As a celebrant, I am always standing with the groom waiting nervously for the bride to arrive and I never really have much idea about her journey. Thankfully Kerry and Monique were working with the husband and wife photographic team, Alan & Jackie Rankine so for once I can see how she travelled all the way from the top of the Royal Mile….

Via the Wedding Bus….

All the way across town, past Arthur’s Seat and Salisbury Crags…

To the imposing mass of Craigmillar Castle…

Where a a pair of pickled pipers had been posted on the ramparts to give warning of her arrival…

Monique and Kerry live in London and I first met them a year before their wedding date. Their homework was funny and clever and they were both original and moving on the reasons they love one another.

I liked the way that Kerry chose to have more than one best man – apart from the pleasing visual symmetry, it’s always struck me as a little unfair that a bride can have as many maids as she wants, but the groom’s only allowed one pal.

Craigmillar Castle is a wonderful venue and the place where the naughty Mary Queen of Scots is said to have planned the murder of her dissolute second husband, Lord Darnley.

I should warn you however, that like all most of Historic Scotland’s wonderful properties, it was built with defense rather than comfort in mind. As a result it is absolutely FREEZING even in the middle of summer, so please remember to tell your guests to wrap up warm. I’m serious about this: put it on the invitation!

That said, it didn’t put a chill on Kerry and Monique’s day – after all Canadians are made of sterner stuff and they wrote to tell me that they the whole wedding was a marvellous party, filled with laughter throughout the day and exactly what they had hoped for!

“We reflect often on the ceremony itself, and will continue to do so throughout our marriage,” they wrote. “We were truly delighted with our ceremony, made so personally meaningful in the humanist tradition, namely completely our own.”

My thanks once again to Kerry and Monique and to Alan and Jackie of Rankine Photography for the wonderful shots.