To ask for your TINY wedding stories

[SomethingBlue22]

NC for this

OH has proposed and we want a registry office and our children there. No other guests. The obvious answer to avoid upsetting family and friends would be go abroad but its not an option for at least 2 reasons and is unlikely to change.

I know it's our day and we can have the wedding we want etc but I'd really like to come out of it married but without having pissed everyone off. I'm about the marriage rather than the wedding and that's the important thing.

Anyone who has done this, did it go well and any tips? AIBU to want to have it our way?

Just dh and I. I was planning the wedding and...the whole thing just massively fucked me off. The extortionate price, the fucking inlaw politics etc. Also I hate, HATE eyes on me so a wedding with guests was the worst possible idea to me. So we went off on our own abroad, got videos done so no one could complain and it was bliss. Ukele player by the sea, a slice of convenience store cake, that was all we wanted.

No one should have expectations of how someone else gets married.
Have the wedding you both want. If people are pissed off, it's not YOU pissing them off. True friends and people who love you wouldn't put their wishes before yours.

OP sounds just like us. Neither like the attention. I want to just go us and dc to register office where we live a d meal after. But i think we'll end up in the city where our families live with both sets of parents and maybe siblings... but I'm drawing the line after that. We've been together 20 years a d have house kids etc so it's a formality really.

We went to the US for 3 weeks and got an Elvis wedding in Vegas. It was great fun, cost about US$250 and we are still married 20 years later.

We got married last May.

There was 5 of us - bride, groom, my two DSes and DS1’s (now ex) girlfriend.

We live in Yorkshire, but went down to London. Stayed at the Four Seasons. I had someone come to do my hair and makeup while DH went and got ready in DS2’s room.

DH and DS2 went in one taxi, while DS1 and his girlfriend escorted me in another.

I’d ordered a tiny bouquet of white peonies and four buttonholes. DH went to pick them up from the florist round the corner from the registry office.

We all met up on the steps of Marylebone Town Hall, then went in and got married!

The DSes walked me in, one on each side, and we said personalised vows. The music was a playlist on my phone, and DS1 did a reading - a Shakespeare sonnet, Let Me Not To The Marriage Of True Minds. DS2 was in charge of the rings.

Afterwards, we jumped in a taxi. We had a table booked at The Ivy, but we were an hour early and all starving, so we went into Brewdog up the street and had a pint and some chips, in all our wedding finery!

Then dinner and champagne at The Ivy (paid for by my dear late dad as a wedding present) then back to the hotel for cocktails!

On the way upstairs, DS2 pointed out DH and I hadn’t had a first dance with DH, so I had one with him instead, in the lift!

It was a perfect day. Perfect.

We had sister and friend and witnesses and our two children as guests. We live streamed it to Mum and Auntie! Luckily our registry office is a beautiful historic building. I wore an amazingly expensive designer wedding dress I'd got for £20 in a charity shop about 10 years earlier, DH in suit bought for friend's wedding. My bouquet I made myself from flowers in ours and neighbour's garden. Only expensive bit was rings as that's the bit you'll keep with you for life.
Went for pub lunch afterwards in our favourite country pub (again v historic and pretty with fab food) then had two nights away in a hotel.
Told no-one.
Had friends over for pizza in garden weekend after.
Absolutely frigging perfect and we have some beautiful pics, all on camera phone.

Friends got married on the London Eye - really restricts the numbers a lot, to however many fit in the pod.
A group of friends went down to wave them on to the pod.

Really enjoying reading this. I'm unlikely to ever get married but if I did I would want a 'tiny wedding'. I love some of these stories. I'd like someone at my imaginary wedding in a crocodile suit @Sooverthemill

We had a tiny wedding in September. Booked it 6 weeks before, told only our 2 best friends as they were witnesses.
Smallest Registry office room, just us , the witnesses and the registrar it was perfect. I was a bit giggly with nerves, DH was crying as he said his vows it was honestly perfect for us. We drove there ourselves and afterwards went for fish and chips and champagne on our favourite little shingle beach.
We invited 10 close family to our house in the afternoon and surprised them with champagne and wedding cake.
Everyone, including my parents were happy for us.
It was a second marriage for us both, first time round I had the full works this time was so much nicer. No stress, and a really personal day.

I wore a simply cream broderie anglaisle summer dress with some roses from our garden and DH wore his best jeans and smart shirt and jacket, very casual.

Having a little sob at lots of these. They just sound exactly what we want. Thank you all for sharing.

We went to New York and married in Central Park, just the two of us. You only need one witness in NY state so our photographer did it. My dress was from ASOS’s bridal range, DH got a beautiful suit in Ted Baker’s sale.

We turned the trip into a combined wedding and honeymoon, and I would do it exactly the same again! It was great.

@OkMaybeNot are you in the same town as me? We got married in the library. Told closest relatives to come along and have fizzy wine and cake at our house. I wore jeans. He wore his work suit. I made the cake. We must have had sandwiches too but I was so nervous I have no idea. If anyone had tried to get me to walk down an aisle in a posh frock in front of 60 people we would have hid. And everyone knows that. The sun shone. We had a water fight. The oldies swapped stories.

Yes we did. Neither of us likes being the centre of attention, and we'd been together 20 years so it seemed rude to say the toaster has had it, We're getting married, here's our gift list.... Dh's gran and great aunt lived on a small Scottish island at the time so we asked them to be our witnesses and had a small registry office wedding. A couple of weeks before we relented and asked both mothers (our fathers were dead) and just as well. My dm wouldn't have minded, but dmil said afterwards she would have cut dh off and not spoken to him again if we hadn't invited her. Everyone else was fine about it - dsis and niece decorated our flat while we were away with about a million daffodils, balloons and banners and dsil organised a party in her garden in our honour in the summer. No regrets here 😁

We got married on a Florida beach with just 6 guests. I didnt want a big fuss; to me it's about being married rather than getting married. It was perfect. Nobody was offended, either.

My grandparents had a tiny wedding - they were married 'in the house', just as many family members that could fit into a tenement front room, probably not much more than them, the witnesses and the minister. In Scotland you can get married anywhere as long as the person is licensed to conduct legal marriages - so you can choose pretty small places, only enough for five people! 😁

What I would say @SomethingBlue22 is do something that's meaningful and fun for you both, amd the kids - a cake if you have a special favourite, music that means something whatever, because it is a special day for you and you deserve to have something or do something memorable and special.

My first wedding was the traditional white dress and church lark and it was great, but looking back it wasn't about us as a couple - just the generic church, vows, reception, speeches and roast chicken dinner that everyone hates.

My next wedding - we're thinking 2022 so not Yet - will be tiny, just us for the ceremony and then maybe a few people for a dinner after. We were thinking of going to Venice but with Venice drowning, Brexit and the added stress and expense of needing to sort out paperwork, get a wedding planner etc we've had second thoughts. I've found a lovely hotel on the coast in Cornwall that suits our personalities and so we will (hopefully unless we change our minds again) marry there.

My step daughter did this, got married and told us all after the event. There were all sorts of complicated family reasons they did it that way, doesn't really matter why. I was ridiculously upset but I got over it and I recognised even at the time that I was being unreasonable. I didn't say anything to them other than congratulations.

Ten years on, nobody cares or even remembers! So do what you want to do, you may upset some people but if they love you they'll recognise that it's your right to get married any way you wish and get over it just as I did.

We had a tiny legal wedding, just us and witnesses, and a slightly larger ceremonial wedding - hired an island that only had beds for 30 so no space for hairdresser, make-up artist etc. Best idea ever.
My tip would be consider doing an informal party or meal to mark the occasion. It's nowhere near as stressful and expensive as a wedding and you can invite everyone you feel like inviting without worrying about seating plans etc. My partner and I are from different countries (and we got married in a third!) so we had an informal engagement bash in each in a very conveniently located spot - hired a room in a nice pubs, had some nibbles and some drinks put on, no need for people to bring a gift or go mad on outfits etc.

We had our parents and 10 friends, so slightly larger than you're thinking about. We got married late morning at the registry office, went to a nearby pub for a drink around midday then a local high street restaurant for a long lunch. Then everyone went home, we didn't have cars or flowers or a photographer, or best man/bridesmaids etc. I did buy a new dress but it's one I'd wear again and isn't at all "wedding-y". In the evening DH and I had a takeaway and I'd made a cake.

It was a lovely, chilled out, relaxed day.

Just us & kids - registry office and lunch at country pub. A lovely relaxed day with no stress. Told others afterwards.

Do the tiny wedding but don't wait til afterwards to tell people. My best friend did this and it still irritates me if I think about it. I totally understood the tiny wedding but resented not being told. I know I know her wedding her choice blah blah but honestly I did mind.

A posh afternoon tea might be special if you have the kids with you?

Another tiny wedding here. We had 12 people (immediate family only) and got married in a lovely hotel about 2 hours from where we live. Neither of us wanted a big day. Dress from debenhams, normal suit, asda cake with some extra decorations, I bought some flowers for vases in the room and mum made my bouquet. No bridesmaids, best man, speeches, cars or official photos (sil took most for us).

After the ceremony we had a few photos then sandwiches, drinks and cake cutting. Then a relax before dinner at an Italian restaurant.

We realised after getting engaged that this was more what we wanted. We would have liked to have a few friends there, but at the time it would have been difficult to invite - eg - the 3 couples we wanted, without inviting 4 or 5 more, and then it would have been 'oh well what about...' so we stuck to immediate family only.

Do whatever you want to do OP. I remember our day as a lovely one.

We had quite a small wedding- just registry office and dinner at a pub. We agreed that it would just be us, parents and siblings but then MIL insisted her parents come but my grandparents still weren’t invited so that annoyed me a bit. I didn’t even really tell any of my friends we were getting married which in hindsight was a bit weird 😂 they all found out on Facebook 😂

My eldest daughter had a tiny wedding. It was lovely and enjoyed by those in attendance. It was in early September, the sun shone and it was lovely and warm.
She married in a lovely registry office in a simple tea dress and looked as beautiful as her sister who married in a full flouncy wedding gown.
We then had a lovely meal in a very nice hotel.
There were 6 guests in all with me and my husband ( her dad ) the groom's parents, the groom's best friend and my daughters best friend. The two friends were their witnesses.
We all took photos, the flowers were provided from my garden and I paid for a vintage rolls to get her there as part of their wedding gift.
A really lovely wedding and day 🙂