Queen Elizabeth turned 94 yesterday, 21 April. Traditionally, her birthday is officially celebrated in June every year. The magnificent celebration, referred to as the ‘Trooping the Colour’, is an enormous feast and was due to take place on 13 June this year. This year, however, Buckingham Palace have announced that the event will not go ahead due to the coronavirus outbreak.
In honour of the royal icon’s birthday, we take a look at her and her husband, Prince Philp’s remarkable love story.
The two got married on 20 November, 1947 at Westminster Abbey, meaning this year they will celebrate their 73rd wedding anniversary!
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They met at a royal wedding when Queen Elizabeth was just eight years old. They fell in love after a second encounter when she was 13 and he 18, and began exchanging letters. In 1946, Philip asked King George VI for his daughter’s hand in marriage. The rest, as they say, is history.
The wedding did not go without incident, however. Elizabeth’s tiara snapped on the morning of the wedding, and Philip was stopped for speeding through central London on the day of the rehearsal dinner (19 November). He reportedly said at the time: “I’m sorry officer, but I’ve got an appointment with the Archbishop of Canterbury.”
When she was just 25, Elizabeth’s ascended the throne on 2 June 1953 after her father’s death. Prince Philip was the first to swear allegiance to the new queen, describing himself as her “liege man of life and limb”.
The two have been by each other’s side for many years now, and are a beautiful example of a strong and steadfast marriage. “He has, quite simply, been my strength and stay all these years,” said Queen Elizabeth II as she described her husband on their golden anniversary in 1997.
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Their marriage is the longest of any British rulers ever, and we wish them many more happy years to come and the Queen a happy birthday.
Source: History Extra
Image: Instagram
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It’s never too late for more love, and once you find it nothing will stop you from keeping it! This 91-year-old couple proved just that as they tied the knot in the middle of the coronavius pandemic.
Jeanine Sprague and Don Sandin made it official on Easter Sunday, (which also happened to be Sprague’s birthday) despite the worldwide health crisis. The St. Petersburg couple told the Tampa Bay Times that they wanted to ensure they were legally married in the event that one of them needs to be hospitalised.
“We just decided a couple of weeks ago. Because of the circumstances that are going on in society, we just felt that we should legalise our relationship, so we would be protected,” said Sandin to the Tampa Bay Times.
The couple had their first date on New Years Eve 2018. It was a five course meal, after which they viewed the fireworks over Tampa Bay from Spragues apartment. For their Easter Sunday wedding, Sprague wore the same outfit that she did on their first date.
Of course the wedding was kept small. They held their nuptials in their pastor’s St. Pete Beach backyard. The announcement of their wedding however, was much bigger. Along with a photograph of the couple which was sent out, was a recording of Sandin singing ‘I’m getting married in the morning’ from My Fair Lady.
“I had been singing it ever since we decided we would get married,” said Sandin.
Both previously widowed, the couple believe they have a good understanding of each other. They said they have the same beliefs and have lived in the same times. “It’s a very easy relationship. We have the same stories. We lived in the same time,” said Sprague.
Image: Twitter / garner pete
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The man, the myth, the legend – Nicolas Cage is a Hollywood icon for reasons far beyond his acting abilities. His meme-able face and unique film choices have cemented him in pop culture as a truly memorable character.
One aspect of Cage very few have turned to? His love life. Nicolas Cage has actually been married a whopping 4 times. Let’s take a look at his past relationships.
Patricia Arquette:
The story of how Cage and Arquette met is a wild ride. Back in the late 80s, Cage and fellow actor Crispin Glover met Arquette at a deli in Los Angeles. Both of them told her they wanted to marry her, naturally.
To prove himself and his commitment, Cage tasked Arquette with creating a list of tasks for him to complete. Arquette had quite a bit of fun with the list, selecting seemingly impossible finds like J.D. Salinger’s autograph (a rare occurrence throughout his career), a black orchid (which doesn’t exist), a Lisu tribe wedding costume, and a Bob’s Big Boy statue.
Instead of a black orchid, Cage showed up at Arquette’s home and spraypainted a purple one black. “She wouldn’t come out, but I could see her peeking down from the top floor. In my very showy way, I whipped the orchid out of my pocket. Then I whipped out the paint can and started spray-painting the orchid black. She was freaked out. I rang the doorbell again and she came down. I just gave it to her and got back on my motorcycle and left,” he told Playboy in ’96.
Cage’s intensity made Arquette wary and the relationship fizzled out. Years later in 1995, the pair met again at the exact same deli. It was love at first sight again, and Arquette quickly proposed while dressed head to toe in black vinyl, carrying a big purple wedding cake. Two weeks later, they married atop a cliff in Carmel, California with only Carmel’s former police chief and a pod of sea otters as their witnesses. Seriously.
However, the marriage was not meant to be. The pair officially split in 2000 after 5 years.
Lisa-Marie Presley
Soon after his split from Arquette, Cage began dating Elvis’s daughter Lisa Marie Presley in 2000. Presley had just come out of her marriage to Michael Jackson. They married in August 2002 after two years of dating. However, by November 2002, a mere 3 and half months later, they filed for divorce.
Presley explains that the pair were kindred spirits but they were like “tyrannical pirates”, which caused the end of their marriage.
“It was kind of one of those things where you marry someone hoping — I mean we’d already had — we’d been together for two years before we got married, so — it was one of those things where you’re marrying hoping that you’re going to either stabilise it or it’s going to, you know, accentuate all that was going on prior to what was problematic,” she said in an interview with Larry King. “So it kind of did the latter, that’s all.”
Alice Kim:
In 2004, Cage walked down the aisle yet again, this time with a fan of his. He married waitress Alice Kim two months after meeting her at the restaurant she worked at. The pair were married for 11 years and share a son together. They divorced in 2016.
Erika Koike:
The shortest marriage Cage had was also his last. He wed makeup artist Erika Koike in Las Vegas in 2019 after a year of dating but filed for annulment after 4 days. He claimed that he was too drunk to comprehend that they were getting married, and was also unaware of Koike’s criminal history. The makeup artist has appeared in court for three DUI’s and domestic violence against her previous husband.
Feature image: Pinterest
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With lockdown in full effect, no one is able to do much recreational shopping. Just because the shops are closed, however, doesn’t mean you can skip out on an anniversary gift!
If you’re celebrating an anniversary under lockdown, now is the time to get creative. Receiving an apple might not be your partner’s ideal anniversary gift. Instead, why not show them how much you care by making them something?
Hardware stores are now open under new lockdown regulations, and stores like Game still sell paint and other craft supplies. Now, all you need is a good idea. Here are a few that will make your partner fall in love you all over again:
A care package:
Put together a care package with a few of your partner’s favourite things. A good mix of things is key. Some snacks like dark chocolate and biscuits paired with bubble bath, bath bombs, essential oils and a good magazine work perfectly together. You can easily DIY you own bath bombs and bubble bath, making this gift even better because you can customise it to fit your partner’s favourite smells.
A photo album:
Let’s be honest, millennials don’t own photo albums. However, how sweet is it to page through a physical album full of memories? It’s definitely more romantic than scrolling through an Instagram feed. Grab a scrapbook and get busy! All you need is a printer, some glue, and scissors. To make this gift even more sentimental, write down little paragraphs explaining why each picture is special to you.
A ‘love box’:
Over the course of your relationship, you’ve probably amassed a lot of meaningful items. Why not give them a special place to live? To make a memory box for your relationship, take a simple box and decorate it with pictures and inside joke references special to your couple. Fill it with items that mean something to you and your relationship. It can be anything like ticket stubs from your date nights at the movies, love letters you used to write to each other, or an old t-shirt you would always borrow when you first started dating.
On your anniversary, spend time going through each individual item and talking about that point in your relationship. We guarantee you’ll be feeling all the love.
A scavenger hunt:
Another gift idea that also helps fill your time in lockdown is a scavenger hunt. Using memories from your relationship, create riddles that your partner has to figure out to move to the next station and eventually the end of the hunt. At the end, have a sweet dinner all laid out to end the evening. Set up a homemade-teepee and hang fairy lights from trees and bushes in your garden for an extra-romantic feel.
Get crafty:
if you’re blessed with artistic skills, this makes gift giving so much easier. Drawor paint a picture of your partner or a special memory that they can hang in your home. You could also write a personal song or poem, and even design an item of clothing for them.
If you’re not that artistic but still want to get your creative juices flowing, here are some DIY tutorials to inspire you:
Feature image: Unsplash