Wedding Bells: Longford couple remains positive after postponing their wedding due to Covid-19 restrictions

Anyone who has been to a wedding will know that social distancing and the dance floor simply don’t work together. So when lockdown struck, it was an easy decision for James Cawley and his fiancée, Ally Kiernan, to postpone their June wedding and go with a Christmas celebration instead.

James and Ally met online and immediately clicked. Five dates in, they made their relationship official and by their fourth month together, they were engaged. They’ve been together for two and a half years and can’t wait to spend the rest of their lives together.

But tying the knot simply wouldn’t be the same without the smiling faces of their family and friends to witness the momentous occasion. “I think it was early April that we made the decision to change the date,” James told the Longford Leader last week.

“It was the uncertainty that was annoying us, and not knowing if we could go ahead with it or not. Also, I have a big family and Ally has a big family and we’d like for them to be there.”

“We were very logical about it,” Ally agreed. “We said June is not going to be realistic because of Covid-19. This is what we had to do. We wanted to get the earliest date, but the safest date. Now we’re looking forward to a Christmas wedding on December 18th.”

James and Ally love Christmas and feel very lucky to have managed to book the last date before Christmas. They’ve kept a lot of the same plans, with just some minor changes to the colour scheme.

“The venue (Bloomfield House) was free and the cathedral was free on that date, so we sat down and went through it all and I think we had the whole thing rescheduled within an hour,” said James.

“All of our suppliers were available for the new date, except for the wedding singer, so we’ll have to sort that out. But we’re very logical and practical as a couple - a big part of our day-to-day life is about planning and being strategic, so we were able to sit down and think logically about it.”

The original wedding date was last Thursday, June 4, and James and Ally couldn’t let the day go by without marking the occasion.

“We went to the cathedral just before one o’clock and lit candles and just sat there together because we were supposed to be getting married at one o’clock,” said James.

“Then we went back to the house and we ordered a three-course meal from dial-a-chef. The biggest thing is we got to see our parents. And we had messages and texts and flowers. We decorated the house. It was lovely.”

Best of all, it means the happy couple get two special days - one last Thursday and one on December 18th.

“I feel a little bit more excited now. We can do the build-up all over again. We get to do the planning twice,” said Ally.

How long social distancing restrictions will be in place remains to be seen but James and Ally are preparing for the possibility of reducing numbers.

Their wedding guest list currently stands at 250 people approximately but they’re preparing a smaller guestlist of 100 people, just in case there are restrictions in place.

“It’s completely out of our control and people have to understand and if they don’t, well then that’s out of our controls,” Ally explained.

“And if we have to go for 100 people, it just means we’ll have lots of mini celebrations with the people we can’t invite,” James concluded.