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So I'm getting married...
Daedalus
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I've got this wedding to plan and, well, I've never done this before (of course). Every time I think I've got the List of Shit I Need To Worry About finished, I think of something else that needs to get added on.
Preliminary requirements: We want to get married on a beach, and we want this thing to be relatively informal, relatively small, and relatively inexpensive. We want to have the ceremony and reception both on the beach.
I think I've got a good location: Assateague Island National Seashore. It's in MD, which is where my fiancee and I are, so that's good. I've been there a couple times before and it's beautiful, and they apparently allow this sort of thing. So here's the list of other shit I need to figure out:
1) Food. I figure that the food will end up being the biggest part of the budget. A friend came up with the idea of having a gigantic roast pig, which seems cool. There's also a cake that I guess is required? Who the hell do I call for this?
2) Drinks. My fiancee and I don't drink a whole lot (which means we don't know what the hell we're doing) but the guests will probably want something.
3) Guests. So, we wanted to keep the number of guests low, and then we realized that our families are both enormous in and of themselves. I've got a small-ish immediate family (mother and father still married, and a younger brother and sister), but my dad's side of the family is all Roman Catholic, which means I have more aunts, uncles, and cousins than I can remember the names of. She's got a different problem: her mother lives in upstate NY, which is relatively close, and when her father divorced he moved as far away as he could, so he's in southern California and will need to fly up. We're trying to schedule this to be near the date of her little brother's graduation so he doesn't need to fly over twice (he's not exactly rich). Still, everyone is going to need a place to stay and everything, and I certainly can't pay for that sort of thing!
4) Stuff to do at the reception. If people are going to dance, we need a dance floor and a DJ? I mean, I can't come up with a playlist that'll keep people unbored for hours myself. Or maybe get a band? She's saying something about a string quartet but I'm worried that that won't have the range of music needed for the whole event.
5) The actual ceremony: neither of us are particularly religious. (Or rather, she's "not particularly religious" and I'm "athier than anyone else I know") Who do we get to officiate this? Does it really matter? We're going to need a state marriage license too, right? That's just some paperwork and a fee, or is there a blood test, or what the hell is that?
6) Gifts. What's the polite way to tell people that we can't physically fit all the crap they want to get us into our apartment? Asking for money seems tacky, but so do gift registries, come to think of it.
7) What else am I forgetting about? What, exactly, the hell have I gotten myself into?
Preliminary requirements: We want to get married on a beach, and we want this thing to be relatively informal, relatively small, and relatively inexpensive. We want to have the ceremony and reception both on the beach.
I think I've got a good location: Assateague Island National Seashore. It's in MD, which is where my fiancee and I are, so that's good. I've been there a couple times before and it's beautiful, and they apparently allow this sort of thing. So here's the list of other shit I need to figure out:
1) Food. I figure that the food will end up being the biggest part of the budget. A friend came up with the idea of having a gigantic roast pig, which seems cool. There's also a cake that I guess is required? Who the hell do I call for this?
2) Drinks. My fiancee and I don't drink a whole lot (which means we don't know what the hell we're doing) but the guests will probably want something.
3) Guests. So, we wanted to keep the number of guests low, and then we realized that our families are both enormous in and of themselves. I've got a small-ish immediate family (mother and father still married, and a younger brother and sister), but my dad's side of the family is all Roman Catholic, which means I have more aunts, uncles, and cousins than I can remember the names of. She's got a different problem: her mother lives in upstate NY, which is relatively close, and when her father divorced he moved as far away as he could, so he's in southern California and will need to fly up. We're trying to schedule this to be near the date of her little brother's graduation so he doesn't need to fly over twice (he's not exactly rich). Still, everyone is going to need a place to stay and everything, and I certainly can't pay for that sort of thing!
4) Stuff to do at the reception. If people are going to dance, we need a dance floor and a DJ? I mean, I can't come up with a playlist that'll keep people unbored for hours myself. Or maybe get a band? She's saying something about a string quartet but I'm worried that that won't have the range of music needed for the whole event.
5) The actual ceremony: neither of us are particularly religious. (Or rather, she's "not particularly religious" and I'm "athier than anyone else I know") Who do we get to officiate this? Does it really matter? We're going to need a state marriage license too, right? That's just some paperwork and a fee, or is there a blood test, or what the hell is that?
6) Gifts. What's the polite way to tell people that we can't physically fit all the crap they want to get us into our apartment? Asking for money seems tacky, but so do gift registries, come to think of it.
7) What else am I forgetting about? What, exactly, the hell have I gotten myself into?
Daedalus on
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Gift registries may seem tacky, and they definitely are if you send it out to people unsolicited (or, gasp, include it with the invites), but it serves a few very important purposes. First, a gift registry ensures you don't get 15 food processors. It also reduces (but will not completely eliminate) the amount of hideous cocktail glasses or the like that you end up with. People are going to want to buy you gifts, and a registry is the easiest way of letting people know what you want and also eliminates the possibility of lots of redundant gifts.
Finally, there is no polite way to tell someone who wants to buy you a gift that you don't want anything, and it won't work anyway--they'll just go buy you a bunch of spatulas or something. If you really don't want anything, pick some charity and tell people that ask you about gifts that you really don't need anything but would be very grateful if they contributed to favorite noncontroversial charity X.
Here: http://www.theknot.com/
Register for what you want, if people don't like any of it they will give cash or gift cards. Or you can setup a honeymoon registry. I'd also recommend starting a website where you can put all the info about where you're registered, where the event is and directions, who the wedding party is, the menu, some people even put the story of how they met or the story of the proposal.
Also, start a checklist or flow chart of what you need to do. Permits, chair rentals, caterer options, flowers, cake, entertainment, favours, STDs/invites/thanks yous, etc. Where you have the reception will determine a lot, my sister's venue is doing her catering, cake and flowers for example. You can visit bridal shows to see different djs if you want one as well as look at the portfolios of photographers.
Also pt2: only invite those you want, don't worry about the rest unless you think the fam will raise enough hell to bother you. You can look into blocking hotels for guests but it's not your responsibility to pay for them. On your wedding website you can include info about various area hotels and transportation options.
Also pt3: Figure out what you want to spend and then rank things on importance. What do you want to spend the most money on vs what doesn't matter as much.
You need to start by asking yourselves 3 questions:
1) Ideally speaking, exactly how small is small from a comfort standpoint?
2) Who is so important to you that the day won't feel complete without them?
3) How many people can you actually afford to have at your wedding?
You probably won't be able to answer #3 before you've got some costs together for things like food. You're talking about doing this outdoors and not at a resort or something I take it, so that might make it a little easier on your cash flow.
It was very important to us that the wedding be ours and not Asshole Distant Family Members' #33, 34, 36, and 52, or some of our friends' families who would have been hurt if we invited the friend but not them. We wanted a nice quiet dinner at our favorite restaurant with our closest, and by cutting out every last person who might cause invitation- or otherwise-related drama, that's exactly what we got. So don't feel bad about drawing lines in the sand, but be sure to be reasonable, and consider pre- and post- wedding drama as well. Don't exclude anyone out of spite, but remember that if you can get away with not inviting your Great-Aunt Mabel who has seven kids who all have bfs/gfs and also has 16 best friends she will insist that you invite, it's probably a worthwhile sacrifice because if you invite her but insist that you're keeping it small you will hear about it before, during, and after your wedding, and she will do everything she can to make your day miserable because people go fucking CRAZY about weddings.
Before you sit down and start sweating all of the small stuff, you need to think about how all of this is going to flow.
Generally, you will have a rehearsal the evening before with everyone who is involved with the wedding. This does not need to take place at the beach, but you will need some sort of space that can accommodate the wedding party.
Also, you will have a dinner for the wedding party and family after the rehearsal. You need to find a nearby restaurant where you can eat. The groom is responsible for this. This can be small if you don't have the money, but you should at least have something for the wedding party and immediate family.
You need to decide whether you want to invite everyone to witness the vows or have a relatively small service on the beach followed by a larger reception. The beach complicates things if you have guests who are wheelchair bound or are infirm.
Presumably, you will need to find a nearby location like a hotel to house the reception.
You also need to think about where you and you new bride will spend the night, and where/if you are going on your honeymoon.
As to your specific points:
1)Unless you can swing some sort of reception on the beach with the pig, it is a bad idea. You are better off dealing with caterers. They will have different packages you can pick from. Whatever you pick, all food at weddings is terrible.
2)Again, the caterer will have different packages to pick from, from kegs to full bar service to beer on ice and wine.
3)You aren't responsible for paying for guests lodging. Pick three hotels nearby to direct guests to: budget, mid range, and high end options.
4)Are you going to have someone play a processional on the beach? You could have a string quartet play the wedding march and then play at the reception.
5)Get some sort of non-denominational minister to officiate and let him know that you want some sort of secularish ceremony. Get the license out of the way before the wedding.
6)Gifts- I am positive you fiance will have different feelings about this. You should use this opportunity to ask for 8 sets of everyday flatware, 8 sets of everyday china, 8 sets of silverware, and 8 sets of fine china. Register somewhere than guests can order online like Macy's.
7)Don't have your bachelor party the night before the wedding.
http://ourmarriage.com/html/who_pays_for_what.html
http://marriage.about.com/cs/marriagelicenses/p/maryland.htm
You can always elope and avoid all that.
It's your wedding, however people love to get involved in weddings, the problem seems to be at the moment is that you don't know what you want. If you do have a small wedding you will probably cop a lot of flak from your extended family as you didn't invite eleventy billion people. Use generic things like, we wanted a small wedding, we couldn't afford it, the bride has a small family and I didn't want her to feel overwhelmed as it is our day not my family's day.
String Quartets are far far more expensive than DJ, there are four times the people for one. Plus all the additional equipment. You need to sit down with your wife and figure out what you both want.
Remember though, it's your wedding. If you think a giant pig on a spit is a good idea, then do it!
Satans..... hints.....
Alcohol policy might be a sticking point. My family doesn't drink much, and I'm pretty sure both sides are lightweights anyway, so anything other than a free bar with a wide selection of drinks wouldn't occur to them. For other families, a cash bar is the only way way to stop each guest from drinking a bottle of vatted malt scotch, a bottle of single malt scotch, and five widow's kisses. How a hypothetical family learned about such snobbish distinctions and drinks is an ongoing mystery.
In a similar vein, your bachelor party could consist of fishing that beach the day/night before and cook them up for the wedding dinner. Of course, beach fishing doesn't always give the best yields, so it might just be better to charter a boat and go sport fishing. Around here, you can usually count on a few stripers (which makes it only one letter short of a normal bachelor party) and enough bluefish to last a year. The latter is super fresh, so it doesn't have that fishy flavor it's commonly associated with.
For the gift registry, it will appear a lot less tacky if it's just a service where a party can search what other parties are getting and register their own gifts (with names hidden, ideally) so you can pass it off as a way to prevent same-dress awkwardness.
If you really want a band of some sort, there should be at least one swing club in your area. Call them and ask if they can accommodate your numbers. At worst, they could give you the number of their band or the playlist they're using.
Food - the pig sounds like a cool thing. Like anything else, consider who you're inviting. For example, we're making our own 'gourmet sandwich bar' aka make your own Subway. Which is nice because it's a little lighter than a full dinner, and incorporates the few veg-heads that are coming. Also the number of people determines the amount of food you'll need. And as far as catering goes, that probably depends on your budget and what they provide and a whole bunch of other factors. Ask around, get prices. People you know who have been married recently are great for getting reviews of catering services.
2) Drinks - you don't have to have a drunk reception. Some champagne / wine at the reception will add alcohol while keeping it mild. Otherwise, booze can get expensive quick. Also, and this applies for other things, but you can get great stuff cheap if you just look around. Grocery outlet stores have cheap champagne / wine, think Costco too for damn near everything else.
3) Guests - Write down a list of everyone you think you'd like to come. It might be bigger than you think, but remember that it's a good portion of those people sadly won't come / be able to make it. And get invitations out on time so you can get RSVPs back and get a solid number.
4) Stuff to do at the reception - I'm assuming it's not at the beach, so it's usually fairly easy to set aside a 'dance floor', and as far as a DJ goes, you can do like we're doing and making a playlist on 2 iPods (backup, because shit can always go wrong), and having one of our brothers do the 'DJ-ing'. Which brings up another point; ask friends and family if they'd be comfortable helping. Most are.
5) The actual ceremony - Well you need to physically go down to the courthouse and pick up the marriage license. Don't do it last minute. As far as the physical 'getting married' part, ask the clerk what the standards are for your state. Everything before that is up to you two. Again, YOUR wedding. My sister's best friend was basically internet-church-certified (not sure exactly how you state that) and did her ceremony. My future older-brother-in-law is going to do our ceremony, and if he needs to be certified to do the final portion "By the power invested in me ... I now pronounce you ..." then we'll pay for that.
6) Gifts - gift registries are actually helpful for everyone else and not tacky at all. Just obviously don't go overboard, which you two don't sound like you would. And also consider registering at a couple different stores. We're doing Target, JC Pennys, and Wal-Mart, so we know anyone out of town can find something we're looking for. And as far as the 'getting too much' ... dude, you can return whatever you can't fit!
Relax and try to enjoy this time. And there will be stress. Me and the fiancee have already had a couple spats about it, but always come back down in the end.
Oh, also honeymoon ... plan that in advance. And if it suits your taste, you can always consider not taking the honeymoon immediately after the wedding, which allows you to take a break, even if it's for a day (what we're doing, plus it gives us a few hours to say goodbye to family from out of state), and if you postpone awhile you can get better deals on off-season vacation areas, if you do travel.
3DS FC: 4699-5714-8940 Playing Pokemon, add me! Ho, SATAN!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPD83iG7P4k
In fact, I believe there was a thread last summer in D&D by a soon-to-be showing off his geeky wedding playlist and asking for feedback/suggestions. It was mainly video game music, but he revealed that this one was going to be one of the keystone romantic songs.
Wow. Goosebumps.
So I'm new at this whole thing, but just for you I gotted my own account!
I am the fiancee in question.
You are one sexist @$%^&#.
That will be all, sir.
Well, I've got a pretty decent income for someone right out of college but she's still in grad school and working part-time. We're saving up and everything but finances are still going to be somewhat limited (hence doing all the planning ourselves, for instance).
To respond to some other stuff, in no particular order:
1) I would love it if we could limit it to like twelve people but she's from a big family and her list of parents, step-parents, and siblings is already past that. Still, we're trying to keep it down to 50-odd, with less being better.
2) That idea to just have some champagne and not a full bar: I like that. I like that a lot. Most will be happy and the couple alcoholics (on both sides) can get drunk on their own dime.
3) The honeymoon will probably involve just grabbing a hotel somewhere in/near Ocean City (which is right there) for a week or whatever; we're not 100% sure but it seems like a good idea.
4) We are, actually, trying to have the reception at the beach; we need to find a rentable dance floor that someone can set up or something.
Anyway, thanks for the great advice, everyone (although that one guy, don't be sexist, broads clearly hate that: she's already involved, obviously, and we are of one mind about the gifts. In fact, she kinda wants to just tell people to donate to whatever charity they want and be done with it, since they're going to have to travel all this way anyway).
If the president had any real power, he'd be able to live wherever the fuck he wanted.
http://offbeatbride.ning.com/page/groups-contents-page / http://offbeatbride.com/
Bridal Bargains
http://www.marthastewartweddings.com/ (their budget tool and guest list tool, plus diy ideas)
I'm another vote for caterer. Check out decent BBQ places in your area and see what their prices/options are like - from what I hear, bbq is one of the cheaper meal options for weddings (yay! cheaper means you can afford a few more people).
Personally if I were on the beach, I'd just want to dance in the sand but that's me. For music, the main issue I can see would be getting electricity out there for the speakers and such
and, congrats guys!
Make sure you can have the reception on the beach, this isn't allowed in many places, nor are alcoholic drinks allowed on some beaches. If it is allowed make sure you have the right permits.
I know it seems like a lot to do right now, how long do you have until you got married? My husband and I got engaged about 9 months before our wedding and there was a ton to do in the first 2 months and a ton to do in the last month and not much in between. The more research you do now, the easier that last month will be although there are some things you just can't do now. theknot.com has good checklists you can look over and figure out what applies to you.
If you want flowers look into doing them yourself, florists are crazy expensive, we had a lot of fun doing ours the day before the wedding and got them from here, you might be able to find some that are more local but look for this sort of a place: http://www.freshroses.com/weddingflowers.html
Congratulations! That said and I mean no offense, don't try and do this yourself. Weddings are not easy to plan and you are probably punching above your weight here.
Premise: Beach weddings are expensive and unpredictable. Weather can shit on the event very easily. For outdoor events you generally need to have a tent set up and available for rain.
In addition to all the permits required for the venue, you need to find out what facilities they have available.
Is the permit area wired for electricity, or will you need to bring a generator?
How many bathrooms are there, will you need to clean them beforehand?
What sort of garbage services are required? Can you dump all your party's trash in public bins or will you need to rent a dumpster/hire the park's cleaning staff?
Will you need a special permit to serve alcohol?
Are there benches, or will you need to rent tables?
1. Food. Call a few caterers and bakeries. If you're doing buffet-style, you will still need to hire a server or two.
2. Drinks. Yes. Your guests will. Find out if you can even serve alcohol on the beach or if you need a seperate permit. From there you will need to provide at a minimum box wine and beer. Dry weddings suck.
3. Don't worry about dad-in-law. Keep him in the loop and he should have plenty of time to budget for travel. You are not expected to pay for the lodging of your guests. send two or three options for hotels with the invitation or work out a deal with one hotel.
4. Entertainment. Get a DJ. string quartet might work for the cocktail hour, but then you'll need to actually have a cocktail hour, which means more servers and appetizers. Dancing on the beach is fine barefoot.
5. If you don't care about the ceremony, get whoever the hell you want to officiate. I was at a wedding once where the ceremony was held by The Divine Avatar from the Church of the Divine Avatar. Get a crazy homeless guy, or a local minister, or write your own ceremony.
6. Gifts. Word of mouth is the only polite way I know of to prevent gifts from appearing. Some registries might have a notation of delivery only, but that just feels wierd to me.
7. What Else? Dude. Don't do this. It's a much bigger headache and isn't going to save you a nickel. Have a smallish wedding at a Knights of Columbus hall with a cash bar or whatever. You will enjoy it a whole lot more.
I also want to add that while you are not required to pay for guest accomodations, I feel like it is kind of expected that you contact a nearby hotel and reserve a block of rooms for the wedding. You will probably not have to put any money down up front for those rooms; hotels love doing this because you're basically taking care of their sales for them. If you are going to go this route, however, you must get the invitations out the door with plenty of time for people to make their reservations; the hotel will want to release unbooked rooms back into their general sales pool a week or so before the guests arrive. So the steps look like this:
1. Talk to a hotel and ask for a block of rooms at a reduced rate for the wedding.
2. Include this information in your invitation, with a polite suggestion that it's appropriate to book one's room far in advance so they can get the reduced rate.
3. ???
4. Profit!
P.S. - I totally forgot to say congratulations!
The week leading up to your wedding and the day of your wedding are a lot of fun, but an enormous amount of work and stress. I highly recommend a day to decompress before you head out to a honeymoon.
Try to be flexible, things go wrong, people are inconsiderate and problems pop up. For example, my wife's mother (who doesn't have much money) bought a dress for the day that she loved. So, we let my wife's step mother (who does have money) know the color and style so that she would be sure not to buy a similar dress. So what does she do? of course.. she buys a nicer dress in the exact same color... awesome. So we ended up having to buy my wife's mother a new dress just days before the wedding. Or how about the tux rental that my brother-in-law discovered at the last minute he couldn't afford.
Don't let it ruin your day, its a great day and it goes by too quickly, be sure to enjoy it!
I agree that having a day or two after the wedding to decompress before the honeymoon will make your trip much better.
For gifts, we did really well with a Honeymoon Registry, people are given a whole bunch of different things they can buy you...for instance we went to Italy so people could buy us a Gondola ride or a scooter tour or a romantic lunch or whatever. So people buy you all these things, but then the company just drops the money into your bank account, and whether you actually do that stuff or not is up to you.
All you have to do now is make it happen. People have made a good point about the weather; it's next to impossible to set up a rain date for a wedding. It might be good to have a contingency plan for an outdoor wedding.
If possible (I don't know, I've never done this), you may want to think about putting two tents on reserve so you can pick closer to the time: A large tent in case it rains, and, if you have any elderly or infirm attending, a much smaller tent so that they can be out of the sun if they need to in case it's beautiful.
I'll give you a point of reference. My fiance and I are doing a small (<20 people) Vegas wedding, reception is a fancy steak dinner with an open bar, and we'll be coming in at right around $7k which is absurdly cheap for a wedding, even a small one. I strongly suggest you set an upper limit right now and work down from there before you go reserving tents and calling bakeries. The absolute worst thing you can do is set your expectations before your budget.
6(^^)b
$7k for under 20 is over $300/head, that's nuts. Unless you have fireworks or it's in the fanciest restaurant in town that's just robbery and is not a good point of reference in terms of cost.
Except there are certain costs associated with a wedding for which the number of guests is irrelevant, so you math fails. Flowers, band/DJ, the reception space, officiant's fee--these's are all fixed costs.
Flowers are likely going to be less for a smaller wedding because there will be less center pieces. You're also unlikely to have a large wedding party with only 20 guests. Reception space will be less because you won't need a large room and different sized rooms cost different. Officiant fees run about a couple hundred, $500 is considered expensive. $7k for >20 is definitely not cheap and the OP should not use this as a measure of a 'cheap' wedding. Especially since the OP isn't doing it in a major city and springing for an open bar.
Hahahahaha, that site is excellent.
edit: yeah, I'm staying out of Vegas for a reason.
And that is insane. The OP wants to do his on a beach with a BBQ style reception. Odds are he can do his wedding for $7k if he plans it right. You can do the style reception he wants for as low as $30/head easy.
In my particular case, it's a simple breakdown: $4k for the chapel, flowers, cake, fees, and a suite for 3 nights, $3k for the dinner and open bar for 25 (we expect not everyone will bring dates but you never know). The average (!) price for a wedding in the US is over $25k, so yeah. Cheap. :P
$1500 is a VERY thin budget for a 50 person wedding. cheap DJ / Tent / Flowers / permit and conservatively over half of that is gone.
$30/head is the food, left this part out. Though total as I said he could definitely do this for $7k.
I read it wrong. $30 a head for food is totally doable.
I left out the food part by mistake, fixed
my advice is just do a destination wedding. fly to some island and get married on a beach with your close family and let the resort take care of everything