Dorset Wedding Photographers Courtenay Photographic Ltd
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So the winner of our Valentines day competition for newly engaged couples has been drawn….and the winner is…….
Liz Mullett!!! 
CONGRATULATIONS Liz…. we will be in touch very soon about your prize!
Best wishes
Courtenay xx
To see Liz’s Engagement story here on our blog, please click the following link – Valentines Competition winner
To everyone else who entered, our thanks, we have loved reading your stories and congratulations once again on your engagements.
A secomd post from me today and one more lovely engagement story for you to read…
Today, please welcome Liz and Martin…
It’s almost a year to the day that Fireman and I became a couple, and during that time I have received what is beginning to feel like an endlessly unhelpful amount of advice. Those older and wiser think I should take things more slowly. It is accepted wisdom that divorces take a long time to recover from. It’s a universal concern that it will be confusing, “bad” even, for my children to see me becoming attached to another man. It is difficult advice to listen to when you’re happy. For my part, I have long since given up trying to understand why couples split up, or for that matter stay together. In the end, what matters is only what they want to do. The rest is just noise.
It has surprised me just how much my divorce and new relationship have become public property. Like pregnancy, it is a life event that people seem very comfortable to comment on, whether or not their advice is solicited, or even welcome. It’s as though these monumental changes can be managed by platitudes, reduced to a universal set of truths. To one-liners better reserved for the greetings card industry: “Don’t get serious for at least a year” “Don’t introduce your kids to him till you’re sure it’s serious” “Make sure he doesn’t want any more children”. I often wonder how my friends would react if I offered that kind of unsolicited advice to them: “Isn’t it time you got a job?” “Your mother is a self absorbed Gorgon!” “Why are you the only person who hasn’t noticed he’s gay?” It is deemed socially inappropriate that I should give this advice, but not that I should listen to theirs. And though it may be well meaning, I find that profoundly irritating.
It’s one of those rare evenings when the kids are all away, there is nothing to do, and the weather is kind. Fireman and I decide to have a barbecue in the back garden. We consider inviting friends but actually I want to be selfish and spend some time just with him. We’re both feeling comfortable and happy in our domestic bliss and I’m fussing around with food and wine and plates and matches and he catches me around the waist and makes me stand still.
“Will you marry me?”
There. Just like that.
It’s no surprise that not one word of the advice I have received over the past year has lodged in or anywhere near my brain. My answer is a reflection only of what I want to do, because I am happy. Is there another kind of answer? Aren’t we just window dressing motives we are ashamed to admit are that selfish? That simple?
“Of course”.
Thank you Liz and Martin, fabulous
So tomorrow is the big day, Valentines day…but later today we shall be announcing the winner of out Valentines day competition. I hope you have enjoyed the few engagement stories we have chosen to share with you. Thank you to everyone who has entered (story published or not), I wish you all the very best of luck. Watch this space!!
Best wishes
Courtenay x
Well today’s story actually comes from someone else, a very good friend of the couple actuall, so I guess this is going to be a surprise in more way’s than one!
Hi My name is Paula, I am writing this on behalf of my two gorgeous friends, Laura Tennant and Chris Sell.
Ive known Laura for many years and to say she was unlucky in love was an understatement, all of her ex boyfirends have been just awful!
She has a lovely little boy called Brendan from a previous relationship and had assumed it would just be the two of them for a good while. Then Laura decided to start looking for romance online and it was there that she finally met Chris.
As her good friends we were all quite wary of the fact she was ‘online dating’. However Chris turned out to be very lovely and since then he has moved from down south in Ware miles and miles up north to Whitby to live with Laura!
He has taken on the role of Daddy wonderfully and they are now expecting their own baby together. Chris proposed to Laura this Xmas and of course she said yes. With their plans of a very tiny wedding getting bigger and bigger and with a new baby on the way I thought this would be a lovely treat for them both.
Laura & Chris
Well what a lovely thing to do Paula, and Laura and Chris, congratulations sounds like you have friends who care about you both very much
Right there is still just about time to enter our fab competition, it closes today!! get your entry in as quickly as you can, as long as its before midnight, we will include you in the draw! Just click the following link and fill in the form, it couldn’t be easier than that- Valentine Competition Good Luck
Today’s recently engaged story comes from Georgia and her man Martin….
My lovely man Martin took me to my favourite restaurant for my 21st Birthday. He gave me a stunning diamond necklace before we had even sat down for starters I thought how lucky I was – it was absolutely stunning and just ‘so me’!
He made me promise that no matter what happened that evening I couldn’t cry because it was my Birthday… and no this didn’t make me suspicious; I blame being blonde, or maybe his trusting face 
! We had our lovely meal and the waiter asked if there was anything else that we needed, I said no, thank you, thinking we would be going home, but Martin ordered another round of drinks.
He then told me I was getting the last part of my Birthday present and told me to close my eyes tight. He placed a box in my hand – but it wasn’t a ring size box, more the size a bracelet would come in, and I honestly thought it was going to be to match my lovely necklace. Then he told me to open my eyes, and that he had asked my fathers permission…..What!!…. The ring was stunning!!! “Will you wear it on your special finger” was all he needed to say and as quick as a flash, it was out of the box and on my finger
Thank goodness he made me promise not to cry or my make up would have been everywhere. But you can’t break a promise that early on in a relationship can you??…. But that is our story and I’m still smiling like a Cheshire cat 
Thank you Georgia, lovely story
Why don’t you enter our fab competition, you could win a night out on us at your favourite restaurant and a free engagement shoot! Just click the following link and fill in the form, it couldn’t be easier than that- Valentine Competition
Another enagement story that has been entered into our fabulous Valentines competition … today I would like to introuduce you to Sam!
We first met in 2009, when I started a new job & he was my supervisor. I didn’t like him at first, as i was shy & quiet to begin with as you are when you start a new job! Chris was sarcastic, and often made me feel put down with his oh so ‘witty comments’!
I first started fancying him when I was cold one day and he offered his jacket to me. I forgot to give him the jacket back at the end of the day, However with him being a staff supervisor he had access to all staff contact details and so proceeded to text me about his jacket. From then on we text regularly & just hit it off, and on November 24th 2009 we officially made it as a couple!
So last year, as our two year anniversary was coming up, we decided to do something special and booked a 4 night stay in a log cabin in the Forest of Dean, which was fabulous with its heated hot tub outside and a real log burning fire.
On the day of our anniversary, we planned to cook a nice meal, get dressed up as if we were going out to a restaurant. In the morning I gave Chris his gift, and he presented me with a box which he told me I couldn’t open till later on, I thought nothing of this. As we ate dinner we had our favourite album on, The Phantom of the Opera. After we ate, Chris asked me to dance, which we did in front of the roaring fire, very romantic. Just as the song was about to finish, Chris handed me back the box to open which I did, whilst I held the box he opened the lid, took out the ring and got down on one knee! It was a beautiful moment, one I shall never forget.
Just after Chris proposed, showing off the ring!
Another great story, thank you Sam and Chris.
There is still time to enter our fab competition, just click the following link and fill in the form, it couldn’t be easier than that- Valentine Competition
Continuing with our current theme of recently engaged couples here is another lovely story, this time from Cheryl…
A friend of mine asked to spend the day with me before I left uni for the Christmas holidays and as I study in Stirling we decided to head up the Wallace Monument. At the top my friend suggested I ask someone to take a photograph of us so I approached the only man also on the top with us. Imagine my surprise when I finished asking the question only for my Boyfriend to take down his hood and spin around, pull out and ring, drop down to one knee and propose!! He had been planning it for months – asking my Dad’s permission, my mum’s advice on the ring and booking flights to Scotland to surprise me Just perfect!
The actual moment!!
Wow Cheryl, what a surprise that was! But a great one all the same
Come on, there is still time to enter our fab competition, just click the following link and fill in the form, it couldn’t be easier than that- Valentine Competition
Here is another lovely story of a newly engaged couple, who have entered our fab Valentines Competition! Sharing her story with us today is Michelle….
So..!! in March last year I had almost given up hope of meeting Mr Wright – there were certainly plenty of Mr Wrongs, Mr Not rights nows and dozens of Mr your so not right its wrong! After a pretty heavy weekend on the tiles I decided to go and meet a bunch of mates for a late sunday nightcap… dressed it on old baggy tea-stained jumper, hair scraped back and black mascara smudged over my face I was not a pretty site to say the least as I melted into the comfy leather sofa and pulled out the Sunday papers..
Then along came Jack. He was so good-looking I went the same crimson shade as my half-chipped nail polish.. Tall, rugged and hansom, my prince charming, the man I had been waiting for my whole life, strolled into the pub the minute I turn up like i should be one of the ugly sisters scrubbing the floor! Disaster – they say you make your mind up in 3 seconds – well I thought it would be a one micro-second look at me and he would be off.. as i hid behind my broadsheet I realised i was going to have to speak to him, he had plonked his cute little butt right next to me!
I took a deep breath, pretended I looked like Angelina Jolie and charmed his pants off – some say I put a ‘shell spell’ on him and spiked his drink but there is no evidence to prove that…
So we exchanged numbers and I should have been over the moon.. small problem, I work in motorsports and was off in four days for 6 very long weeks – to the other side of the world! Dam it! I told him, you better ask me out quick because I’m off soon! subtle was never my strong point! and we spent the next four blissful days together before I flew to Melbourne…
Writing about it now it sounds crazy, but after two weeks, daily emails and phone calls, I missed him so much I asked him, half joking, to come and meet me.. and he did!! We met on a beach in Thailand exactly one month after we met – it was our fifth date!
After a blissful two weeks in paradise, we returned home to the UK, got a place together and have never been apart since! After what can only be described as a magical Xmas Jack whisked me off to New York. After an afternoon strolling round central park on New Years Eve and a trip to the Zoo, he made me climb on to this huge rock, called childrens mountain, and whilst I thought I was standing there to have my picture taken like a numpty, Jack dropped to one knee and pulled out a dazzler of a diamond and asked me to be his wife.
YES, YES, YES!!! I know its quick but not one person has ever questioned it, they say we were made for each other. I love Jack with all my heart and he really makes me the happiest girl in the world and also….. he still loves me in my joggers and tea-stained jumper!
Another fab enagement story, thanks so much for sharing Michelle and good luck with the competition.
What about you?…You still have a chance, there is still time to enter our fab competition, just click the following link and fill in the form, it couldn’t be easier than that- Valentine Competition
