What I want

Blackbird230

After seeing our first venue last week, we were driving home when FI asked me, "Well what do you envision for our wedding?" I didn't have an answer. I thought as a kid I always knew what I wanted, the big princess gown, the ballroom. However, all I can think about is I want to marry him. I don't care where it is. I don't want a big fancy affair. I just want to have my friends and family and the white dress and a small happy occasion. When we first started looking, we had the idea of "we don't want one of the wedding factory venues." You know the ones that only really host weddings, all inclusive, etc. But now I'm thinking it may be nice to just do it there. Have it easy. I'm already getting frustrated with planning and I'm over a year away from the wedding date. 

Did any of you ladies feel like this? When you just reach a point, say fuck it, I don't care where it is or what it looks like, I just want to be married? We've joked around with eloping, but that's a bit too simple for me. 

Dignity100

I think it's natural to question your wedding and get frustrated.

Honestly - I couldn't imagine trying to book photographers and DJs and caterers and bakeries and etc etc etc - too many moving parts and it seems stressful.  I love that my wedding is a package.  Sure, I get some choices.

Just remember, after you invite guests, it's also about their comfort.  The last wedding I went to had so many etiquette mistakes in it - a 3 hour gap between ceremony and wedding, really really bad food, the bride & groom when going around to tables ASKED that we take and share as many pictures as possible because they only had their photographer until 8 and she wouldn't even get her father/daughter dance with him... they had a cake and they did it as their favors I guess, both FI and I were sick and left around 10pm, they didn't put it out until 11pm - did I mention the really really really bad food?

buddysmom80

If I had a quarter for every time I said I wanted to elope, I'd be a millionaire.

I get where you're coming from, I always envisioned getting married in Mexico at the resort that we stay at but his mom can't fly for long distances so that was out of the question.

My parents offered to take her out to Vegas with them in their luxury RV so we could elope out there, she didn't want to do that either.

So, we had to have the wedding where we live because it wouldn't be fair to not have his mom there. It kind of threw me for a loop because I always had my heart set on getting married on a beach with just our family and some friends but that just didn't turn out.

With that being said, working in the wedding industry at one point (hairstylist), I knew I couldn't putz around if I wanted to get married in 2014, so I have to find a venue and it was just easier for me to do an all-inclusive. Everything else kind of fell into place after that and now I don't have anything really to worry about until the wedding. Like if I forget something, it's NBD because all the important stuff is booked and paid for.

ShallowSeas

FI and I are at that point right now.  Things happened so quickly between us that I never really imagined or envisioned what our wedding would be like or what I wanted, so once we started planning right after he proposed was like, "I DONT KNOW WHAT I WANNNNNNT". It was really hard. The only thing I knew at the point was what style of dress I wanted.

FI said to me the other night, "Ya know, our wedding is going to be great and we're gonna have an amazing time with everyone there celebrating with us, but if I had to go back and do it over I think I would want something more intimate."  At this point, I completely agree with him.  I'm sure when the day comes and ALL of our friends and families are there we will be happy that we had a larger wedding, but right now something intimate sounds so perfect.

Sometimes when I think about weddings they don't make sense to me. Like, you get engaged to the man you want to marry, but instead of just going and getting married like you want to, you wait months or years just so it can be a big event. I'm just ready to be married right now, so I totally understand what you're going through right now.

cu97tiger

I knew I didn't want to have my reception in a typical ballroom and that I wanted the ceremony to be outside. DH had his heart set on this golf course that we would go to for brunches (I think because he heard they had a good deal on wedding plans one night at a bar). It worked out that we could have the ceremony on the golf course, then the reception in their dining room, which had huge windows all along one wall.

Peaseblossom55

I didn't really feel like OMG we should have eloped until 2 months before when I was hit with so many details, that I couldn't take care of until the date was closer.  Otherwise I enjoyed it but I also tooks some breaks from planning as well. 

lmcooper86

Yeah, I'm sort of feeling like that right now. I knew that I didn't want a hall or ballroom, so that limited our venue options; we saw 2 places and picked the one that we liked better, because neither of us had really strong opinions about any particular place.

Aside from knowing what sort of venue I DIDN'T want, I really don't have much planned out in my head. I've been stalling on researching florists and bakers and stuff because I really have no clue what I want.

luckya23

I would have loved to get married on a beach or at least on the water, but that just didn't come to pass...SO is from the mountains!  I wanted something small and budget-friendly, but cutting the guest list is difficult with large families, and I couldn't leave my grandparents out of it by eloping or even having a destination wedding (although it's kind of a destination in that none of us live there, but it's not a NICE destination or far enough away that we can't justify not at least inviting all the family).

When we looked at venues, price and not being a windowless box were my priorities.  His family offered their backyard, but after considering all the logistics that I was just not interested in dealing with, we went with a mostly-all-inclusive outdoor venue because we were at the point that we don't even want to worry about setting up tables or even choosing a menu.  And we only venue-shopped for one week online, and one day in person! 

I found that once you see all the options, you start to picture the wedding at one in particular, so that's how we decided, even though the price makes me choke a little ;-)  Plus it offered the possibility of a built-in theme, which is kind of beachy, so I'm glad about that!

 

 

 

Hummingbird125

I know exactly what you mean. After visiting a few different venues that were just barely within our price range, and not loving any of them, I was upset, frustrated, and kind of just wanted someone else to figure it all out for me. Finally, I toured a "wedding factory" type place and was surprisingly happy with what I saw. I was THIS close to booking it, when I realized that while I liked it a lot and probably would have been perfectly happy getting married there, I didn't LOVE it. One week later I found a quaint historic house that we could rent for the whole weekend and bring in any vendor we wanted and I immediately fell in love with it. It sucks to realize that maybe the wedding you always imagined having won't be a reality, but I'm encouraging you keep looking for the "perfect" place to get married because you will be SO happy when you find it. It might be a full-service wedding venue, it might be a restaurant, it might be a shack in woods - but you should be excited about the place you're going to get married. I know everyone has different experiences, but for me, finding the venue has been the most stressful and frustrating part of wedding-planning so far, and now that I've found that everything else has just fallen into place (fingers crossed it keeps going this way). Good luck!

Hummingbird125

Blackbird230 said:

Did any of you ladies feel like this? When you just reach a point, say fuck it, I don't care where it is or what it looks like, I just want to be married? We've joked around with eloping, but that's a bit too simple for me. 

Also, just keep in mind that the smaller you can keep your guest list, the more options you'll have for doing it YOUR way within your budget. If you can find a room to rent someplace, you can put a big chunk of your budget into decorating and good food & drink. For the all-inclusive wedding venue I almost booked, we had to have at least 100 guests (which we could have come up with, but it's more than I wanted to invite), but I wasn't going to be happy with the quality of the event, because we wouldn't have had any money left over to spend on adding personal touches. 

Blackbird230

@Hummingbird125, I can totally believe that venue is the hardest to figure out. So much falls into place or is dependent on the venue. 

eilis1228

We're still very early in the planning process, and there have already been times where I wanted to say, "Fuck it, let's hop a plane to Vegas!"  The most stressful things for me have been the guest list, and, in turn, the budget. I have a very large, extended family. My parents divorced and remarried when I was young, and my step-dad's parents also divorced and remarried. We want a max of 100 people, but my family members alone are 80-ish people. It's stressing me out like crazy to have to cut family members, but I mean, we can only afford 100 or so people, and we'd prefer to have close friends and family, sooooo I'll have to bite the bullet and cut family. But yes, that alone has already made me want to go to Vegas and elope. I can't imagine how I'll be once we get down to the details. :-\

I always remind myself though that all of this stress is worth it. At the end of the day, I get to marry my FI in front of our close friends and family in a beautiful setting, and then we're going to have a kick ass party after. It's going to be AWESOME!

phira

Absolutely.

My favorite example? I love cake. Cake is important to me (shocking). But when the baker asked what we wanted the cake to look like?

Eh, like a cake? I dunno!

BreMR

Before we were ever engaged T and I always said that we would get married in Mexico on the beach... he's very introverted and the smaller the wedding the better for him.  However, when we told people that plan, (pre engagement) my dad had a meltdown and said that he'd match my contribution to my Mexican wedding if I stayed local.... so we kept that in the back of our mind.  

When we actually got engaged I started exploring local options and the prices were insane, and the thought of making a guest list and not insulting people stressed me out.  My dad told me I should do what I really want, and he won't be a brat about it.  We booked our Mexican wedding within a week.. and it's so amazing because I literally have nothing to think about until we arrive at the resort (other than a dress, save the dates, and invites).  I am not a planning person, I have a really hard time envisioning things in my brain, and I have never been the type that dreamt about my wedding.

BUT that being said, sometimes I get sad that I'm not having a traditional wedding with a reception and tons of family, I know we'll miss out on a lot of people because of travel and that's a bummer. I'm sure there are plenty of pros and cons to both!! The best part is, you're married when it's all said and done

KeptInStitches

Hi. Yep, Exhibit A here. I'm just trying to hang on to "I'm marrying FI, I'm marrying FI, I'm marrying FI ..."

Blackbird230

phira said:

Absolutely.

My favorite example? I love cake. Cake is important to me (shocking). But when the baker asked what we wanted the cake to look like?

Eh, like a cake? I dunno!

SITB

@phira, I love you.

GoldenPenguin

I haven't been majorly stressed out about anything yet, so I guess that makes me the weird one? 

We had a list of a few venues we wanted to look at, and went to three. The first one was a restaurant, and I really liked it. The second one was a farm, and we hated it. The third one was the art center - I started crying as soon as I started walking towards the ceremony site. Easy enough. 

The only thing we've really had to compromise on is the size - we originally wanted like 40-50 people, but when we wrote out the list of "HAVE to be there" it was up to 70-80. It's still not HUGE, and everyone on the guest list is someone we genuinely WANT there - there isn't any "you must invite this person because of X reason." 

Other than that, everything has been relatively stress-free. My bridal party is awesome & helpful (I wouldn't have found my absolutely AMAZING photographer if it wasn't for @swazzle, and she also did a lot of preliminary caterer research while I was in the car for six hours one day). 

So, maybe I'll get more stressed later? 

GoldenPenguin

TwoDimes said:

@goldenpenguin, Maybe I'm misinterpreting, but I don't think it's so much STRESS as much as it is, "IDGAF what the colors are, or what flowers we have, or what shape the napkins are folded, I just want to be married, so let's skip planning all the little details and go to a JOP now!" feeling.

At least that's how it is for me. It's not that I am stressed about planning, it's just that I don't have strong opinions about wedding-related things, so it's nicer/easier if there's less to plan.

I have no idea if that makes any sense.

I do definitely get that part. I want there to be good food and booze. I really couldn't care less what color the table cloths are, or if there are multiple glasses on the table, or whatever. 

Which means I'm probably TOTALLY going to forget to book something like linens... 

BreMR

I also have a difficult time caring about linens and such... I picked a destination partly for that.. I'm super surprised because I'm on a board with people who are getting married at my resort and they're all like "i'm buying napkins, table sashes, favors, vases, candles, programs, gift bags.. blah blah blah'  I just think... WHY???? I'm going to get married in Mexico because the beach is decoration enough... 

500days

I haven't been "stressed" yet because I'm a year out from the wedding. When we were originally searching for a venue we just wanted to find something local that we could afford the minimum spending amount. Everything is so expensive!

Many of the venues did not have bar packages...which scared me a little bit. I needed a bar package! A set price per person was hard to find until I started looking at restaurants and non conventional wedding venues.

Now that we've booked everything except for cake, I'm a bit more relaxed. Just hope this feeling lasts for a few months!

phira

Blackbird230 said:

phira said:

Absolutely.

My favorite example? I love cake. Cake is important to me (shocking). But when the baker asked what we wanted the cake to look like?

Eh, like a cake? I dunno!

SITB

@phira, I love you.

For real (now that I have a few minutes to come up with a more thoughtful response), what I've experienced planning a wedding is that when it comes down to it, I'd probably be happier not having a choice with most of the details. I have opinions, and there are things I like and things I dislike, but when it comes down to it, a lot of it is just ... whatever.

For example, when we picked our venue, we didn't really pick it based on appearance or ambience. It was just ... does it fit our guest list and our budget? Yes? Okay, done. The end.

I think if you're feeling a little burnt out or irritated with the kinds of detail-decision-making that go along with "how you envision your wedding," my advice is to just cut everything down to bare bones. If someone starts asking about a detail you don't care about, you can always go with, "I hadn't thought about that yet, thanks," let them talk at you for a bit, and then conveniently forget.

If you have to pick something (like a dress or a floral arrangement or invitations), narrow your options down and then just pick something you feel like you won't look back on with regret. Because it feels SO much better to have the decision made.

Dignity100

I'm SO glad I don't have to do Linens or something like that. It's just crappy because if you 'forget' or don't do linens, it's like everybody will remember, but if you do them people will forget it; if that makes sense. I guess we always remember the bad and not the good.

lennonkdc

I really really wanted to elope, especially since having a big wedding meant having a 2+ year engagement (after dating 9 years...) I loved the idea of having a time that was 100% just about FI and I, and a fun vacation for just us. FI really wanted the big family wedding, and I love him, so...I'm now equally as happy with the big wedding we're planning. (Esp. after everything with my Dad this winter)

We were 99% sure we didn't want the whole 'wedding factory' wedding, but we did look at a few places just to get an idea of pricing/vibe/etc. We also looked at a really outside the box art gallery in a old warehouse...and thats what we went with. We can bring in our own vendors, so we're having our favorite restaurant caterer it and the owner is acting as our DOC, so she's handling all the rentals, we're helping set up (mostly b/c we want to) and we know the food is going to be killer.

We decided that if we had a big wedding, it should feel like 'us', if that makes sense. We wanted it to feel like inviting a bunch of people to a kick ass dinner party, so our guiding thought was "if we were throwing a party at our house, would we spend money on this?" So good food, music and booze were a 'must'; floral center piece, fancy linens, passed apps, not so much. 

labro

I think the most important things to figure out first are:

1. How many people do you want there/can afford to have?

2. How much space do you need to fit your guest list?

3. Which venues fit your budget that can accommodate your guest list?

From there, everything else is extra. Do you want to get married outside? Lots of natural light? Private bridal "getting ready" space? All inclusive? Not all inclusive? A mix? In the city? In the country? Somewhere historic? I think it's just visiting places and figuring out what fits you and what feels right.

I didn't stress a lot over the venue search. I made up a big list, narrowed it down, and made about 5 or 6 actual venue visits. I emailed about twice that many venues. I think I spent one sleepless night stressing over which venue to choose (from my top two). I had a favorite but I was worried that my favorite was outside of our budget. I spent the night crunching numbers, and weighing the options, and ended up going with the venue I loved (even though the other one would've been somewhat cheaper).

I'm excited and ready to get married to FI, but I'm not at that the IDGAF stage where I just want to say forget it about all the WR stuff and elope. I really really want to have that big party and celebrate with everyone. Also, I do care about the linens, and I do care about the flowers. In fact, I really really love all of my flowers and I'm excited to see the venue all decorated on our big day. I'm looking forward to getting dressed up and having my make-up and hair done and I really enjoy all of the little details (as little as they matter in the grand scheme of things). Our venue is all-inclusive, which meant I had a list of preferred photographers, djs, bakers, and caterers to select from. I could've brought in an outside vendor for an additional $100 or something but so far all of the vendors recommended to me by my venue have been top of the line. My venue owner/wedding coordinator has been incredibly helpful with suggestions and guidance on the things that I felt wishy-washy or nonchalant about which has also been nice.

Blackbird, I think it might just take finding the right place that "fits" the type of people you and FI are. That means it could be simple, or extravagant, or natural, or whatever you want it to be. But I promise there is something out there that you will feel happy and excited about!

joy14bw

This topic scares the crap out of me.

My first go around, I had plans of (and dreamed about) getting married at my parents farm.....If I get engaged again, I don't know if its even ok to think about having it there or starting all over with another place..

Uck, I hate even thinking about it bc I think my mom will be so disappointed if oped for new everything.

bride2b71614

@blackbird230, I totally understand where you are coming from. I try to compare it this way. I started making a wedding board on pinterest (private setting of course), about two years before I got engaged. I thought I was going to follow this board, and that this was my "ideal" wedding. Well I opened it up recently, and I thought "jeez what the hell was I thinking". I am glad that I didn't follow this "vision" because my vision now differs. The wedding you envisioned in childhood, may have changed, but this isn't a bad thing. Somehow all the things will fall into place, and your wedding will be awesome. 

For now, I am going to ditto what @keptinstitches, @dignity100, and @phira said. At the end of the day, you're marrying your FI, you need to consider your guests comfort when you are making decisions, and not to be caught up in the small details just yet. 

Blackbird230

Thank you ladies for all the advice. I really needed to hear all of this. I think yeah, we're going to keep venue visiting and pricing things out and just slowly figure out what we want. I need to take a deep breathe, settle a bit and relax.

jenna8984

Well, not only did I have those feelings, I acted on them....

Growing up I never had an interest in weddings. I always thought they were a big showy waste of money (no offense to anyone) and I always wanted like a casual backyard pig roast or something. I knew I wanted family around and a great dress but none of the "wedding factory" type stuff. I cringed through my brother's entire traditional wedding. Well, we got engaged last October and we threw around the idea of backyard but for some reason we kind of caved into our parents telling us you need this and that and invite all these people. We ended up booking a venue with a guest list of 75. We thought ok we're still doing it our way, fairly small, we won't do any of the bouquet toss or stuff we don't like, it'll be great.

Cut to 3 months before the wedding and I went out to lunch with a friend and she was asking all about the wedding. I realized every single thing I said to her was negative. How I didn't give a shit about the flowers, or the DJ, or all the guests. I didn't care about any of it, I just wanted to be married. So I got home and asked FI why are we doing this when it's not even what we ever wanted? And he said I don't know, I thought you'd regret if we didn't? And we both said F this. We canceled the venue, canceled the DJ, canceled the guest list. We booked a nice private room in a restaurant for our parents, grandparents, siblings, and 4 wedding party members for a total of 23 people. And I could not be MORE excited and relieved. I'm so looking forward to it now, as I wasn't before. It's finally the intimate affair I always wanted. And plus side- the deposit we got back from the venue is enough to pay for the entire restaurant bill!!

I just wish I had decided sooner because even though I got my deposits back, I still spent a lot on stuff like centerpieces and my gown that I probably would have spent less on if I knew this is how the wedding would turn out. But whatever, I love it all! And loved ones have given us such positivity- they all say good for you, save the money, do it the way you want, etc.

Blackbird230

All day today I pretty much procrastinated at work and looked up venues. I can't believe that the perfect one may have been under my nose the whole time.

I was going through my state's board on TK and someone mentioned the Inn that's literally down the street from where I work. It was an old estate then an armory and now they restored it to be a colonial inn. It's beautiful. I did a story on them last year when it was their anniversary. Supposedly they are great with budget weddings and are all inclusive and awesome. Needless to say, they got an immediate email about setting up a tour and getting more information. 

I feel like I need to double facepalm out of silliness.

lilacck28

I was a little overwhelmed but I reminded myself of the most important things to me when it came to a venue. 

1. I wanted brunch

2. I wanted an inn/ garden type feel. Big windows, lots of light. Open and airy. Not horrendous carpet.Those details were negotiable, but I ended up finding what I was looking for.  

My favorite places were too small. Originally the guest list was around 80 people. That was minimal friends and only family up to first cousin. Then, my parents decided to up the number to include some great aunts/ uncles, some of their friends, and then gave something like another 20 or so spots to FILs to fill so that the sides would be even (his family is much smaller). So, now we needed space for 130. 

We then looked at three venues in the area (within 20 minutes of my parent's house) that could accomodate that number of guests. The first we really liked. It was a wedding event space, but had an old inn feel, and they seemed excited about the prospect of brunch. FI immediately liked the look of this one. 

The second was a restaurant/ inn, that was really elegant. They also did brunch no problem. They were a bit more expensive than place number one. Their decor was a little darker. FI compared it to Betty Draper's house. 

The third place was a golf course/ country club. They couldn't do brunch during the spring because of... duh... golfers. They only held events at night. 

Place number one gave us a good fairly all inclusive quote, and that was that. 

Blackbird230

@lilacck28, props to your FI for the Mad Men reference!