Wanting to begin their married life with an adventure, Maddison and Scott made a complete switch in climates to travel from Australia to Germany, a destination new to both of them, for a wintry micro wedding in snowy Bavaria. With a backdrop as breathtaking as Lake Eibsee, Maddison chose a gorgeous, long-sleeved BHLDN gown to match the naturally muted color palette of the Alps and carried a simple, snowflake-like bouquet of gypsophila and feverfew by Blumen Rosl. Just one look and you’ll agree these incredible photos from Wild Connections Photography are pure winter magic right out of the pages of a fairy tale!
How did you meet?
Scott and I met in high school! I met him on my second day of Grade eight (the first year of our secondary school here in Australia). I was at a new school, and wanted to try out the choir. We quickly became friends and were friends for almost 4 years before getting together!
What is your proposal story?
Scott and I actually love to travel when we can and decided to plan a trip to Japan a few years ago. Little did I know, this would be the trip that we would get engaged on! We both love Japan, and were so excited to be going to a place we were comfortable in, to see new sites, all of it! Almost a week into our trip, we had organised one particular day to attend Tokyo Disneyland. I’m a big Disney fan and always have been, but have never had the opportunity to go to the parks. On this day, it panned out so magically. I was already in awe of the magnitude of the parks, how they brought so much life and fun from my childhood into reality. We spent the day doing normal Disney things, and at night went to watch the night time light shows. After 2 or 3 shows (in which I had already cried during) Scott advised he needed to run to the bathroom for a bit, to which I was left in the middle of a big Disney park admiring the sites. A few minutes later of the loud speaker, the attendant advised that the night time main firework show had been cancelled due to the weather (It was winter there and extraordinarily cold and frosty). Although it would’ve been nice to see, I wasn’t really disappointed as I had gotten so much more than I asked for that day. But a few minutes after that, Scott came back to me extremely disappointed to which I asked why. At that moment I couldn’t have predicted that a short moment later, he proposed. With shivering hands from nerves and the cold, he told me he loved me, asked the question and he slipped a ring on my finger and that was that. Pretty perfect if I do say so myself.
What was the most important to the two of you while planning? Was there anything that you chose to splurge on or skip?
The most important things for me included the setting and the music. Somewhere beautiful, and music to pull at the heartstrings. Two of my favourite things. My partner really wanted somewhere that we could remember! I think we got that. Ultimately, we got everything we wanted. Peach Perfect provided everything we could have ever asked for and more, which meant we didn’t really have to go out of budget to get what we wanted, nor did we skip out on anything. They really provided the whole package.
What were your favorite parts of the day?
Oh dear! This is the interesting part. Unfortunately I was extremely sick with food poisoning on the day of the wedding of all days. I could go into detail, but ultimately it included an ambulance, wonderful care (and some medicine) which our wonderful videographer and photographer organised, a whole lot of courage, and a fantastic hair and make-up artist who made me feel beautiful in an awful situation. Without this dream team I don’t know what I would have done. But I can confirm my favourite part (as was my husband’s) was and always will be walking down the aisle, in such a magical place, with whimsical music, getting married to my favourite person. It was a dream. Thanks to my wonderful celebrant, Yvonne Beck, the ceremony went off without a hitch and made the day so special.
What did you do for favors?
Fortunately with elopements, we actually didn’t have a whole lot of people to think about. So we ended up not doing favours, and have organised small dinners with everyone since we returned to thank them individually!
Did you include any family heirlooms or special traditions?
We did have a handfasting ceremony within the ceremony thanks to our absolutely wonderful celebrant Yvonne. Yvonne gave us the idea early in the planning process, and to be honest, it made the ceremony so much more special to us. We were literally “tying the knot” as they would say!
Do you have any advice for couples planning their weddings now?
Think about what is special to you. Also think about how you can make something special within yourself. For us, we knew we had priorities to buy a house, and although a huge wedding with lots of people was something we thought about often, an elopement made special by us and a wonderful team of people was equally as wonderful, if not better.
What’s your biggest piece of advice for other couples planning a mountain wedding?
You are special together, and you always will be. Translate that into a wedding and you’ll find you have all the magic you need to plan a wedding that you want.