The Offbeat Bride: Miranda, payroll and admin (and Offbeat Bride member)

Her offbeat partner: Nathan, student support officer

Date and location of wedding: Glen Davis Boutique Hotel, NSW, Australia - March 29, 2014

Our offbeat wedding at a glance: Our wedding was a weekend-long escape from civilisation. We booked out a hotel in the middle of nowhere, aka Glen Davis, population... probably 30 or so. Despite the grand plans, we were working on a pretty tight budget so anything that could be was DIYed.

I wore a knee-length dress and $15 heels and did my own makeup - with very shaky hands! We walked down the aisle together, arm-in-arm to satisfy my feminist side. There was no bouquet or garter tossing, but there WAS a very tipsy first dance. Our reception was held outside the hotel, under a beautiful fairy light canopy created by my stepfather. It was a very laid-back event. We had picnic blankets and Pimm's, badminton, and trampolines. I was running around in gum boots in the rain on Friday, and swimming in a velvet one piece on the Sunday.

Tell us about the ceremony:
Our celebrant made us fill in a questionnairre about each other, which was really hard to do! But it paid off. The ceremony was personal, touching, and funny. The highlight would be when my stepdad read for us Robert Fulghum's"Union." All the bridesmaids started crying.

Our biggest challenge:
Our budget was a big issue, because for some reason we decided to build a house at the same time as plan a wedding! We could pay for food, photographer, furniture, alcohol, and the celebrant, but there was no room left in the budget for anything else. So all the decor and stationery was DIYed. One of my bridesmaids made the cake for us, another bridesmaid did all the music playlists, my stepdad was in charge of the fairy lights. Nathan's grandmother sewed together picnic blankets using material I sourced from discount bins in curtain shops and $2 tablecloths. My mum went down to the flower markets and spent $100 on flowers, and our families sat around on the morning of the wedding making all our bouquets and boutonnieres. If they weren't making bouquets they were helping to set up tables, hang my ridiculously heavy photo frame collage, or a billion other things. It was really overwhelming how everybody was so happy to chip in.

My favorite moment:
I've never had a middle name, and when trying to figure out what to do regarding a potential name change, I had a stroke of genius. I christened myself Miranda Elliott Surname, after my maternal great-grandmother, who moved to Australia, but I didn't tell anybody except Nathan. So after the ceremony was over, I got to explain what I'd done to my mother and grandmother, and it was a lovely surprise.

We hadn't really planned for speeches, but on the day a lot of people had lovely things to say to and about us! My family isn't one that expresses emotion openly, so it was really touching to hear.

My favourite bit was actually the fact that we had no mobile phone coverage (seriously isolated little town). It was kind of weird how quickly we all adapted to not using our phones, and it was sort of sad to get sucked back into it when we returned to civilisation.

My funniest moment:
Despite my best efforts, I'm always the girl with holey tights and disheveled hair, who gets pockets caught on door handles all the time (seriously am I the only one?). I had a ladder in my pantyhose before the ceremony even started! So I knew I'd do something to ruin the graceful bride vibe. I managed to get tangled up in some chairs and fell over in a spectacular fashion. I was just glad it was at the end of the night!

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

Enough talk - show me the wedding porn!