Our wedding story: a ring sent halfway around the world

Alice Peakin & Enda Forde

Alice, a nurse, and Enda, a maths teacher, were working in Hawaii on J1 working holiday visas when they first met in 2008.

The couple, both from Dublin, have lived in Sydney for the past six years. Enda proposed there in 2014 with his mother’s engagement ring, which was posted to Australia for the occasion.

While at home in Ireland for Alice’s brother’s wedding in 2015, the couple set about planning their own day. “When we came back we had a jam-packed week of meetings with vendors lined up and chose who we liked then,” explains Alice.

“We did our tastings and met the chef of the Glenview Hotel who really impressed us. Everything else was down to email and how quickly people responded to us.”

On July 8th, 2016, the couple married in St Patrick’s Church in Kilquade, Co Wicklow. Maid of honour was the bride’s cousin (“she’s practically my sister”) Heather O’Brien and the groom’s older brother Colm was the best man. The groom’s father is Michael Forde and the bride’s parents are Liam and Helen Peakin.

During the ceremony classical opera singer Siobhán O'Carroll sang with organist Charles Pearson and Alice surprised her new husband with a change in the planned final song to You'll Never Walk Alone.

One of Alice’s favourite parts of the day was “being early for the church and sitting in the Bentley with my dad having a good chat. It’s times like that that I miss when we live so far away.”