30 years ago continued...

 My BF talked all the way home about what had to be done to make my wedding complete and perfect. A new dress, shoes, cake, food, invitations -"oh we haven't time to send invites! oh my goodness who will be able to come to your wedding on a Friday? this Friday! Are you MAD!!!"
Because I love her dearly I just grinned at her and kept on driving. I dropped her off at her home and went back to our little house.
Mr M was in work and I thought I ought to let him know what was happening so I did something that was frowned upon. You have to remember that he works in a steelworks so ringing him is just not that easy. At that time he was working "On the Entry End of The Line" so not something to be interrupted for mundane matters. I thought that telling him the date of his wedding was special so I rang. The Foreman answered the phone when I was finally put through to the Line and after a brief wait Mr M was on the phone.
"I just thought you should know that the wedding is booked for this Friday," I said suddenly feeling very insecure and wondering if he would change his mind or if he ......well it was all so new.
"This Friday?"
"yes, is that OK?"
"That's perfect," he said, with his typical calm, "See you when I get home."
He told me later that as he put the phone down his foreman asked if everything was alright because phone calls like that are usually emergencies. Mr M explained that everything was fine and I was just ringing to say that the wedding was this Friday.
"FRIDAY! THIS FRIDAY? Your getting married this Friday? well you mean b*st*rd! How are we going to have a booze up this week when we are on afternoons and nights? Oh and how can we have a whip round in three days?"
Apparently Mr M shrugged his shoulders, grinned and said "I told her we'd get married when she arranged it and she did."
When the children came home from school I told them that Mr M and I had decided to get married. They assumed that it would be at the start of the summer holidays and immediately began making plans about where we would all go for our honeymoon. I didn't tell them.
On Tuesday morning we went to Monmouth and bought the wedding rings - The jewellers gave us a set of teaspoons as a wedding gift. I also did the shopping for all the stuff to make my wedding cake. On Tuesday afternoon I rang my cousin at whose wedding Mr M and I had met and told her to be at the register office on Friday for 3pm. I contacted Anthony and Jane's parents and got a message to them asking them to be at the wedding
Wednesday and Mr M phoned his parents to tell them the date and time. I rang my Uncle to ask if he would give me away because My parents were not due back until the following week. I so wanted to tell my Mum because she knew that Mr M was so right for me. My Dad still believed that I hadn't worked hard enough at my first marriage so.....
Mr M went off to work the night shift on Wednesday and I began the cake. I used a recipe for fruit cake that I had been using for years and as I was pouring the cake into the tin I ran through the ingredients in my head - butter, flour, eggs, sugar....... SUGAR! there it was, still in the bag on the table! I quickly scraped the cake back out of the cake tin into the bowl and threw the sugar in. No one would ever know. I put the cake in the oven and turned my attention to something savoury. I made dozens of bite sized pasties.  I planned to make sandwiches on the day as well as a rice salad and a green salad. I made four swiss rolls - two with jam and two chocolate ones with chocolate cream filling. I made all sorts of other stuff secure in the knowledge that with Mr M, his brother and my youngest son there would be nothing wasted.
On Thursday morning at 8am the phone rang. It was my Dad ringing from Toronto to see if we were all OK and to remind me that they would be home on Tuesday.
"Dad, when you and Mum got married and sent the telegram to Granny to tell her, what did it say?"
"Um, it said getting married on Saturday, will explain when we see you next week, why?"
"Well, My telegram to you would say Getting married tomorrow, will explain when you get home."
"Oh well, you'd better talk to your mother then." So I did.
Mum was thrilled and asked how the children had taken the news and then she said "So which day is tomorrow for you? I'm a bit confused about what day we are on now."
"Friday Mum, Friday the 19th June."
"Oh, right, the same tomorrow as us. There's something about that date..." she half covered the receiver and spoke to dad. "Bernard, what's special about the 19th June?"
"Nothing much," Dad replied "Unless you count our wedding anniversary."
"Oh yes," said Mum, "I knew there was something on that date. We'll never forget that will we?"
When the children came home from school I told them that they were not going to school the next day because they were coming to the wedding. Whoops of delight told me this was regarded as a Good Thing.
I began putting the marzipan on the cake after Mr M left for work at 8.30pm. at 8.45pm I rang my BF and asked if she still had the bride and groom from the top of her wedding cake. She said she did and she still had the ribbon too. She then asked if I had done all the cleaning and was everything washed and ready.
"What do you mean, washed and ready?" I asked
"All the china, you have washed all the china, haven't you?"
"Well, no, it's clean. Why would I wa......" I was talking to the dial tone.
five minutes later BF came through the door, thrust the box with the bride and groom in it into my hands and went straight past me to the sideboard where we kept the china and glasses. Within two hours she had taken out every last piece of china. Washed, dried and buffed to a shine AND scrubbed out the cupboards, polished the cutlery and scrubbed the kitchen floor. I had put the marzipan on the cake made half a dozen quiches and pulled the butter out of the fridge to soften over night for the sandwiches. She began to leave at the same speed as she arrived, promising to be back at 8am to clean through. I stopped her and explained that Mr M would be home off night shift so no cleaning. She turned around and dragged the cleaner from the cupboard and did the whole downstairs before calling it a night and going home.
On Friday morning.............................to be continued