To ask for your absolute wedding HATES?

[WeddingNoNos]

I am just starting out planning a wedding and trying to navigate having the day we want without any guests coming on here to post about my cunty bridezilla nuptials.

There will be no wishing well and no twattish poetry. What else do I need to remember?

Agree, either make sure you recall that your wedding party are guests.

OR, conversely, do what I did, and what some of my friends did with my DH and I for their weddings, and very intentionally appoint a best man and a chief bridesmaid to fill the roles in a very interesting way - i.e. as stress-and-fuss-managers, almost in the role that a wedding planner would fill.

It worked exceptionally well, because it meant all the mither of clock-watching, guest-wrangling, venue-liaising etc etc fell to two people NOT the B & G, and from neither family, who were instantly identifiable by outfit. For us, and for our friends, it meant that Bride and Groom, and MOB, and MOG etc could sail around serenely like swans all day, whilst the frantic paddling was done by two other people, who were not as emotionally invested, had no axe to grind and no pre-exisitng bias, who were trusted to do it - and key here - knew they were going to before hand.

The large bottle of champagne at 9pm, when everything's settled is most gratefully received as well. :-)

Other than that, so what you want and make sure you enjoy it. If you do, and you remember that your guests are people, it'll be fine.

Fireworks.

Lots of weddings now have fireworks at the reception. What's that all about?

It's expensive, unnecessary and tacky.
Fireworks should be for Bonfire night and New Years Eve, not weddings.

And as somebody pointed out - the first time somebody has these quirky things - OK, it's original to start with, but now every man and his dog are having fireworks at their wedding, it's nothing special.

Am getting married next year. Am taking careful note of all these points

Take it from a recently married woman OP

You need to:
Have a small intimate wedding with everyone you know invited
Invite people with children but make sure the children are gone by 9pm and silent during the ceremony
Have a gift list but don't tell anyone about it. Make it clear you are happy with cash but never ask for it.
Have a table plan but don't tell people where to sit
Have the speeches before the food but don't make people wait for food
Dont' have it in a hotel but don't have it where there is a gap between the ceremony and the reception
Don't have it in a posh venue and don't have it in a field

Have I covered everything?

MyEyes but the expense has nothing to do with the guests

Totally agree re 'quirky' touches. I don't understand why people are so sheeplike when it comes to their wedding. It's a special day so make it a bit personal, instead of bending over backwards to copy everyone else's ideas.

I think your wedding sounds lovely!

My rules are,

1. don't make me spend more on your wedding than I did on my own (weddings abroad when neither bride nor groom comes from the place they're getting married in, massive country house weddings where rooms and drinks cost a fortune)
2. Anyone who is coming to the ceremony, is coming to the meal and speeches - inviting friends to the evening reception only is fine but don't do like a friend of ours and invite your entire research lab to come 150 miles south to the ceremony, kick them out for 8 hours, and then have them back for the evening do! We were all quite drunk bored stiff after 8 hours of kicking around this town together in wedding outfits...
3. Invite kids. I've never understood kid-free weddings. Given your wee auntie Susie is going to be hanging off your arm half the day a quarter bottle of gin the worse for wear by 2pm, oh no wait that's just my lot it's hardly going to be a meeting of sophisticated grownups about town, so why not just invite the whole family?

We asked for no gifts. We told everyone that if they wanted to they could sing a song at the reception...or bring a homemade gift or some flowers from their gardens.

[hippy]

That bouquet tossing can be a reminder to your single friends exactly how single they are. Went to DH's friends wedding where they not only did the bouquet toss but accompanied it with "all the single ladies" by Beyonce. Most guests were mid -late 40's with divorces behind them and it did not go down particularly well.

That using close family members to do anything helpful on the day is probably not a good idea. My mum drove me mad over the flowers she'd offered to arrange and my family spent the hour before the wedding started (we had our reception and ceremony at the same place) annoying me with trivial shit when they could have annoyed our event person in charge. I'm still fuming about that as by the time the day comes around you really stop giving a shit about the minor details (well, i did anyway)

Feeding your guests is v important. We had people arrive, gave them a drink, did the ceremony 15 minutes later (which lasted 10 minutes) and then did a cocktail hour with lots of canapes and then sat down to dinner and then did the speeches. Also don't forget to feed yourselves. Our venue had a dedicated person for us all night who made sure we always had food first and always had a fresh drink

I will put up with anything for a bride....as long as I can sit down! Being shuffled into the bar while 90% of the seats are moved to make room to dance means I have to push over great aunt june quickly get a seat and not move all night in case great aunt June someone takes it!

It's not so much a hate as a tip - if you're having a church wedding try to pick at least one 'crowd-pleaser' hymn - DH and I went to more than one wedding last year where the hymns were so obscure that the church was mostly silent.

Hates - loud, crappy bands who try to put their spin on every song so nobody has a clue which song it is. Ditto crappy DJ's who play way too much 70's disco music.

Speeches. Yawn.

'Give us money/buy us a honeymoon'.

Not enough food, long gap with no food.

I went to one wedding that was a buffet. But someone was handing out plates. You had to check in to get one. If you hadn't RSVP'd, you didn't eat! Bet some of those people will never fail to RSVP again!

Another one taking notes for next year. We haven't done any apart from inviting all the kids of these 'hates' so far so I am reassured!

If you aren't inviting children, accept that that will mean some people can't come. Don't get snitty with them about it - not everyone has overnight childcare available to them.

Those tacky ribbon bows stuck on the end of pews in church.

Do people think it's ok to have an outdoor ceremony on a cold day?

I recently went to a wedding where the B&G had their hearts set on an outdoor ceremony. There was an indoor room which was arguably not as nice as outdoors, but still a very nice room. The venue staff wanted to do it indoors but B&G insisted on having it outside. It was a beautiful setting but it was cold. I was wearing a wrap over my dress and had tights on but was still cold. Some people without wraps/jackets or tights (who admittedly should probably have dressed more warmly) must have been freezing. I did notice goosebumps! The ceremony was about 20-30mins so it was bearable but unfortunately we then had another few hours outside on the terrace (where the drinks and canapés were served). I realise I'm probably being a bit unreasonable but I do think they should have had the drinks reception inside at least.

Hope people don't mind me asking here, I do think it's relevant to the thread.

I like a good speech but went to one wedding where there were TWO HOURS of speeches! Thirteen bloody speeches with no break to get a drink or go to the loo. It was a lovely day but bring up that wedding among our friends and the first thing mentioned will be the speeches.

'If you aren't inviting children, accept that that will mean some people can't come. Don't get snitty with them about it - not everyone has overnight childcare available to them.'

This. And not everyone can afford to hire strangers to look after their kids or wants to just because you are getting married.

Venue location - pick a single venue or at least make sure that you can walk between them in wedding outfit.

• make sure you can get there by public transport

Gift list

• please have one! It is the one occasion that loads of people (that don't know you perfectly) want to buy you presents, it's nice to know that the gifts are wanted. Just suck it up! (Or do a charity list!)

Seating plan

• why would you not do one!??! The thought of the elbows out dive in giving me palpitations. I guess they might Be okay if you knew who a group the exact size in the table and you got a table.

Also I like favours and ceilidhs, but not discos.

Oh yes to CMOT, I think some friends have just fallen out with us after they didn't just not invite the dcs, they uninvited them! We couldn't find childcare, since the usual suspects were booked up already. Couldn't arrange childcare at the venue as it was very remote and the place was booked for only wedding guests (no exceptions).

They haven't responded to our RSVP, and I don't think they will.

I think we're better off.

Babies/toddlers squawking during the vows should be made illegal.

Pimms with grass floating in is vile and not everyone's idea of a nice treat.

Bear in mind how much your wedding might cost the guests. Travel, hotel, outfits, wedding gift, drinks, hen/stag nights.....

Weddings on a weekday, which mean that getting time off work/childcare is a nightmare. Yes, I know it's cheaper and that's fine, but don't expect everybody to be able to make it.

This too:

'If you aren't inviting children, accept that that will mean some people can't come. Don't get snitty with them about it - not everyone has overnight childcare available to them.'

Do people think it's ok to have an outdoor ceremony on a cold day?

Or on a hot one. I live in Florida. The last wedding I went to was outside on the shore of a lake, but to get the lake view we were all sitting facing the sun. And then the cocktail portion of the reception was outside as well in blistering heat. When DH and I took his older sister, who is not in good health, inside to get out of the sun, the MOG tried to chase us out. I refused and just plopped SIL on a chair while DH went to get her something to drink. Then people saw us in there and the whole crowd began to came in. Luckily, the MOB did see the problem with having 100 people baking in the heat and the whole thing got transferred indoors.

SenecaFalls yes this was a cold day in England and I guess the same would apply for a very hot day elsewhere!