Christine & Emma – An Emotional Small Guestlist Wedding

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With a guestlist of just 15, Christine & Emma married in an incredibly emotional ceremony in Brisbane, and spend the evening dining out.

Tell us the story about how Christine and Emall met.

We met on Tinder when Emma sent Christine a message that said “hey” on 24 September 2015. We chatted late into the night and the wee hours of the mornings.

Emma was instructing on an Army course at the time and had no spare time until we finally organized to meet up in person on 16 October 2015. We decided we would go to Mexican for dinner, one drink led to ten, and we went for drunken Mexican.

Emma sealed the deal with a Fireball shot, and Christine has been by her side ever since.

What is your favorite memory together?

We have many favorite memories together – from all of our trips together, whether traveling to Melbourne or our trip to New Zealand to buy our first home! But most recently, one of our most favorite memories was waking up on the morning after the wedding. Looking out to the Story Bridge in Brisbane, finally being married, and going for a walk to get a coffee. Just the two of us – before we met with our guests to have ‘morning after breakfast.’ It’s so corny to say it, but it was the most grounded and ‘right’ we have felt.

You’ve had some setbacks, how did that impact your relationship?

In March 2017, while Emma was playing rugby union, she ruptured her ACL. Meaning she could not work and was forced to take five months off, and we had to pay for her surgery. Our whole lives changed! It was the most challenging five months of our lives emotionally, mentally, financially, and physically!

However, this experience honestly helped form our relationship to what it is today! During this period, we became each other’s rock, learning the importance of communication, comfortable silences, and that it is okay to ask for help.

Tell us about your proposal.

Emma decided she wanted to propose and, as usual, went out immediately and brought the ring. However, once the purchase was made, she realized she hadn’t thought about how that would happen!

So, she then researched (as she does with everything) and finally organized a grand proposal in Melbourne (our favorite city) on their upcoming trip. Emma had engaged a local artist, and together, they designed “My Queen C, Will you marry me? Love EB,” which was sprayed in graffiti on the wall of Hosier Lane.

Emma was very much out of her comfort zone, being a private person and publicly declaring her love for Christine. So we spent the afternoon being wined and dined around Melbourne city and had the most fantastic dinner at Ginger Boy Restaurant! Demolishing way too many ‘Gin no names’ cocktails.

Tell us about your wedding day.

We had planned a larger wedding with around sixty-five guests for 7 July 2020, exactly two years after getting engaged. But, like so many other couples, we had to postpone thanks to Covid-19! So fast forward to April 2021, and Covid was still rearing its ugly head here in Brisbane. So we decided to reduce our numbers from sixty-five to just fifteen people – immediate family, our bridesmaid, and two of our closest friends.

The weekend before the wedding, there was another Covid outbreak in Brisbane, and we entered a snap three-day lockdown. It was a stressful three days, and it wasn’t until the lockdown lifted on the Monday that we knew we could actually get married.

Fast forward through the lockdown to the morning of 7 July 2021, and honestly, it was a perfect day! We woke up to a crisp Brisbane morning, not a cloud in the sky. We spent the whole morning getting ready together, drinking coffee, and sipping champagne with our mothers and bridesmaids. Unfortunately, due to the Covid situation in Sydney, one of our bridesmaids could not travel to Brisbane, but she witnessed our day on FaceTime.

Our ceremony was personal, intimate, and bloody emotional and we don’t think there was a dry eye in the room. We wanted to celebrate finally being married with our guests, so we did what we do best. We went out for dinner at one of our favorite restaurants in Brisbane – Fatcow Steak and Lobster restaurant with our guests.

Both our mothers commented that our wedding day was just so us and that’s all we could ask for! We did what we wanted and didn’t let anyone’s opinion or ‘expectation’ of us get in the way of making our day inauthentically us.