Hope everyone is enjoying the spring weather that seems to have made an appearance recently.
So, at the weekend I went on a hen party, not just any hen party, but my best friend's hen party. I was asked to be Maid of Honour last year and I couldn't have been more thrilled to be part of her big day and that's when I realised I would have to plan the send off to end all send off's. Nervous!
After a bit of brainstorming between myself and the bride-to-be on where to go, (Lisbon was a strong favourite) we opted for Edinburgh, and what a good choice it was! We got the list together of who she wanted to invite and booked the apartment.
We found one in the centre on York Place, which was aptly named York Place Apartments. We could pay when we got there so meant everyone could save up the money needed and wouldn't have to worry about paying there and then when it was booked.
Once the apartment was booked this is where I took over and had to come up with exciting ideas to make it a really rememberable weekend.
Having a WhatsApp group with the girls coming (bar bride-to-be) made this planning so much easier. We all got to know each other as time went on and felt like we were already friends before we'd even met. I could put ideas to the group and see what they thought and they were so helpful with what needed to be paid for upfront. That's that group of girls though, I only hope if you're planning a hen do you'll get as fantastic a bunch as I did!
I had a few ideas floating around in my head but knew I wanted for us all to go for afternoon tea and make the first day feel like a really classy affair. I opted for The Atholl at the Howard Hotel which served afternoon tea with a glass of prosecco for £24.95. We absolutely weren't let down by this.
For later on that evening I thought it would be nice to have a laid back night in, play some games, have some food and get to know each other.
The next day was perhaps you're more standard hen party ritual in the form of a man with very little clothing. Now, my bestie did not want a stripper, so I did not get her a stripper, instead I went for the very classy painting a man's body instead...Madame Peaches, you didn't disappoint.
For the Saturday evening, a gorgeous meal at Rick's was booked with a set menu, meaning once again we knew where we all stood with money. It's all about planning, planning, planning.
Now for how the weekend went...
Myself, the bride-to-be and two of her friends all met at Sheffield station all with plenty of prosecco and some snacks, and at 9:30 we got on the train and proceeded to drink the prosecco. Another of our hens got on at York and we carried on drinking prosecco with another hen getting on the train at Darlington. Three hours later and six bottles of bubbly down we got off the train and met everyone else at Edinburgh.
We made our way over to the apartment and checked in. It was beautiful, and the place was just perfect for what we needed. We had a couple of hours to get settled in and I made up the goody bags I'd bought. After another couple of glasses of prosecco each, we headed over to the hotel for afternoon tea and were greeted by the super lovely staff who seated us in a room on our own. They told us we were the only ones in there so if we would like we could put some music on. They brought us a wireless speaker and I set up Spotify to play something nice and mellow, (I didn't want to freak them out, it's a gorgeous place). We were given more prosecco and of course tea and then the cakes and sandwiches were brought out. They were all beautiful and I could've eaten about 10 more of everything. I would definitely recommend any one going for afternoon tea here if you want a little treat.
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| View from our apartment |
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| More prosecco! |
Afterwards, we headed went into All Bar One for a cheeky Pornstar Martini and then went back to the apartment. By this time we had more prosecco in our hands and were ready for ordering pizza. Papa John's came through and we ordered a feast! We played games (pin the cake topper on the cake and Mr & Mrs) and were all suitably very drunk by the time we went to bed.
Saturday morning came around and the bride-to-be was a little worse for wear (everyone else was fine - sorry Helen!). We all got up slowly, had a bacon and egg sandwich each and then we got back on the prosecco. Today was the day everyone was anticipating...the semi naked man! I had booked us in for body painting, paint a man's body with paints while he stood there. Now, we could've paid a little extra and had him fully naked but as Helen had said she didn't want strippers, I thought it best to keep it PG13 (anything I did to her, if I get married, she will do back to me 10-fold, I didn't want to push my luck). So we turn up at the venue and out comes a man in a robe, not really what we were expecting him to look like but maybe we're just being shallow. We sat down, he introduces himself and tells us what we're going to do, we had the added extra of doing some life-drawing. He then pulls Helen up to unrobe him and well, all I can say is, "it's not what I ordered"! Literally! He starkers under his robe and we all just burst out laughing. Not one of us can keep a straight face but luckily he played his part well and kept us all in high spirits...or maybe that was the prosecco.
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| The Dome |
After 90 minutes we'd seen every part of him twice over and just before it came to leaving, he asked us to wipe him down with baby wipes as he had an appointment afterwards. We had a great time painting him with silly pictures but didn't realise we'd have to clean up after ourselves as well, this just set us off in another fit of giggles and luckily one of the group really took one for the team and cleaned the bit on his body no one wanted to go near.
We headed off and couldn't stop laughing, we needed a drink though to get us through it and headed to a pub up the road, which was luckily just in time for the rugby, nothing like men in shorts to get you over an experience like the one we'd just had!
Once, we'd polished off our pints, because Lads! we went back to the apartment to get ready for the evening.
We got to Rick's and were shown our seats. We ordered our food, I had Pig cheek & pancetta croquettes with wild mushroom & truffle oil to start, Pressed pork belly with slow cooked ham shank, braised pig cheek, potato puree & toffee apple jus for mains and Lemon Tart with raspberry sorbet for dessert and it was all delicious. I can't fault it whatsoever.
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| Yum! |
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After a delightful meal we went over to The Dome for a cocktail. What a stunning place it is. They don't normally let hen parties in but I'd bought Helen a pretty classy looking sash and they said we were allowed in so winner!
To end the night we went to WhyNot Nightclub which was ideal, right underneath The Dome, we didn't have far to go. I put our names on a guest list so we got in pretty quickly and had a little boogie and then by the end of the night we were knackered and ready for our beds.
By the time we were on the train back to our respective homes we were all ready for a good sleep but lo and behold we couldn't stop talking about the Saturday afternoon. A highlight for many by the sounds of it.
I don't want to blow my own trumpet but I organised a cracking weekend and we all managed to give the bride-to-be a right royal send off, we're evening thinking we might have to have a "hen-iversary" next year to celebrate.
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| The hens! |
Thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed finding out about our shenanigans xx
