I've spent my two-day waiting period at theknot.com trying to find advice and solace in the form of other couples in similar situations as me and my fiance. I've been very surprised how judgmental and uncharitable (and ultimately unhelpful) many posts I've read on this forum have been. Apparently, if you elope and marry in private, you forfeit your right to: --a traditional wedding party --a ceremony --a bridal shower --a bachelor/ette party --love, happiness and general social acceptance The presumption is that if you get married the "right" way, then all of these things flow naturally to you, because you deserve them. If you get married the "wrong" way, you forfeit your "right" to all of the other celebrations, and if you still want them, your intentions (unquestioned if you a "real" bride) must be sullied, you are a spoiled brat who just wants to be a princess for a day, in it for the presents (which is a bizarre concept considering that all the muffin pans and tea services in the world won't make up for the cost of our wedding--if we were in it for gifts, wouldn't it be much easier to just head to Crate & Barrel with our visa card?), or just supremely selfish. My fiance is a European citizen. We've known each other for a few years, but only became serious less than a year ago, and have since spent thousands of dollars crisscrossing the globe to be together. We will now have to spend another $2000 for the legal privilege to get married in the U.S. We are applying for a fiance visa, which can take 4-9 months to process. This means two things 1) we are broke and 2) we have almost no control over when our wedding date will be. We can guess, of course, but it's possible our visa request will be denied, or for some administrative reason, it could drag out to a year. Then what happens to all the deposits made, the plane tickets booked? We could plan it on the fly. Once we're approved, we have 90 days to get hitched, 90 days which may well fall in a time period that, because of my job, might make it impossible to do anything other than a J.O.P. ceremony. In fact, it might fall into a time period such that my own sister wouldn't be able to come without losing *her* job! Not to mention friends who wouldn't have time to get visas, friends and family who couldn't travel from across the country or the other side of the world (from Europe, China, Africa) on such short notice. From our perspective, eloping is the only thing that makes sense. He and I believe getting married is about making promises. You make a promise to each other, as a couple. You make a promise to the state. You make a promise to God (if you are religious). You make a promise to your friends and family. If you can do it all at once, good for you! Sometimes, just sometimes, the call to serve, cancer, or U.S. border control get in the way. We'll have a private ceremony (just us) that will be fun and uniquely us (i.e., not remotely look like a proper wedding at all!) The J.O.P. will ask me, "Do you take X to be your lawful husband?" and I'll say yes. Not "I do," but yes. That's it. We've made our promise to the state. At the wedding in my fiance's country, there will be a ceremony. A loved one will assist and we will say vows we have written ourselves. Vows to each other, vows to our community of family and friends. I wouldn't even call this a "vow renewal" (I don't think this concept even exists in my fiance's culture) because these are completely different vows: the words will be different, the intentions different. Our families can meet, at last, and help us celebrate one of the most important milestones in our lives. I'd like to be in a pretty white dress. I couldn't give a crap about presents. I hate being the center of attention. The only reason why I need and want to do this is because if my family and friends didn't see it, it didn't happen. I need all the people in the world I love and care about to witness our love for each other in order for us to begin our new lives together. Why not just get married in hubby's country, which has far less expensive and arcane rules about marrying foreigners? Well, we want to live in the U.S. I want to get married in hubby's country because it's gorgeous and all of his extended family (out to third cousins) all live in the same town; mine are scattered all over America and would need to get on a plane no matter where it is held. This is why we will have the post-elopement ceremony and reception there. But to get married the "right" way, we'd need maybe 6-18 months to save money and plan, 6-18 months during which hubby and I would be living in different countries. Once we were married, it would take another 12-20 months for him to immigrate (since immigrating takes *much* more time than going the fiance visa route). But then I'd preserve the "right" to a real wedding! Sure that would mean 18-38 months of separation, dotted by stolen weeks here and there, in the far-flung places of the world, but we would have shown how supremely patient we are! Then I'd "deserve" to have the wedding I've always dreamed of! Now, if you've read this and you agree that I don't have to forfeit my little girl dreams of a wedding where I get to share one of the most important moments of my life with friends and family (and not just the friends and family who can be there on a moment's notice) just because the love of my life happens to not be American, then I would love your advice. We'd like the J.O.P. wedding to be as unique and special as possible, but in a much more fun and lighthearted way (we are thinking of doing something themed, in Vegas!) We want it to be a special memory, that's just ours. We want it to be as distinct as possible from the actual wedding, so that the excitement of that day is preserved as much as possible. We won't call each other husband and wife until that day. Any other ideas of how to keep the wedding in my hubby's country as special as possible? In the invitations to the celebration in hubby's country, we were thinking of putting the photograph of us at the J.O.P. ceremony and writing something like, "We said yes to Uncle Sam. Help us celebrate as we make our vows to each other in front of our loved ones." (I know that sounds a little awkward, but something with that sentiment.) I agree that it's stupid to lie to people about your legal status, and so without actually individually calling everyone and telling them we eloped, this would be a way of letting those who are not a part of our immediate family know (and I imagine the photo will be pretty funny--which fits the tone of many wedding invitations in hubby's country). It would also be a way of sort of defining the wedding celebration. As in no, we're not getting legally married because we did that, but we still need your help completing this rite of passage. We want you to witness as we affirm our love and commitment to each other. We also want to have smaller parties in the U.S. and in the third country where we met for friends and families who because of time/money/visa issues can't make it to the wedding in hubby's country. I know of couples who have been able to accommodate people who cannot travel by holding an engagement party, for example, in, say, the husband's hometown and the actually wedding in the bride's. However, we can't call this an engagement party as we'll already be married. Any ideas of how to frame these two parties? The third country is *super* far away and expensive to get to, so it's possible we won't have that party until after the wedding in hubby's country. Regardless, we want to celebrate!! (And please, again, don't tell me we're gift-grubbing; it would cost more than the value of any potential gifts to ship them back to the U.S.; the goal is to get to see people we hardly ever get to see, and to integrate our social and family lives). The U.S. and third country events would be super informal. I have a friend in third country who has a restaurant with a really nice atmosphere who could probably give us a steep discount. In the U.S., I'm thinking of hosting it at a friend or family member's house. So we're having, in essence, 3 events (not including Vegas). It's a lot! Unless my mother or sister are *super* insistent, I'm thinking no bridal shower. Also, my bachelorette party will involve me, my sisters, and my closest friends (who will already be there anyway) going out on the town two days before the wedding, no more, no less. My question is, do I then send invitations to all 3 events in a single envelope? So that our guests have the option of which event to attend (hubby's country, US, or third country)? Would people get confused? What haven't I thought of yet? Thanks!