There are SO many possibilities for any wedding, and while that freedom can be really liberating—it can also be overwhelming. I feel like, especially at the beginning, a lot of our planning consisted of “planning by omission.” Here’s a sampling, and why:
Engagement Pictures
This is mainly because we couldn’t think of what we’d do with them. This might seem silly—of course you get engagement pictures done!—but beyond making a Facebook album and sending some to our folks, I was afraid they’d be sort of wasted. I knew early on I didn’t want to incorporate them into any of our paper products, and we chose a photographer largely based on her flexibility in exchanging an engagement shoot for extra wedding coverage. No regrets here.
Bouquet Toss/Garter Toss/Big Reception Entrance
We’re really trying to minimize the amount of time that 1) people’s eyes are on us and 2) is taken away from the party. I also get really nervous about logistics. What if my toss is not long enough? What if the garter gets stuck? Things like that. This just saves me some of that.
Flower Girl/Ring Bearer
Neither of us knows any little kids as most of our family members are grown. We could probably think of someone if we really put our minds to it, but I didn’t want to incorporate a child I wasn’t already close to into our ceremony.
Wedding Cake/Cake Cutting
Neither of us is big on dessert, and the cake cutting is yet another small moment that takes away from the party. Plus, cakes are so expensive! I know there’s symbolism in the cutting…but I honestly cannot tell you what it means. Plus, the donut thing sounds awesome.
What about you? Anything you’re NOT doing? Did anyone else “plan by omission” in the beginning?
I wasn’t really planning to do the bouquet toss/ garter toss either. I’m among the last of my friends to get married, so we’re mostly “been there, done that”, and there wouldn’t be anyone to rock out to “Single Ladies” 
However, my fiance’ is the FIRST of his friends to get married, so all of “his” friends that have since become “our” friends are single and want us to do it. So, bouquet and garter toss, here we come. I’m also a bit concerned about logistics, but I have a long dress so it shouldn’t be too bad.
Well with an Elopement to a Destination Wedding… followed by our Honeymoon and then a Back-Home Reception (B-HR), there are a lot of things that are not being done, done out of order… or done differently !!
But ya know, as an Encore Bride, I gotta say that is part of the charm… not doing things in the usual way. 
*Smile*
We thought about Engagement Photos… or precisely, I thought about them. I think they are really cute… Back-in-the-day when I got married the first time (Circa 1980), Engagement Photos were always a Formal Sitting… I think the more modern take on them is far more natural & fun.
Mr TTR isn’t one who likes getting his pic taken at the best of times. So as it stands now, we haven’t done any… and don’t have an appointment to.
BUT we have some photos that have been taken by Friends & Family over the Summer that truly reflect the happiness of our relationship and our interests… so I guess you could say they’ve become our “stand in” E-Photos.
Off your list, the only other thing that stands out for me is Wedding Cake & Cake Cutting… this is one tradition I want to embrace at our B-HR. Very much looking forward to having a cake decorated to reflect our Wedding Theme, and displaying it, and then cutting it and sharing it with our Guests. Lol, to me a Wedding isn’t a Wedding without cake… which is why we’ll have some sort of Cake or Cupcakes to nibble on after our Elopement with a Glass of Champagne.
We are not having a ring bearer/flower girl because we don’t know any kids in that age group. Most of my friends kids (and there are just a few) will be about 1 or a little older at the time of the wedding with a few who are teens. No one with a 5 or 6 year old so we are not doing it.
We are doing engagement photos because I want something for our save the dates and really we don’t have alot of pictures of the two of us (literally I think we might have like 25 over the last 4 years) so I thought it would be a good way to get more pictures of the two of us….now to find a photographer….
I have to say, I giggled a bit when I read your title about things you’re “not” doing. . . I am constantly surprising my friends and family when they ask me what I’m doing for (insert wedding tradition) and I simply say, “We’re not!” We have both been married before and I have a son from my previous marriage. We are having a smaller than small ceremony on November 29th with our preacher, my son, our God daughter, and the best friend couple that helped pull off the surprise engagement. (Surprise to me, they all planned for months!) It will be the 5 of us adults, and 2 kids for the ceremony then we will be going to the restaurant where we met for dinner. This ceremoy is on the anniversary of the day we met at that restaurant. I plan on ordering cupcakes to have with dinner and having them say “family” as we are calling this “Family Day.”
Then, on December 31st, we will be in Jamaica as a couple and have a “vow renewal” ceremony that will be just the two of us and one more couple. We plan to always celebrate Nov 29th as family day as an anniversary with our kid(s) and Dec 31st as our anniversary as a couple. We are very excited about both services, but people around us just don’t understand! We’ve decided that we are doing what works for us as a family and couple and not doing “traditional” things that everyone expects. Initially we had some upset family members because we weren’t having something that family would be able to attend, but now everyone has become very supportive. This is about us coming together as a family with my son and celebrating our love as a couple, not putting on a show for everyone. This allowed us to save enough money to go to Jamaica and we’ll be getting married without any wedding debt.
I wish you the very best in all the things you decide to do or not to do, I think it’s wonderful to do what’s right for you as a couple!
We are not doing alot of things.
Small wedding followed by a reception dinner at a restaurant nearby…
Not doing the bouquet throw (2nd marriage for both of us)
No engagement pictures; although I like the idea; I am going to have my neighbor take some pics of us so that we can add it to our website.
Do have ring bearer; he is my grandson
We nixed a grand entrance… We just walked in and joined in the party with our guests.
We also passed on the Flower Girl and Ring Bearer. We didn’t want any children at all and it was easier to tell everyone NO when it was really NO children at all.
I laughed reading this…we made almost all the same choices at our wedding ( I’ve put up pics in the recaps) It was great. No one missed the cake, or the garter, or any of it. We even did donuts and they were a big hit. The baker was totally into it and made glazed ones in our colors and had bacon maple ones that were the talk of the wedding.
Sounds like you guys are really letting your personalities guide your choices- I’m sure it will be awesome!
This will be my first marriage, but we are skipping the engagement pictures and the garter/flower toss. My FI and I don’t do well with posed photographs, so we’re going to put that money towards nicer invitations or our honeymoon. As far as the flower/garter toss, there won’t be a lot of single ladies at our reception. Besides, I think the garter toss is rather tacky, IMHO. I’m still going to wear a garter, but it will only be for my FI’s eyes.
Ha ha – when I think of our wedding, feel like it’s far more traditional than I wanted – and yet when I read your post, I realized that we are DEFINITELY skipping a lot of the traditions.
1) Engagement photos? Pffft. We have like 10,000 photos of us on Facebook. I think we’re good there, it never even crossed my mind.
2) No rehearsal dinner . . I mean there IS dinner – but it’s at a camp, and we’re not paying for it (we’re paying for 2 nice meals the day-of, so we sort of skipped the rehearsal dinner part.)
3) No diamond. Engagement ring is threaded pearls – more eco-friendly, simpler. More me.
4) No aisle walk. We’re having our friends and family do a kirtan chant with musicians and actually come down a row of trees to bring us together to be married.
5) Split-up wedding. We’re doing the ceremony at 11 am with a nice luncheon – then a BREAK in the day so we can take our “First Flight.” Later, a Bollywood themed reception.
6) No cake – cupcakes, malasadas, mochi, pie, diwai candy.
7) No formal dinner – it’s a serve yourself Indian food buffet. Very casual after the more formal luncheon.
8) No flower toss, no ringbearers or flower girls, no garter toss.
9) Oh yes – and most important of the traditions we are skipping . . . no marriage ha ha!
We are NOT getting legally married – we’re having a commitment ceremony, but for many reasons, we are skipping the government tax-based part of it.
We do want to have it made legal later on down the road – but for now, we realized that what made it a “marriage” to us was the commitment to one another before family and friends and we just do not care if the government thinks we are married or not.
So thank you for this lovely post – because it reminds me that this little wedding isn’t turning out quite so traditional after all.
For those of you with “couples” a friend of mine had suggested that you could make a bouquet of lottery tickets, or movie tickets, etc and toss that to a co-ed group if you so wished. I personally feel that we are beyond throwing the bouquet, but thought I would pass it on.
We are having no flower girl or ring bearer because well i’ll be honest i’m not a “kid” person and I want the attention on me and my man and my bridesmaids and grooms Squad!
We definitely skipped the engagement photos.
No engagement party, either – our friends and family are everywhere but here.
No bridal shower – see above explanation.
We’re not going to have individual programs, but rather one sign with the program information.
We’re not going to have a DJ, but are rather going to put together a few MP3 playlists for the different portions of the reception.
We’re going to skip the big cake, but we will have a small one for us to cut.
It’s nice to see how everyone else is making their weddings their own!
i liked seeing this post. it made me feel a lot better about what we have decided to do.
we are having a short ceremony (but meaningful). no wedding party, followed by reception which is next door to the chapel at a boutique cafe, so do big gap in between. No entrance song etc (it would be silly given the size of our venue. No bridal table (we are just having one large horseshoe shaped table that everyone sits at, so no name tags. No garter or toss of any type. we might have a first dance, only to get people up and dancing but no dj as we are using our own itunes combined with a ipad app called wedding dj. no cake cut however we are doing a croquembouche (which involves chucking the cake in the air and catching it with a table cloth). hopefully people will still be happy with our lack of tradition.
We skipped a lot of similar traditions. No flower girl/page boy, no garter, no bouquet toss, no cake smushing.
We cut out the receiving line, ceremony programs, dinner blessing, and a few other things that didn’t make sense for us… along with many of the things mentioned in the comments above. The first thing we nixed was the traditional tosses (garter/bouquet).
Things we are skipping:
1. Ring bearer & flower girl
2. Bouquet & garter toss
3. Receiving line
4. Rehearsal dinner
5. Engagement pictures
6. Dance floor/first dance
We are having a small outdoor ceremony near the river with family and friends around noon and then following it with a catered luncheon type reception. We did not want it at night as it was double the price and we’d also have to worry about all the alcohol, etc. We will have a cake but we are NOT doing the cake smashing thing!
THANK YOU for posting this! There are so many things that I’m sure we WON’T be doing just because to me they seem silly, like a waste of time or money, or just totally not my style. We are planning on “no flowers” !
We will probably still have a big entrance because I do like “all eyes on me,” haha, but I definitely don’t want a flower girl or ring bearer — really, I don’t want any kids at my wedding, so why would I give one this important place then not allow any other children to attend?
I can’t decide whether we’ll do engagement photos — they’d be for the exact same reason you mentioned. I’m thinking maybe we’ll have a friend take some nicer-than-usual pics of us together instead of the professional thing.
@nikstar: Even before we got engaged I had to explain to my friends that we weren’t planning on a wedding party. It shouldn’t matter if “people will be happy” with our celebrations because they should be what means the most to us!
I don’t think I’ll do the bouquet toss or garter toss either. I say just because its tradition or something that happens a lot doesn’t mean you have to do them!
Mrs. Gray Wolf, Washington DC Age and Occupation: 26, Business Development Executive Fiance's Age and Occupation: 30, Research Scientist Engagement Date: November 11, 2011 Wedding Date: February 2013 Venue: Whittemore House About Me: I'm an ultra-organized, pun-loving, list-making, cheese-enthusiast bride-to-be. Although my day job is in cubicle land, I'm happiest in the modern art wing of a museum, having recently earned my Masters in Museum Studies. Shortly after a chance meeting five years ago, I moved in with Wolfman and haven't looked back since. We love music, movies, TV, and all things pop culture; we have an unspoken competition to be the first to share the latest YouTube sensation or indie song. Together, we've filled quite a few pages in our passports, but also love quiet nights in with a Game of Thrones marathon and our French Bulldog, Tonks (Harry Potter, anyone?). I'm planning a small, cozy winter wedding---think mercury glass and candle light---in the heart of DC. Our venue is a historic home with a lot of political charm, but needs a bit of work to be wedding-ready.
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