To wonder what people's weddings were like

[meantosay]

One of the current wedding threads just got me wondering? There's a lot of talk about people having weddings they can't afford etc and was just wondering how many of you had small simple affairs.

I had a small church wedding and buffet lunch at our new house for about 40 people.

rockin, your assumptions don't apply to me either. We had 150 people because I have a big family. I was 33 when we got married. Neither set of parents contributed a penny, we paid for it ourselves. I am also surprised that you seem to assume that expensive weddings = "showy".

Our wedding was absolutely perfect...for us. We loved sharing the day with the people that we loved and who loved us most in the world. As we were in the church, I felt this huge surge of love towards us and it was just wonderful. Having said that I love the stories where people say that it was just them and a handful of people and they went for a nice meal afterwards. Those stories always make me feel warm and glowy.

I was 34 and, like I said earler, really didn't want the big fancy wedding thing. However, I am the eldest girl in the family and I could see my mother was terribly disappointed at not being able to invite her friends to my wedding and doing the whole traditional thing so I just gave in. I didn't want my wedding to have memories of my mother being upset.
However, my sister is very grateful to me because when she got married 18 months later my mother was much more relaxed about the whole thing. They had 30 guests to the church and then had a picnic on the beach with champagne and then sis and her dh headed off on the train for the first leg of their honeymoon

Cursing - welcome! what a wonderful honeymoon.

Thanks taffetasplat . It was a wonderful honeymoon. Wish we could do it all over again. 'cept now we have one buzz buzz splat and another one on the way so it would be even more interesting...

Right I'm off to lurk elsewhere and maybe cook some dinner.

I'd never fantasised about big white weddings, but still had the big expensive church wedding. I'm the only girl (two brothers), and my parents are rich (self-made), and would not have it any other way. My parents had lots of family and friends they wanted to invite.

It was a marquee in the garden, with 160 guests free bar all day and lots of food and frivolous extras. We then had another 100 guests at night.

It was not what I wanted, but parents were paying, and I decided it was easier to give in, and let them have the showy wedding they'd dreamed about. They couldnt get their head around a small wedding - I tried. I focused on the fact that I got to marry DH, and that my parents and guests would enjoy it.

Despite my misgivings, I enjoyed the day, as did everyone else.

DH and I agreed if we were paying for it ourselves, it would have been a civil service, max of 50 guests, and much less fancy.

We got wed in a registry office with both our mums and our 4 DC present. We then went home and ate crisps. No photos or anything - true story :(

It didn't bother me at the time as I just really wanted to be his wife but 2 years on I'm a little bit very resentful!!!

I was 21 at my small reg office wedding so not me.

Our wedding was a perfect and relaxed day. 65 close friends and family packed a small country church. My grandparents wedding is recorded in the register for the church just a couple of pages before ours.

We then went back to the PILs garden for a cream tea with very freshly made scones (caterer forgot the flour so raided MILs cupboard) This was followed by BBQ in the evening. No seating plan, no first dance, quiet music from a stereo in the background so people could mingle and talk, which they did.

A beautiful day.

Myself dh and ds in Barbados. Married in a sugar mill with 2 people we met who became adopted parents to our ds as witnesses.

Champagne choc cake and pics on the beach at sunset.

Then we went and had a lobster meal on the sand with fire torches around.

The evening marred slightly by me stumbling in my heels and launching the remaining wedding cake over dh's back on the way to our room.

Suited us as we needed a break together have no close family and needed a quickie wedding to due my husband's job in the forces.

We had one day sailing alone around the grenadines while ds was looked after by a nanny.

Adopted grandparents sorry...we are his parents

I was 29 at my "showy" wedding and my mum helped me pick my dress and talked about stuff, but otherwise that was it, certainly wasn't about flashing the wealth.

As for being showy, it wasn't that - I wanted to get married in a castle because I'm a history freak, the idea of being married surrounded by somewhere with that kind of heritage made it my perfect day. So that limited us in terms of venue costs, there aren't many cheap castles! DH didn't want to split the ceremony and the dancing/dinner, so we had it all in one place, which then not only tied us into their chosen catering supplies (choice of 5 - none cheap), we had to hire in everything from chairs and tables for the dinner to a portable bar unit and sofas for people to sit on in the bar area as there was nothing available from the venue itself.

We had 120 guests as DH's family is HUGE and we have a large group of friends all of whom we wanted to share our day with. I didn't want to do evening only invites as the castle was in the middle of nowhere so most people were going to need to stay over and I felt that it was rude to expect people to fork out for travel and hotel then only let them come for a couple of hours at the end, felt we at least needed to give them a good meal!

So really, that was most of our budget, and why we spent that much. Although to be honest, I'm not sure why I'm justifying myself, it was a fantastic day, everyone who came said they had an amazing time and if a few people on the internet dismiss it as "showy" then it's not the end of my world

Clytaemneastra :)......you're being a bit oversensitive there.....the use of the word "showy" in my own post WASN"T in anyway intended as a judgment or insult, simply as a descriptive term to make myself understood,

& NO, you certainly don't have to justify your choice of a "HUGE" Castle wedding, anymore than I do my lower key 1, each to their own, & IMO thats exactly as it should be...

though your love of History would of been a lame argument to marry in a Castle, we also have a penchant for the old & historical, & married in a beautiful old Gothic building, without the Castle price tag, but like I say, irrelevant

I was just curious as to whether our ages when marrying played a part in our choices..not judging anyones personal choice......& from the replies....seems it doesn't

Registry office with 20 ish guests, then off to a nice restaurant for a long boozy lunch. Me and DH left everyone there (including the children) for a dirty weekend away.

I LOVE 'showy' weddings, just never wanted one for myself :o in fact, I never wanted to get married at all until my thirties

We had two.

First was a Register Office affair with about 30 friends - then we just went to the pub afterwards for eats and drinks. This was just to make things official so she could stay in the country.

We had a religious ceremony a few months later that year at Midsummer at a bunk house in the Brecon Beacons. We're both practising Wiccans, so it was outdoors with the mountains as a backdrop. Luckily the weather was gorgeous. We had about 50 people there, but it didn't cost much, because as is usual with Wiccan-style rituals, everyone brought food and drink along and we all mucked in for a buffet-style 'Reception'.

in fact, I never wanted to get married at all until my thirties same here Greeneyes....though I waited until my 40s & had no intention of EVER doing it & prior to that, myself & a group of friends had our selves pooling our resources for our own personal "Golden Girls" retirement home planned, complete with a million cats ....I let the side down a bit when I married & then had kids :)

Reg office with nice tunes at start and end of ceremony.
Three best men
Nice lunch across the road
Disco in the local church hall in the eve, bring a bottle.... still have the CDs if anyone interested, I made them myself based on everyone saying the 5 songs they most wanted to dance to..
Was fun!
Nice flowers.
Champagne was from Asda on offer I think?!

Regret not having nice white dress though, I'd have liked that.
Maybe next time?!

First marriage - all done professionally, catered for, loadsamoney, very 80s. Big hair, big dress. 125 people sit down meal, free bar etc. Only things slightly wrong I cut myself cutting the cake, flowers were not what we ordered and I got drunk and slept on sofa in wedding dress with confetti stuck down bra (which then transferred dye into dress). Anyway, it was a nice day. Marriage lasted less than a year!!!

Second marriage - thrown together. Skint, so accepted what seemed like kind SiL offer to do everything - catering and cake, even inviting her own family and giving out bouquets during reception to thank people she thought were important!! Have no real recollection of what any of it looked like. DH invited a load of very odd people from his office who did their best to ignore me whilst polishing off the buffet (whatever that might have contained). It rained all day, MiL sniggered throughout service, my dress was a disaster and I was, yet again, fairly drunk. Flowers were nice this time though!!