Wedding of the Week: Heather and Stephen's wedding plans were scuppered but their day went perfectly
Heather O'Donoghue and Stephen McCarthy on New Street, Killarney. Pictures: Mícheál O'Sullivan Photography, www.Osullivanphotographyirl.com
Kerry couple Heather O’Donoghue and Stephen McCarthy first set eyes on one another on Kenmare Pier, on the day of Kenmare Regatta, 12 years ago.
Heather, from Killarney, was there to support her club, Flesk Valley, and Stephen was taking up oars with his native Kenmare.
“I wasn’t rowing due to an injury and Stephen was rowing that day with his senior men’s crew,” says Heather. “A few shy words were passed as the boats were loaded and unloaded on the water.”
They attended more regattas the following weekend. “And we finally plucked up the courage to start a conversation,” adds Heather.
Six years later they exchanged the south Kerry shorelines for Portugal when they got engaged on July 19, 2016, on a pier on Cascais, outside Lisbon.
Their fellow oarsmen and women wished them well as they emerged as newlyweds from St Mary's Cathedral, Killarney, recently.
Members of Flesk Valley and Kenmare and their current rowing club, Templenoe, gave them a guard of honour after they were married by Father Kieran O’Brien.
Mícheál O’Sullivan, award-winning wedding photographer, organised a photoshoot on the shores of Lough Leane, while Brendan Reidy was the videographer.
Toasting to the newlyweds’ future happiness were both sets of parents, Madeleine and Denis O’Donoghue, and Bridie and Edward McCarthy, Heather’s grandfather, Sonny O’Connell, and Stephen’s grandmother, Betty McCarthy.
Heather’s sisters, Illona and Klara O’Donoghue, were by her side as bridesmaids while Stephen's brother Bryan McCarthy was the best man, Heather's brother Donnacha O’Donoghue was the groomsman, and the groom's nephew Jimmy Griffin was the pageboy.
“The wedding we planned and the wedding we got weren’t on the same wavelength at all,” says Heather. “We booked our wedding in January 2018 for April 25, 2020. We had originally wanted a big day out for a guest list of more than 250 people but Covid had other plans. We postponed the wedding until September 2020 hoping that we might have some semblance of the day we had envisioned but no, that didn’t happen either."
Heartbroken, they decided to wait until the new year but the pandemic again had other plans. “Fourth time was the charm as we decided to push the date over a year out — and it was worth the wait,” adds the bride.
“In January 2022 nearly all restrictions were lifted a week after our invites were sent out. The result was a room full of people who cared about us and wanted our day to go perfectly — which it did.”
Heather looked stunning in a dress she sourced in Aibheil of Adare, Co Limerick, and the bridal makeup was by The Beauty Boutique, Killarney, with hairstyling by Salon B.
The groom and his party’s suits were purchased at Suits Select in Tralee and Joan McCarthy at Carthy's, Killarney, was the florist.
They drove in style on their wedding day in the first car the groom ever owned, a Subaru Impreza.
The newlyweds enjoyed a few nights in the five-star Castlemartyr Resort and a break in Killarney.
“After the week off we both went back to work,” adds Heather, who is a pharmacy technician at Sewells and Trants pharmacies in Killarney.
She and Stephen, a metal fabricator for Lynch Trailers in Coolea, County Cork, live in Kilgarvan.
- If you would like your wedding featured email eve.kelliher@examiner.ie
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
