After Party... Thoughts?

Ahrbear7

Hey Ladies,

The other day I was searching through TK invites and found a picture of After Party cards and that gave me some inspiration. My FI and I have been struggling on how our wedding day should go since we have so many out of town guests. Our guest list is at 122 (59 people from TX (all of which are from the church we attend) and 63 people from out of town). Most of the people from church don't drink and aren't use to the party type reception but our out of town guests are.
Our original plan was the have a party type reception with a DJ, dancing, beer and rent our venue until late but now Im thinking of doing a laid back reception with the dinner, an iPod for music and just serve wine, soda, and sangrias and have the reception end at 9:30pm. *I should note that our venue is in a dry county so we can only have wine and beer (1 keg max) but have to pay an extra fee for the beer and hire a bartender.* Then at 9:30 we'd have a bus pick up the guests who want to attend an after party and go down to the Stockyards and they can go and hang out at which ever bar they want. We figure we could pay for cover for our guests at one of the bars (possibly Billy Bob's) and see if we can set up a tab for just beer at the bar which we would pay for. We would then have the bus pick up the guests around bar close and if they choose to leave at a different time they can get a cab.

 So I know that was an overload of information but I wanted to get your thoughts on this... is it tacky, do you think it could be pulled off, or should we just have our small reception and the guests can make their own decisions from there?

Thanks in advance

Donnaaries

I think the people who aren't drinkers will leave the reception early anyway (usually after the cake cutting).  I don't know if an entire separate "after party" is really necessary.  In your plan, your party guests will have to be subdued and maybe bored until 9:30pm (when does your reception start?)  But you have the best feel for your guest list, so if they are the party hardy into late of the night kind of people, an after party may be in order.

As someone who is getting closer to her wedding and tired of planning all the logistics (we're using a shuttle as well), I say keep it simple.  One reception is hard enough to plan, I wouldn't want two.

emimayor

In theory, it sounds like a lot of fun. In reality, it sounds VERY expensive and a TON of unnecessary work/planning. Do what is best for you and your fiance. If you want to have a fun "typical" reception, than do that. You could even sitll have an afterparty, but just not be responsible for hosting one. Trust me, you'll be tired from your intimate "low-key" reception, so don't add more to your plate than you need. A happy medium would be to suggest a few places for OOT guest to go to post reception and if you feel up to it, meet them there. My BIL set up an unofficial after part after our wedding at the hotel bar for OOT guests and it worked out. We never made it, but were happy to hear guests were still partying and happy.

HTH!

Ahrbear7

Our reception begins around 6pm so the reception would be 3 1/2 hours. Most of our out of town guests are the type of people to party late in the night and we feel that since they are traveling we should plan some events for them.

Donnaaries

Emi, I love the idea of the "optional for bride and groom" after party!  I'm worried that I'll be too tired to do anything when the reception is over but FI wants to visit with his out of town friends (coming all the way from Ohio, so totally understandable), I think letting the word get around that people are getting together at the hotel bar (which Palomar has a great one!) is a fantastic idea.

fallbride1109

The only way I would suggest an after party is if you had an afternoon ceremony and cake and punch reception.  Like the PP said, you are more tired and it's more planning than you think.  In theory, we would have loved to join our guests at the hotel bar, but there was no way--we were exhausted (and plus we had brunch still the next day).

That being said, I LOVE the idea of an afternoon reception and after party and sometimes wish I had done it myself.

ETA:  Don't feel obligated to plan events for the OOTs.  Provide them with a list ot things to do in the area--they are all adults and can fend for themselves.

emimayor

Thanks Donna. Looking back we wish we would have gone, but the night of, we were exhausted and wanted our alone time. One of my favorite parts of our evening was ponied up at the bar, sitll in full wedding garb, sharing a bottle of champagne...just us (and the ppl at the Adolphus bar).

Ahrbear - do you have an attendant that could maybe put together something unofficial for you? Make going a game time decision.

Christy_Woodson

For our wedding we are having 285 invited guest. Most of those people are from out of town. We have turned the wedding into a "wedding weekend" suggesting thigs to do each night. Our wedding while formal and in the evening hours ends at 11pm and from there we have aparty bus to take the out of town guest to a night club not far from the venue.

I hope this helps.

wagnerj3

We have a downtown reception until 11:30 and half of our guests are staying at the Fairmont. So we talked with the Fairmont and they are going to keep their bar open until 2am for our partiers.  I just made up the "brochure" for the OOT bags and in that I listed the After Party Party at the hotel bar as one of the events so people know that is a place to gather after, if they wish, but there is no promise for us to show up or no obligation on anyones part.  I think it will work out nicely. For those that want to party, they are in the hotel and safe and those that don't want to can go to their rooms or head home.  HTH.