A couple who have won a £10,000 wedding package will finally get their fairytale wedding – eight years after getting engaged.
Jody Norris and Mark Billingsley, from Keynsham, are the lucky winners of this year's Bath Chronicle Win a Wedding competition.
The couple have won a complete wedding day package which will see them tie the knot at The Manor House Hotel and Golf Club in Castle Combe.
Miss Norris, 30, said she was thrilled to win the competition and is excited to get married in such a beautiful setting.
She said: "It's a stunning venue, looking around and seeing the grounds where it's all set is just beautiful. It's the cherry on the cake.
"If we hadn't won this competition I don't know what we would have done – maybe Vegas or a register office, but nothing this glamorous.
"Everyone's so happy and pleased for us – when I told Mark's sister she screamed down the phone at me."
The couple met ten years ago while on holiday in Gran Canaria, and decided to meet up after coming back to the UK.
Mr Billingsley, 29, is originally from Chester and proposed two years later while on a rugby tour.
Miss Norris, who works at financial services company Ascentric in Bath, said that Mr Billingsley's job in the armed forces has made it difficult to plan the wedding before now.
She said: "We've had a lot of time apart and with all that we decided to put off the wedding and get a house first.
"When this opportunity came up we really wanted to go for it and make the most of it. I was really nervous the whole time and Mark was a typical guy, laid-back about the whole thing."
Miss Norris has already been to have a look at some dresses and tried a couple on, and said she is happy to have the stress of wedding-planning taken off her hands.
She said: "The way our relationship has worked with Mark being away, I don't have a lot of time so it's nice to have it pre-selected – sometimes there's too much choice. All the suppliers look amazing so I'm very happy.
"All the fun things about wedding planning I still get to do, like hen parties and colour schemes."
The £10,000 prize also includes a three-tier wedding cake by Baby Cakes, £1,000 to spend on a wedding dress at Krystle Brides, photography by Portraits by Claire, cars from England's Finest Wedding Cars, flowers from Bath Spa Florist, evening disco from Entertainment Direct UK Ltd, rings from Nicholas Wylde, hair by North Hairdressing, make-up by Sarah Brock, chair covers by Reveries Events, photobooth by Snap in a Box and a Krispy Kreme donut tower.
Miss Norris said her fiancé's only grumble about the prize has been the wedding date, which is set for January 17, 2015, as it falls in the football season.
She said: "We might have to wait until the football season's over before I get my honeymoon, hopefully somewhere hot. We'll probably do a staycation just after the wedding and have the proper honeymoon later in the year."
