(Part 7 of my UnCommon Sense Series of rarely offered information,
opinions, and articles.)
My wife and I were married less than a month ago. Before the big day, we would often ask married friends, albeit half-heartedly, if they had any advice for us. Not many did, although one friend had this to say:
"Don't get sucked into all the hype. Do what's important for you."
Of course, it is only in hindsight that we can truly process the magnitude of that simple advice and what it means (or could have meant). Speaking for myself (and I think, to a certain extent, for my bride) we have very few regrets for the day. However, being something of a perfectionist, zero regrets would have been even better! Here then is what made the whole thing successful (for us) and what we might have done differently. If you have wedding bells in your future, perhaps this cathartic rambling will be useful to you.
Before I begin our YES and
NO list (from our
perspective), I should first share two overall themes that, in and of
themselves, might make our celebration different from most:
Many people refer to the wedding day as "Our Special
Day" and special emphasis is placed on the bride and groom having the best time
possible. While we can't argue with that, our definition of the "best time
possible" largely revolved around our friends having a good time.
This was without a doubt the largest collection of our friends in one place and
one time. We wanted them to have fun and to be with them as much as
possible. There are years to follow with lots of opportunities for "just us". Our goal was not
to be the centre of the party. It was to be the best hosts ever.
That attitude had a big impact on what we felt was important.
We took on a huge amount before the wedding in preparations. In our unique situation, we have a lot of time on our hands and we like doing wildly challenging things. Some of these ideas are not for everyone. Enough said.
I am proud to say that we got awesome feedback on our wedding, which is precisely what we were striving for.
Traditions are ideas, not rules
From the get-go, we decided that it was going to be a non-traditional wedding. Not that we had anything bizarre in mind; we just weren't going to be bound by traditions. Here are some examples of what was and was not important to us:
Invitations
Apparently, tradition says that the bride's and groom's parents each invite 25% of the guests, leaving 50% to the bride and groom to invite. I suppose if they are paying for the wedding then it might be a different matter. We're perhaps too old for that, and we were not going to be a showcase for our parents' friends at this party. In fact, they are having a separate party where we will quite comfortably play that role. We invited our families and our friends (100%).
Speeches and Toasts
There is a whole series of these things by tradition. We planned none and left the floor open. If anyone had anything to say, they could stand up and say it. In our circle, that meant people sang song parodies written for us, danced for us, and read poetry created for the occasion. Given our theatrical background, the wedding had a programme which had a long list of 'crew' to thank, so no particular toasts there were necessary.
Make the most of the day
We decided on a morning ceremony, followed by a lunch, dance, buffet dinner, and house party. Many of our friends traveled great distances to be there. Why would we try to socialize with that many people in just 3 or 4 hours? Instead, we had 12 hours, plus a brunch the next day. You don't even have to be up particularly early if you don't intend to be having hair and make-up done for the 3 hours preceding the ceremony. Again, that was not important to us. We had three more ideas that worked really well for us:
Separate Ceremony and Party
As with most couples, we had a limited lunch budget. We had also selected a relatively small church for the ceremony (seating for under 100). Coming from large families, we did not want to have to pick and choose from our friends for invitations. So we had a ceremony and lunch for as many as we could afford (and fit into the church), and then we had limitless invitations for the dancing, buffet dinner, and house party. The party guests were invited BYOB in lieu of any gifts, and that worked out just fine. Even our local village librarian, who we just met as the organizer of our book club, made it to the party with her husband!
Expanded Guest Tables
The tables at our lunch sat 8 guests each, but there were 9 chairs at each table. That meant that we could travel around (with food if necessary!) and sit down to chat with all of our guests. There was a 'head table' in the middle of the room but it was usually empty. We are really happy we implemented this idea. Also, when determining seating arrangements, we mixed people based on compatibilities and interesting combinations rather than on who already knew who. Allow your guests to meet new people! It will strengthen your circle of friends.
Take the Time but Skip the Honeymoon
With some friends traveling thousands of miles, we definitely wanted to set aside time for them in the days before and/or after the big day. After all, this was their precious vacation time and a big investment. So we took the time off, but spent it hosting our visitors. We can travel on our own any time - and so we will.
Don't delay sending those invitations
Some of our close friends had prior commitments by the time they received our invitation. Others never got one because we ran out of time letting people know about the party. To me this is an easily remedied error: Get your priorities in order. They'll tell you to book all kinds of things way in advance, but there will always be another caterer, a different photographer, etc. Friends, however, are one-of-a-kind. Book them first.
Where to spend your money
The word "wedding" can sometimes be like "surgical" or "marine" - it triples the price of the most mundane things. For instance, beautifully bound books with blank pages are typically a fraction of the cost of "wedding guest books" (and look a whole lot better in my opinion). It should come as no surprise that we passed on the major hair appointments, limo, expensive church, huge floral arrangements, etc. How do our friends benefit from those? Here are some of things we focused on, and ways that we kept costs down:
Flowers and Decor
We are blessed with some friends who have a flair for this kind of thing. Their wedding gift was stunning home-made pew decorations incorporating wild flowers from our gardens. Where something extra was needed, we picked up a couple of large arrangements from the grocery store floral department. Bouquets, corsages, and boutonnieres we decided were best handled by the professionals - again, the grocery store did an excellent job at a great price.
Rentals, tents, etc.
We sat down with the rental catalogue and got very creative about how to assemble precisely what we needed. We left off the chair covers, chair ribbons, and other frills. Who needs them? We did our own table decorations way ahead of time. One neat touch which Elswyth came up with: She took the RSVP envelopes as they came back, shredded the paper, and re-made it with added flower petals and seeds. We then used the homemade paper for the table place cards. (Martha Stewart: go back to jail.) We found a private individual who had a 30'x60' tent that they rented out, and they threw in the tables. I built a tongue-and-groove OSB dance floor, which we painted with a big bucket of off-tint. NOTE: The huge dance floor was a major advantage for the contra dancing, as described below. (I covered the entire tent space because I knew we'd be using the OSB for renovations later - I expect most people could probably sell it again privately for sub-floors.) I also built a stage for the string trio, dance band, and evening R&B jam band.
Food and catering
Elswyth loves to cook, so we had lots of fun preparing things way in advance, whenever possible and appropriate. We got several quotes from caterers for the lunch, ranging in style from low-budget-company-picnic to high-end-gourmet. In the end, what sold us was a mid-range meal from a caterer who demonstrated enormous flexibility. We threw every curve possible at this guy, both ahead of time and on the day. He never once said "we don't do that". When major problems arose, he only came to us to quickly let us know how he had solved them.
We made our own ice creams weeks ahead (seven unique flavours) and had the caterer serve them up in ice bowls we had made with embedded flowers. Elswyth made a stunning three-tiered wedding cake (not her first time for that). My father (a vintner/sommelier) created all of the red and white wines and we put special labels on all the bottles. We made and froze several platters of lasagne for the buffet dinner. We stocked the bar and the caterer provided the bartender.
Guest favours (for each person who attends) are something we feel that should be as personalized as possible from the bride and groom. This can range anywhere from handwriting their names on little trinkets themed to the wedding, all the way to giving them a chocolate truffle that you made yourselves. We have recently taken up beekeeping and we attempted our first honey harvesting two days before the wedding. As a result, each guest left with a small jar of our own honey, an achievement we are very proud of!
Dancing
Some good friends replaced the DJ by recording all of their own music ahead of time and just plunking in tapes. (That was before the days of CDs, of course - now it's even easier to put a party together yourself.) I liked that idea at the time, however we took a different approach:
Most typical wedding music and dance styles are attractive to a limited age group. They are couples-oriented and are not much different from a high school dance or a night club. Those who don't dance or don't fit the style or who are self-conscious simply stay off the dance floor. We prefer the original concept of weddings where pretty much everyone dances, everyone meets everyone else, and everyone has fun. We hired a contra band to play country/folk dance music, and a caller to take us through the dances and keep the spirit high. It was a huge hit. (Later, for the house party, some professional musician friends formed a little R&B jam session, which got some guests involved.)
Know your wedding photographer
We sort of blew it on this one. We did not meet the photographer ahead of time, we met their husband (who is also a photographer). As a result, she did not understand what we wanted or what was important to us. She delayed the ceremony by half an hour, getting pictures that we didn't really want. She held us at the church afterwards, getting more pictures that we didn't really want, and causing us to miss most of the reception. As we got more and more frustrated, there was no way we were going to get pictures we would want to keep. Faces don't tell lies. We did not want pictures of us as models; we wanted pictures capturing the day and our friends. We wanted pictures of us having a good time, not posing under a soft-focus tree. It is tough to be firm when dealing with professionals who know their job (but not your wishes) - especially when you are so distracted. Live and learn.
A case for videos?
I think if you had asked me before the event, I would have been the last person to want a video of our wedding. I still think most of those videographer packages with the edits and special effects are way more money than I would ever pay. HOWEVER, I would never have expected to remember as little as I do of the events of the day. Even if you did remember more, there is so much else going on that would be fun to see later. A video camera on a tripod at the back of the church and hanging around at the party might not be a bad idea at all. Not to have people performing for it - just let it observe and record.
To conclude
It's kind of like I tell my corporate clients: know what your values are, what is important to you, and write it down. Then evaluate all those wedding things against your value list. I hope this litany of thoughts and ideas can be useful to some poor souls out there somewhere. If you want any more information or have questions, contact us.
The foregoing is my opinion. You can send me yours by clicking here.
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