Such is the nature of real life that, in the week before the wedding, when according to everything I have read other brides are getting stressed about things they haven’t yet managed to do and jaunting off on expensive beauty treatments to make themselves thinner, prettier or smoother, I have plenty of time, and am using it to cover my hands in chemicals – no, not in labs this time: I’ve been cleaning the house. So has the Fiance, but he was working since 5am this morning, and as a consequence I have done a bit more of it than he has.
I’ve also done the garden – cut the grass, put down weedkiller and repotted all the little fruit trees my mum brought us. The cat watched unoimpressedly as I polished and shined everything within site: the fridge, the oven, all the tiles on the back wall… even her chat flap. Which, by the way, was filthy. I discovered cat prints as far apart as on top of the freezer and on top of the scanner in the living room. She was definitely a guilty party.
And apparently it isn’t just my OCD at fault here: one thing I have heard about, is lots of women cleaning before their wedding days or going on holiday. Why? Is this some kind of female cleaning gene?
Historically, in this country, when a woman married she would immediately move to her husband’s house. This is why lots of couples try to have the night before the wedding apart – because traditionally for the bride it would be her last night under her parents’ roof, and for that reason very special and emotive. Her new husband would carry her across the threshold – and probably straight up to her new bedroom. Whether he had lived with parents or alone before, someone else would have done the cleaning (maybe his mother or a housekeeper): the new house would be cleaned thoroughly and made as fresh and inviting as possible for the new bride to comne home to.
And it seems as if women still seek this, even if they, like me, are already well established living with their partner. That ‘coming home to a clean house’ feeling is mimetic of new beginnings, fresh starts, and the exciting potential of the future – whereas a dirty house is hangover from the past.
And not just this: cleaning can be cathartic too: my mum used to dust skirting boards as a displacement activity when she had an essay to do. Cleaning, like grooming, is a simple, time-consuming physical activity, a form of preparation, readying oneself for the time when your hair and nails are pefect and your house is shining and new. We don’t just clean the house for guests: we clean four ourselves and our own cleanliness of mind.
And because, in this respect, I am a real girl, here are some pictures of my pretty clean kitchen.
Just be grateful I haven’t gone round photographing the entire house!
To a lot of people, weddings are about having your dreams come true, breaking the normal rules and being justified in doing exactly what you want, and making a splurge.
Well, I’m sorry, but if most people’s dreams come true on their wedding day, they have pretty limited dreams. I’m not talking about marriage to the love of your life – I’m talking about the wedding.
Weddings are about compromise more than ever.
And the strange thing is that the people around you don’t even know. Their generosity is astounding. They push money and gifts upon you, offer to be there to help, go out of the way to enhance your enjoyment, excitment and the quality of the things you’re investing in.
But at the same time, they will start making demands. We don’t want you to have your wedding there, it’s not nice enough! It’s worth splashing out on your wedding day. We’ll help you. X has to sit next to Y, and if X doesn’t get on with Y’s other half, Y’s other half will have to be moved. You can’t have that! Nobody will like it.
They think they’re making your day better – actually they are making your day better for them.
Yes, everyone needs a bit of advice, because there will always be things we haven’t thought about – mistakes to avoid, butI think it’s very different to say to somebody, “Have you thought about how you’re going to dance in that?” or “Go and buy and better one – you can: it’s your wedding day!” But I… liked… the first one.
And of course, you do want your wedding day to be good for your guests. When did it become about the bride and groom’s taste anyway? When my grandparents got married, the bride’s parents traditionally arranged everything for her: they would not only pay, but also arrange the guest list and choose the trimmings. Yet only two generations later, we behave as if we have some kind of god given right to golden candelabras covered in paper butterflies if we want golden candelabras covered in butterflies! We have themes. The dress matches the venue. We write vows.
The wedding is no longer a present to the couple from the bride’s family on their marriage, it is an expression of the bride and groom, from the bride and groom. And there is more competition.
But even competition means that you’re expressing yourselves less than you want to, than you think you are, because you’re defining yourselves by comparison.
So what am I saying? Essentially, don’t stress over the dream. The dream is never going to be realised, not at your wedding. Insist sometimes, and give in others. Strike a balance. Don’t worry about competing.
Some things are just not feasible. Like my desire to have a singing moose head at our wedding.
…I know.
But we came across this singing Chrismas moose at the German Christmas market and I adored it. I was so excited – like a little child. Can you imagine having this singing at your wedding?
It would be very, very unique.
Unfortunately, google cannot tell me where to hire a singing moose head. I’ve no idea who would get it there and operate it, and it would probably be hideously expensive anyway. Building our own singing moose head is not really an option. But what does it matter? Will anybody’s enjoyment be seriously decreased by lack of singing moose? Will anybody (who doesn’t read this blog) even know? You go through lots of ideas in the course of events planning and most of them go straight out the window. That’s just how it works.
Every couple, when choosing their venue, have to take into account their guests. How they’re going to get there, how much it will cost them, and all that jazz.
But don’t worry yourself to death over it. Yes, it’s handy if your venue’s in the place where most people live, but what with universities and people moving for jobs, the chances are your loves ones, like ours, are spread out across the country – or the world. And people do expect to travel for weddings, take trains, drive long distances and stay overnight. The effort people will go to for a wedding is quite touching. I suppose it all comes down to – they just love you that much.
So don’t upset yourself worrying about them, but don’t go out of your way to make things difficult for them either so that you can have your fairytale dream. Common sense.
But here’s something which may not be common sense to everyone. Making things easy for the guests is not about proximity, but access.
What do I mean by that?
Well, we’re getting married in the centre of Oxford. It’s within 10 minutes walk of the train station, 5 minutes walk of the coach station and 5 minutes walk to a main car park. There are park and ride facilities and we even have a few parking permits for slightly more central locations, which we have mentioned (quietly). I think this means pretty good access. We have friends and family coming from Sheffield, Bristol, London, Wales, Germany, Malta and Australia. These are not proximate.
We’re also having a daytime wedding, so guests from the UK can come that morning, leave that night and are not obliged to stay over. Some of our friends are “crashing” at another’s place (as we have at least a couple of friends from Oxford). So they might have to spend a bit on travel, but they don’t have to pay for a bed that night – the cost isn’t prohibitive.
As someone who doesn’t have a car, I’m always noting that most wedding venues are crap for access. Not just inconvenient, but totally and utterly crap. They tend to be very out of the way, with no nearby train station, poor or not too close by bus services and expect all their visitors to drive.
I don’t have a car, and I think it’s a disgusting reflection upon society that I’m expected to. If we came in a car, someone would have to not drink, or we’d have to stay in the venue, or we’d have to park at a hotel and taxi in and out – all things which spoil enjoyment or significantly compound the cost.
I’m talking about manor houses, the bigger, more expensive and more picturesque hotels and other countryside resorts. They’re lovely, but they’re mostly very inconvenient for most people, and personally that’s a big deal to me. When I RSVP to a wedding I check that I can get to it.
Worse are the church weddings where you have a reception venue miles away and needs to be driven to – not a great idea if there’s alcohol after the ceremony, and again puts people under pressure to order taxis (yeah, because weddings never run over time, do they…) to ensure they make it on time. When everybody else is fighting for them too, of course.
The basis function of all this is, if your venue is out of the way, you are going to have to check your guests are okay with that too – yes, ask them for permission. If you don’t have enough people able to get there, it is your responsibility to help them. One popular solution is hiring a vintage bus to transport guests to the reception venue and to off-site better value hotels at the end of the night.
The other suggestion is carpooling. Your guests won’t all know each other, so it’s best to include something in the invitations. I’d recommend hosting a spreadsheet on google docs, asking drivers to fill in how many spare seats they have on offer, and those not driving to fill in requests for seats. Share and share alike. It would take you minutes to set up such a document and be hugely appreciated by all your guests.
Sometimes I like to post wedding/marriage related things which I find elsewhere, think about or invent. Today, I found something on “the forum” about destination brides – i.e. couples who get married abroad. It’s an interesting issue.
Is getting married abroad selfish?
Well, in my opinion, if it’s a choice made by the couple, not the couple AND associated friends/family, then yes, it is. Not very selfish, but still selfish. We all know it’s cheaper for the couple and more expensive for the guests.
The fact that I wouldn’t want to marry abroad and somewhere meaningless to me with only a few guests isn’t the point. It’s a guest filter for those rich enough and obliged enough to go.
I’ve had a problem with this for a while, because obviously nobody’s perfect, and it’s easy to go bridezilla when you try to make things easier for people (e.g. paying for their accommodation) and they’re still not happy with the compromise (paying for their own travel). So I’ve seen a lot of brides on the forum get stroppy about being told their being selfish and having close family (usually with small children) refuse to attend their weddings.
I just found this summarial response by Champagne_Please to a similar frustrated poster, and I’m reblogging it because I think it’s really good, and says a lot. I haven’t asked her if I can post it, but since she (we assume) posted it anonymously on an open forum, I’ve no qualms.
Unfortunately there is a mindset with Destination brides that if they give people enough time [to save] there are no excuses for not coming.
If you want a wedding in Rhodes that is lovely, but despite what financial help you are giving to people you can’t expect anybody to have to go.
As a guest at an abroad wedding, we only get one holiday abroad together a year, and when friends get married abroad, the most annoying thing to hear is “treat it as a holiday” “you should be happy” “it’s a lovely destination,” the kind of feelings that you have towards your sister. This is actually a real bug bear of mine, and if I can give you any advise for when you talk to your sister and your friends about your wedding, don’t make it out that “they can make a nice holiday out of it…,” or that it being in Rhodes is a benefit to them etc, because the key point is they are giving up probably the only holiday of their year to have your perfect holiday, not theirs.
Holidays are precious, and to say that somebody is going to have to sacrifice their own holiday, giving up where they wanted to go, when they wanted to go and very importantly who they want to go with, is probably a bigger issue than money.
I know this might sound harsh, but hopefully it will help you see it from a guests perspective. Me and H2B have been invited to a wedding in Italy, which means we can’t have a holiday that year, and the holiday we do have we have to spend with about 80 people, not just the two of us as we would want.
So your sister is allowed to go on her all inclusive holidays to Egypt etc, and you shouldn’t be holding that against her.
I honestly believe if you get married abroad, you cannot have these feelings towards any guests, and I think often destination couples do not realise what guests are actually sacrificing to come to their wedding. The smallest issue is probably the cost, but that is the easiest reason to give to a Bride without sounding mean.
I hope that has helped you see it from the other side.
As I have been idly perusing online, I’ve come across several blogs and sites which give you a budget breakdown of general wedding costs. Some of them defend their numbers by explaining that these are the average quotations you will get from suppliers, et cetera, but they still leave me gasping. They are also in total disagreement with each other about what kinds of numbers are appropriate/common for which things.
Here’s just a little example with some numbers I took off two sites, Rock’n’Roll Bride and WeddingFace. The WeddingFace numbers are a little weird because it’s an Irish site and I have been translating out of Euros. I assume I’m allowed to reblog this kind of content, but if I’m not, someone tell me and I’ll make it anonymous!
Wow! So for my wedding, with 100 guests working number, no bridesmaids to dress or make up, R’n’R Bride reckons I should be spending £10,050-£17,200 and my groom is attending naked (which hey, I might not have too much of a problem with). WeddingFace, meanwhile, calculate a whopping £18,215 for my supposed budget, and apparently this will be the music/entertainment extravaganza of the century.
Our own estimate of £8,175 seems pretty modest, although we don’t know what we’re spending on the honeymoon yet (neither do R ‘n’ R Bride), and actually, on closer scrutiny some rather important details have been left out (AHEM registrar fees).
I mean, let’s talk jewellery, giving notice, suit hire for the men (lots of naked men at the wedding?), room decorations and (for those insane enough) chair covers, aisle runners, rights to certain music! The list goes on. Our little £3 ring box isn’t on there for sure, and these things add up. I have a hat, a parasol and a handbag. What about SHOES? Some women spend about £300 on shoes and never wear them again because they’re a silly colour.
shapingpromises 