Wedding Blog
I thought I had thought of everything to make planning for our guests as easy as possible — wedding website? check. room blocks? check. airport information? check. rental car info? check. when/where details? check. directions/maps? check. Pet friendly hotels? WHAT? Ugh.
Recently while in the car with my fiance’s mother, grandmother, aunt and cousin-in-law, his grandmother said, “Well my dog will have to come with me? What hotels are pet friendly? Also her son and his partner would also be traveling with their two dogs and “can’t come without the dogs.”" Ok, so I thought you put your dog in a kennel or got a friend to watch them when you go places, but apparently these people travel with their dogs!
So I checked with the three hotels I’d blocked rooms at to discover one of them actually did allow pets for a small additional fee ($10 per dog per night). Hooray! Not bad at all. Feeling triumphant I emailed fiance’s grandmother to inform her and called my future mother-in-law to let her know too. Then I promptly updated our wedding website with the information!
Pfew — crisis averted. I hope there is nothing else I’ve forgotten. My mother’s side of the family is Italian (and I identify with that heritage the most) and so I have this constant need to make sure everything is taken care of (and everyone is feed well)!
What lengths have you gone to to make your guests travel experience is easy as pie? Anything like this you realized at the last minute? Do share if I’m forgetting anything.
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I feel your pain!! I near about cried when my mother in law told me that my then-fiance’s aunt and uncle couldnt leave their dog home and i needed to find them a pet-friendly hotel. Seriously people? Cant you have someone watch it for you???
Glad it worked out for you!
I offered to have a couple out of towners stay in my house instead of using a hotel. No problem I have 3 bedrooms. But NOW, someone that I invited who has been waffling is still wanting to come WITH her 2 kids. I did not offer for her kids to stay with me…I don’t know what to do.
When my family traveled with our golden retriever back in the day, we also found that there were a number of places that would outwardly say no to pets, but would allow our dog when they learned the breed, since the breed has a reputation of being well behaved. And then we would find ourselves on a ground floor (for easy coming and going without letting other guests know there were pets in the place) dedicated to people with pets that had been screened in some quick-and-dirty (but obviously effective, since nobody disturbed each other) method for deciding which pets would not cause a ruckus.
I don’t think that being the bride means you have to think of any and all possible travel problems people might have and solve it for them. All these people are adults and have no doubt travelled before. If I wanted to travel with my dog I would never even dream of asking the bride to solve that problem for me…I’d just look and see what hotels allowed pets. Luckly it looks like it wasn’t too much work for you to look into this but if any more problems like that popped up I wouldn’t spend even a second stressing over it, I’d either delegate it or politely tell them to look into it themselves.
I’ve decided that having a wedding website was the best thing we could have done — people wonder why there’s a dragonfly on the invitation? Put an explanation on the website. Someone wonders whether the welcome party is a formal 5pm - 9pm event or they can come late/leave early? Put it on the website. Someone asks about attire for the wedding? Put it on the website. Even if almost no one looks - at least I’ll feel like I’ve done my best to inform our guests!
thankfully, I haven’t had to deal with this issue. but also thankfully, one of my BMs did and she still has a list of all of the local hotels that allow pets! whew! i’m certainly glad everything worked out for you!
I also have created a website with every detail I could imagine… when I still received calls requesting the same information that was on the website, I mailed out a newsletter to all of my OOT guests.
In spite of all of this information, I’ve become the personal travel agent for many of my FI’s family members who don’t travel very often…. Anything to get them there I guess *sigh*
I also cannot believe that people NEED to travel with their pets. Our hotel is very pet friendly (they even have a VIP (very important pet) program and provide all sorts of amenities for pets… but we are trying to NOT spread the word. My fiance’s grandmother is disgustingly attached to her dog, and if she knows the dog is welcome at the hotel, then we are afraid she will also bring it to the ceremony and the reception. Watching the dog eat off her plate at Thanksgiving is repulsive enough; I don’t want to watch it at my wedding as well!
I think simply providing your guests with a list of hotels in the area is sufficient. Arranging discounts or hotel blocks is going above and beyond.
But finding accomodations for pets? Not your problem!
This was too much! Alas, there’s always someone who thinks you are their personal travel agent.
A friend of mine called me 24 hours before the wedding to ask for directions. Nevermind that it was on our website, nevermind that the wedding was at a major federal landmark that anyone could find anywhere in town, nevermind that the internet exists today, and nevermind that we grew up just 15 minutes from there.
i was looking for pet friendly places just so we could bring our family dog. mostly because i’m trying to put him into the wedding!
Um, I bring my dog EVERYWHERE, to work and school, and I would never think of insisting that the dog come to a wedding. A person with a dog should know about all the research tools available that specialize in helping people travel with their furry companions. Do not worry another second!
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Miss Onion, NYC/Burlington, VT
Age and Occupation: 27, PR & Marketing and Jazz Singer
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 28, Data Analyst
Engagement Date: April 2, 2006
Wedding Date: September 2007
Blogging Since: July 11, 2007
Venue: Restaurant in Burlington
About Me: I didn't think I'd be "that girl," but I am having so much fun planning our wedding (mostly by myself). I'm a PR and Marketing Director for a major jazz festival and camp by day, and by night, a romantic jazz singer and bride-to-be! I hope all my research can help other brides in their planning.
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