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20th December 2016
12:10am GMT
The prize consists of catering for a wedding party, served by a dedicated team of staff, complimentary bottles of prosecco for the top table, as well as a DJ and dancing 'til late.
We've been bowled over by the amount of entries we have received, and with other people getting in touch - such as a photographer who volunteered her services free of charge for the day!
We now have a shortlist of 6 entrants, so take a gander at the stories below and then cast your vote for your favourite love story!
We're already technically married, so maybe we don't qualify. I'll try anyway!
You wanted to know how Em proposed. We'd been together for almost 3 months, and we were drunk cooking in my kitchen on New Year's Eve. I said yes immediately and every single day since. We were young and silly and madly in love. To be fair, that was 13 years ago, and we still are.
We married in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada in 2005. It was amazing, despite my (religious) Canadian family largely boycotting it. We paid for it on a shoestring, sleeping on friends' floors and keeping things small. My wife's Irish family flew to Canada to surprise us, taste Maritime lobster, and attend our wedding. The years since have been hard. I was in a car accident, gained a lot of weight after the injury and became very depressed. Because of my immigration status, I got stuck in a terrible and abusive job environment. But we made it through that together.
My wife is genuinely one of the best people in the whole world. You want to meet her. I'm happier these days, and I've found an amazing job with wonderful people. They'd all be invited.
We had a daughter 18 months ago (you want to meet her too, she's wicked), and now rarely sleep and almost never party, but we've never been happier. We'd love to celebrate our 10th anniversary with my Irish family, our daughter, and our wonderful friends, and mark the recognition of our marriage by having a proper wedding party. Will you guys spring for a babysitter too?
It's simple really. There was "before jane and Jeananne "and there was life. Like breathing. Our worlds were radically enhanced from the moment we met. Like oxygen escaping a gasping breath. We awoke to each other's love.4 years later - 3 failed IUI's, 1 missed miscarriage and to start of 2015, a heart attack but in 2013 an amazing civil partnership ceremony with 180 of our nearest and dearest. Let us show the world what marriage is really about.
I met my partner Danny, the love of my life, 13 years ago. We were both young , slightly naïve & very much in the closet. We met each other in Spirit Night Club, on a Straight Night funnily enough. It may sound cheesy, but we have a saying between ourselves, which is Free Spirit. This saying signifies where we met, and when we were freed from the closet. We gave each other the strength to come out to our Families & we have grown together over the years. To be honest, I cannot imagine my life without him. It is for this reason that I proposed & asked him to Marry Me on our Ten Year Anniversary. I actually beat him to it as he too had a proposal for me planned on the same night, which I kind of ruined by getting there first. I was so happy when he said yes. Danny & I do not believe in Civil Partnerships & have decided that if marriage equality does not pass, we will elope to get married in another country, which is something that we do not want to have to do. We have fought passionately over the years for Gay Rights and Marriage Equality in Ireland & believe that it will pass & we will get to experience the happiest day in any couples life, the day they get to Marry one another. We have been through thick & thin together over the years & want to get married in front of all of our friends & family to spend the rest of our days together. Oh and yes, we are the deadliest couple out there, hands down.
We were friends who liked the same music and the same comics and the same video games... And we thought the other was hot. Let's do it; let's fall in love. He moved to Dublin to be with me, I got him a job in my work, we moved in together, we got engaged and we held off hoping when we married, it would be for real. Then I got a brain tumour and exactly one year after my diagnosis, the public gets to decide the value of our term years together.
Greg and I had been together for six years before we celebrated our first Christmas together. Being a bi-national couple, holidays were often spent apart, with only our families to bring us festive cheer. In 2008 Greg’s father died and with the bank ready to foreclose on their home, Greg wasn’t feeling particularly festive.
When I arrived, the house was already packed up in boxes. The place was a mess and not a single fairy light, tree or shred of tinsel was in evidence. Meeting Greg for the first time in many months we were both overjoyed, but I could tell that deep down he still mourned.
We spent the next week together and with friends. One Wednesday while Greg working, a mutual friend brought over some decorations at my request and I hid them in the shed and waited.
Christmas Eve came around and I once Greg had gone to bed I began digging out the decorations that I had hidden and quietly started decorating the house, putting up the tinsel, the lights and the tree with the presents under it. My task finally complete, I crawled into bed beside Greg and was soon asleep.
I awoke the next morning to the sounds of surprise. Greg had awoken before me and was presently walking around the living room, a look of wonder on his face. I tip-toed down the hall and he held me in a tight embrace as I took pleasure in his delight.
We spent the day on the beach, where my ambition to send a sun soaked photo home to my family was damped slightly by the torrential rainfall that soaked us to our skins. Our Christmas dinner consisted of Belgian waffles in IHOP, but I honestly couldn’t imagine being anywhere else that Christmas day.
We met in drama school in 2007 and were unlikely friends, me from Chicago and in 1st yr, she in her final year and from Ballyfermot. I come from a super conservative home and so had never even considered the fact that I might be attracted to women as well as men.
And so it was a huge surprise when it was actually me who made the first move! It was October 23rd, the night after my 21st birthday. We had been in the Sugar Club all night. We went back to her place I was suddenly hit with the realisation that I was really attracted to her. I could literally feel my heart beating out of my chest. She kept asking me what was wrong, because I was being so weird. I was terrified! And finally I managed to get out the words. "I...sort of...um..want to...um...kiss you." She thought about this for what seemed like an eternity and then finally started to lean in to me. I met her halfway. :)
And the rest as they say is history... We are coming up on 7 years now and last December I got down on a beach in Portugal and asked her to be my wife. I never thought we would live in a place where marriage would be an option. Now that it is ALMOST here, I cannot wait to have our special day where we celebrate our love and commitment.
It breaks my heart that I won't have any parents at my wedding because they do not accept our relationship. But regardless, I count myself so blessed to have found the one person who makes me better, makes me stronger and makes me happy (even when we want to kill each other.) We have 17 nieces and nephews together and seriously need to win a 'best aunties' award. We spend weekends babysitting, and wouldn't have it any other way. After our wedding we are hoping to start our own little brood- so bring on the big day already! Here's a video I made for Audrey on our 6 year anniversary last year. Ranae xxxxx
