A medieval Pagan handfasting vow renewal

The offbeat couple: Kjirsten (Supreme Ladypop and Ruler of Planet Hartwell) & Bruce (Internal Sales Legend and Minion Controller of Planet Hartwell)

Date and location of wedding: Mount Gravatt Showgrounds, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia — June 25, 2011

Our offbeat wedding at a glance: Our first wedding was traditional (church, white dress, random relatives we didn't really know, etc.). We decided to do our 20th anniversary re-vow the way we'd always wanted: a medieval-style handfasting with some Pagan elements, and a big knees-up.

We had a maypole, pinatas, everyone came in costume, and our sons, mates, and dogs were in the wedding party. In a way, it was more meaningful than our original wedding. Anyone can make promises, but keeping them “through thick and thin” takes a whole lot more effort.

We did just about everything ourselves including decorating, invitations, flowers, favours, and maypole. My amazing mother made 21 costumes for the entire wedding party. (She has since had cataract surgery. I'm hoping the two weren't related.) I'm a huge fan of bargain shopping and a total thrift shop junkie, so my dress was made from curtain material and the underskirt came from a church basement thrift shop.

A mate of mine took the photos for free. I figured I couldn't go wrong. At our original wedding we paid a fortune and didn't get ONE full-length photo of me and hubby together!

The reception was held in a local hall (at the top of our street) so we just walked to the wedding. We bought a bunch of huge bubble wands for the kids from a discount shop and had battery-operated candles on the tables. Very child-friendly, although the little gremlins kept pinching them off the tables, so by the end of the night we were sitting in the dark!

On our order of ceremony card we had a quote that said, “when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness — and call it love — true love.” That's us in a nutshell.

Tell us about the ceremony: We had a Pagan-inspired handfasting ceremony, performed by my god-daughter. It incorporated casting a circle, calling the elements, and sharing a cup. We had all my little nieces and nephews and my best mate's kids as attendants. They took it SO seriously, and were awesome. We promised to love each other “from the rising of the moon to the setting of the stars.” We exchanged torcs instead of rings. Our sons wore them to the ceremony and then presented them to us at the appropriate moment.

Our biggest challenge: For me personally, it was dressing up. It was really hard to do that whole “centre of attention” deal. It's not comfortable for me at all. I went for a trial make-up appointment at a local place, and the woman made me look like an extra from Priscilla Queen of the Desert. I cried for hours after I finally got home. I was ready to call it all off then. But my niece/bridesmaid came to the rescue and showed me how to apply makeup that still made me recognisable to my kids.

My favorite moment: Having my best mate in the world give me away. My dad passed away 10 years ago, so it meant so much that he traveled 1500 kms to be there for me.

Making promises to my husband, while my eleven year-old sang “peanut butter jelly time” under his breath. It totally summed up our life.

I also loved watching my husband watch me walk towards him, knowing I looked beautiful. As a mother of two special needs boys, my appearance is so far down my list of things that have to be dealt with that I wear flannel pajama pants as my day-to-day day wardrobe. I mean, they don't have teddy bears or hearts on them, but they're not stylish. But, the kids on the school crossing think they're cool.

My funniest moment: My dog Benson barked all the way through because he was sure that the incense burner on the altar was a barbecue and he was hungry.

My best mate looking out the window as my husband and his attendants walked to the altar, and announcing, “Here comes Bruce and a battalion of Smurfs” (since we had a lot of little attendants).

Was there anything you were sure was going to be a total disaster that unexpectedly turned out great? The maypole. We were so sure that our slightly conservative families would take one look and run away screaming, but they loved it! It was a total exercise in medieval cat herding, but brilliant, nonetheless.

Asking people to dress the part. But everyone did it! My father-in-law and grandfather of many dressed as a monk. My god-daughter was in a massive pair of black wings. My niece, her boyfriend, and little daughter were dressed as Vikings.

My advice for offbeat brides: Do it the way you want. Please please please. You'll thank me later. When you look at your photos and you get nothing but good vibes, you'll be so glad you did. I promise.

Don't be afraid to look outside the box… way way outside. I dumpster dived onto my wedding underskirt. It was buried under a mountain of whiffy woollen jumpers in a tiny church basement. Turns out there were eight metres of material in the skirt and the same material in the shops went for $89 a metre.

Have you been married before and if so, what did you do differently? EVERYTHING. Last time was what everyone expected from a young couple getting married. This time it was what people had come to expect from the two of us after 20 years together. We did what we wanted, wore what we wanted, and said what we wanted to say.

What was the most important lesson you learned from your wedding? Don't sweat the small stuff. Seriously. No one remembers that shit afterwards, and if they do, it's generally with a giggle, so it's all good. Write down the funny stuff right afterwards before you forget. With ten little people in our wedding party, some of the stuff they said was priceless. Our smallest flower girl announced that she wanted “a bell and a wand. And some lady hair. Like Uncle Bruce.”

My 11-year-old, when asked what he wanted to wear to the wedding, responded with “a longbow and some arrows, a brace of throwing knives, a broadsword, and a battle-axe.” When I announced to the page-boy that we were “getting married, not fighting Orcs” one of them replied, “Yeah, ‘cos if there were Orcs, you'd probably get married inside, huh?”

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

• Invitations, place cards, and order of ceremony cards: freebies from VistaPrint.
• Costumes for the wedding party: the House of Mother. Thanks, mum, you totally rock.
• Wedding decor, cups on the tables, and table covers: thrift shops. We got 100 assorted earthenware cups/bowls from a thrift shop for $10 if we agreed to re-donate them after the wedding. TOO EASY!
• Goody bags: made by me, with the little brooms from a local craft shop. The bags had handmade chocolates and gingerbreads that Bruce and I made and toffee apples.
• Cake: was made by a friend of my sister-in-law. She does them as a hobby, and it was to die for.