Weddingbee

I would like to plan a traditional church wedding with a reception following in the fellowship hall. In my head, I would love to have music and dancing. (Nothing that would be unappropriate at the church of course.) However, I have had people comment to me that you should NEVER have music or dancing at the church, even in the fellowship hall for a reception. I wanted to know what others thought about doing this. Did you have music and dancing at your church wedding. It’s a Christian church not belonging to any denomination.

- Amanda

Dear Weddingbee,

We’re having a huge church wedding and reception, but would still love for everything to look beautiful! Unfortunately neither of us have an eye for design so we were considering hiring an interior designer to create a cohesive vision for us. We know that floral designers often handle the decor, but a fellow church member is doing our flowers for us and while they’re great with flowers, they don’t have experience with the details that pull an event together.

How are you putting together an overall vision for your wedding, especially if don’t have an eye for design? Are you designing your wedding yourself or enlisting the help of an interior designer, florist, wedding planner, friend, family member?

Thanks!

ec

Since the beginning of my relationship with FI over 3 1/2 years ago, his brother and (now) sister-in-law have been rude and horribly disrespectful to me. About a year and a half ago, they started attacking FI’s parents and FI, making cutting remarks and excluding them from their child’s life and major events/holidays/etc. FI tried talking to his brother dozens of times over that year about how he and his wife treat us, but he blamed his wife and made some excuses. Nothing happened. We decided to try ignoring their poor behavior– we invited them to holiday gatherings and gave gifts to them & their child for birthdays and holidays. I guess you could say we took the route of *kill them with kindness* and hoped they’d come around. They didn’t and things just went from bad to worse.

Then, five months ago, FI’s brother and wife made a very sudden, very public scene in front of FI and all his friends. They screamed at him that they hate me, that we are trying to make them look bad, that we’ve spread rumors around to friends about them. Nevermind that it wasn’t true, they just kept screaming some pretty unforgivable things. FI and I decided after days of tears that they would not be welcome in our home or at our wedding. We told FI’s parents and asked that they respect our decision. At first they did, but recently I found out that they didn’t. They’ve been bringing it up to FI when I leave the room, when he’s at work, or when they know I’m not home. FI told them to stay out of it, that the decision stands, and that if his brother had a problem with it *he* should be calling to talk (since he hasn’t called in over a year). Yesterday, FI’s parents rescinded their wedding gift (which we were using to help pay for the wedding).

We decided on a Sunday wedding to save money. It’s an evening wedding, because the reception venue won’t let us start any earlier than 5 pm. Originally, I was fine with the possibility of guests leaving early, because I know our closest friends and fam are cool with taking Monday off from work. (And guests leave early from Saturday weddings, right?) But now I’m starting to have “Sunday guilt.” Will people see our wedding as an inconvenience?

Jen

So, my FI and I are in a bit of a pickle. We have a guest that we want to disinvite. He’s already responded “Yes” that he’s coming. Before the etiquette police come to get me, hear me out: This guest has been a friend of my FI’s brother for a looong time, and somewhat of a friend to their family. After our Save the Dates and invites were sent out, we got information that has totally swayed our perception of him. He’s gotten in trouble with the law, in a really creepy, bad way. I don’t even want to give details because I’m ashamed that he’s even on my guest list. It’s really that bad.

Our wedding is about 3 weeks away. My FI is very concerned that since this guest’s mug has been all over the media, that FI’s extended family will recognize him and wonder why he’s here at OUR wedding. What can we do? My vote is to just call him up, say, “In light of your current situation, we’d really like you to not attend the wedding.” My FI is concerned that if we do that, he’s just crazy enough to show up anyway. Help! -Ugh.

Boy do I hope I can get some help on this.

My best friend and I have been friends since before either of us can really remember. We’ve been BEST friends for over 10 years. When she got married last year, even though I wasn’t exactly in the best financial position, I flew down for her wedding (we now live across the US from each other). Now I’m getting married in August, and she says she doesn’t have money for a plane ticket OR a dress. Naturally I started researching ways to get her here for my wedding, and a few ideas came up and she shot them down soon after. I personally don’t have the funds to fly her down and buy her a dress, so that’s out, too. My parents offered to use their frequent flyer miles, but I don’t want to take away from what they earned… they were planning on going to Europe soon!

I feel like I have tried and tried and bent over backwards trying to get her to my wedding, but now it just seems like she doesn’t even want to go. Should I just forget about helping her at all?

Thanks for the help

Hi… for those more experienced brides out there… what’s the best way to start looking for a photographer? We’re leaning towards having a “destination” wedding (and I say destination in quotes because we’re not talking Hawaii or the Caribbean or something, but a weekend getaway wedding in the continental US that’s accessible to everyone). We want to have a photographer there to capture the weekend of festivities… but I don’t even really know where to start!

We’re in Manhattan, and our first choice venues are in Virginia so I guess if the photographer is based in NJ, PA, DC etc. we might save some money on travel expenses? How did you book your destination wedding vendors and work out travel expenses? Help. I don’t know what I’m doing…

Caroline

My fiance and I are forgoing the traditional wedding reception “events” such as the bouquet toss and cake cutting (we’re having cupcakes). Any thoughts on whether we should have timed “events” to keep the guests entertained, and if so, what those would be (we don’t want to do a first dance either as we both have left feet, but we have been informed that it is a “must” and that the guests “will expect it.”)

- Summer Bride

I have a dilemma now I didn’t expect to have. Until two weeks ago I had a location and was ready to sign a contract for an October wedding, when my mother in law sent an email to my fiance and I asking if we really insisted on having the wedding on a Friday, which posed a problem for her guests. I live away from the city, have had lots of promises of help with no follow through from her, and I loved the first place I saw. I also loved Friday for the price and fact that my out of town guests have the full weekend to see NY.

2 weeks and many fights later with my fiance, the date is cancelled to next year due to most Saturdays being booked up now. This was crushing to me to say the least but now my fiance tells me his mother is going to give us a lot of money. With my mother’s limited ability to help financially, I’m worried but don’t want to receive this large donation. My fiance would otherwise carry the largest burden since he makes more (his bonus is my yearly salary) and has the largest group of guests.

So with all this info as background, how do I make sure I control the wedding details and not offend his mother by not asking for her help in some items I simply want to control? I just am very hurt by what happened and don’t want this to happen again. The person who controls the purse has the say, and that is not me here. Anyway I appreciate your help as I am really conflicted about this .

Vanessa

I have a problem. It’s three weeks ’til my wedding and the venue just informed me that we can’t hang anything from the walls or ceiling for the reception. To save money (we are on a tiny budget), we are having our reception in the fellowship hall of the church where the ceremony is. (And after reading so many wedding sites, I feel like the only one out here having a reception in a church hall.) Anyway, they originally told me we could do whatever we want to decorate. It’s a very old church built in the 1930’s with a tiny old congregation to match and the trustees are scared we’ll ruin the wall or ceilings.

I’m so bummed because I was going to hang strings of globe lights and paper lanterns. I thought with those and some soft lighting, it might not feel so much like a basement.

I can’t think of anything way to hang them without building some type of poles or renting 12-foot trees of some kind to string them from across the room (though I’m sure we can’t afford either of those ideas, anyway). I don’t know if I should call and plead with them or give up.

Any ideas?

meredith