Weddingbee Blog

When Mr. Seashell and I began the process of creating our registries, there was one thing I was admittedly nutty about. Straight up anal. In fact, even before we got engaged, I declared that I’d be happy registering for this one thing and nothing else. What was it, you ask? Our wedding china.

Here’s my logic: of all the things you register for, your wedding china stands the possibility of becoming a family heirloom. Ever dreamed of getting passed down Grandma’s cookie sheets? Her cheese grater? Probably not. But wedding china likely seems a little more meaningful. Thus, I was determined (like, crazy determined) to choose exceptionally beautiful china. Additionally, I love the sentiment of having a beautiful set of china, assembled by loved ones, that you can use year after year, holiday after holiday, to feed those that mean the most to you.

Mr. Seashell and I began the search for our wedding china soon after we got engaged. More specifically, I casually mentioned we meet at Bloomingdale’s one evening after work to “look at some registry stuff”. The part I didn’t anticipate was that Mr. Seashell would be so opinionated.

After browsing a few patterns and having him immediately call things ugly, I was hopelessly discouraged. He balked at the idea of owning a $45 dinner plate and couldn’t fathom who would purchase such a thing. I started yapping about tradition, and feeding our children… our families… think of our first Thanksgiving! And he made some comment about paper plates getting the job done. At this point—I’ll be honest—I tried to produce some fake tears so he’d back down and say something to the effect of, “Clearly this is VERY important to you, honey, I’m thinking you should choose whatever you like (because in the end as long as there’s food on the plate I’m happy).” Yeah, no such luck. Stupid tears.

I began to pull a few china patterns—I knew I wanted to mix and match—and asked Mr. Seashell to do the same. He came over to see what I had chosen with a bunch of plates in his hand. He looked at my selections and immediately asked why I’d chosen plates with gold detailing. I said that I liked gold, something about it being regal. He said, “but then the silverware won’t match.” You should have seen my face. I was starting to lose it. “Have you ever seen GOLDware? What are you talking about?” He explained that he’d chosen plates with silver detailing so the silverware would match. OMG. Clearly we were not choosing our wedding china that night. It was a quiet ride home.

We went back to Bloomingdale’s two other times. Both ended unsuccessfully. One time I fell in love with a pattern that Mr. Seashell insisted was, “trippy, and too ’age of aquarius’,” and then he started doing the dance from the closing sequence of 40 Year Old Virgin. The other time we almost found something we liked but agreed it wasn’t “it”.

Finally, I went to look by myself. Mr. Seashell decided that he was “done” looking at plates, and he couldn’t remember why he cared so much. I told him that I’d keep in mind what we’d found on our last trip, and if I selected something he absolutely hated we’d go back one last time to reselect. Honestly, I was getting burned out, too. But our day had come.

Behold, Our Wedding China:

Oh, how I love it. And of course since it’s 2 patterns mixed, it can also look like this:

{Barbara Barry “Radiance”}

{Villeroy and Boch “Aureus”}

Did you have any registry woes? Did your finance ever question silverware not matching your gold plates?