations (you can see how I made them here) , orders of the day and post box. You may notice the phrasing too is taken from Jurassic Park 🙂 We saved a fortune making all these ourselves and even Joe helped out when we ran out of PVA glue with the trusty DIY adhesive…

Cake

We chose a local supplier for our cupcakes (seriously, don’t pay hundreds of pounds for a cake – it’s flour and sugar mostly, don’t be ripped off!) We had a cupcake tier based on our colour scheme of black, white and lime green. But, to dino it up we had dinosaur sprinkles on top. So excited by our wedding theme, the shop owner asked if we’d like some cake toppers made and we excitedly said yes! Having seen no designs of the cake toppers prior to the wedding, seeing these for the first time was one of my favourite bits of the day.

Room Decorations

Just for fun, I used Decopatch to create some dinosaur figurines to be dotted around the room. We had some with our cake, some on the postbox and guestbook table, and two little Brontosauruses on our registrar table. Aww.