Get married at Home! How to turn a 'corporate' wedding into a small family event and live happily ever after

We often talk to brides who have 'downsized' and opted for a family wedding, instead of a 'corporate' sized event. For a variety of reasons (cost, travel, family situation, timing, or just unhappiness with the whirlwind of planning a giant wedding) they have decided to pass on the country club, penthouse, loft or wedding palace, and have cut their guest list down to immediate family and close friends (usually 20-80 people, depending upon second cousins).

This brings up a dilemma: should the couple elope? Should they have a small wedding in a chapel or restaurant? How do you find a space for two dozen people, when restaurants have a minimum of 50? What about the dress, the cake, the ceremony -- the presents?

The first decision is whether to elope or to hold a small family wedding. If you want to get away and have a private wedding, it's best to just make arrangements and go for it. If you start including close family members and friends, you've turned the corner to a private wedding. Either way, you can still arrange for a reception back home at a later date, or a second "Wedding Blessing", where the legally married couple can have a ring blessing, a spiritual blessing, a vow renewal, or any combination of rituals you wish, followed by a reception and 'welcome home'. This is becoming a common new/old trend, and we have seen the 'wedding blessing' parties evolve into real celebrations, sometimes a year later than the legal wedding. See our other post on this topic.

But if the point is to involve your parents, or young cousins, or elderly relatives, and you are willing to have a family ceremony, why not 'recreate' the weddings of your grandparents, and be married at home, in the parlour (aka livingroom), or in the backyard, or in a friend's home or someone else's big backyard (or the community park in the bandshell, or the park's recreation center, or even a national park, if it's close by) - and have fun decorating with dollar store tulle and paper lanterns and homemade flower arrangements and candles in jam jars and and pictures of you both as kids on a table with a guestbook, etc.. You could even have a theme (Fiesta, Victorian, Gaslight, Greate Gatsby, MusicMan, Tropical Island) to coordinate dresses and decorations and music.

Hire a civil officiant; a unitarian or humanist, or jp, who can design a family-friendly ceremony which is dignified but incorporates the family in some way, whether offering readings, or speaking about the couple, etc. Gather the 'parlour' chairs and have most people stand up for the ceremony but seat the elderly in a few rows in the front. The bride (and the groom) can come down the stairs, enter from the bedroom, or drive up in an old fashioned car. After the ceremony (or if coming back from the park - even walking! -- finish with at "at home" reception of potluck dishes or a FreshDirect or catered meal with some big centerpieces (a carving station) and lots of vegetarian options. Ask people to bring desserts or cupcakes like a church social, and build a communal cupcake tree. Set up a taverna or speakeasy bar (hire a bartender from the local community college hospitality program). Live music would be the most fun, with IPOD backup for later in the night.

Unlike the giant weddings, everyone will be able to talk, and mingle, and have a good time, and everyone will remember it -- and so will you.

Flying a wedding dress in the baggage area

From "stuff I didn't know" --

I found this on a Destination Weddings list from 2006 -- and I can't find the original source, sorry -- so for those of you who fly First Class, grab that coat closet before someone tucks their Xtreme Skateboarding gear in it...

"How do I get my wedding dress there safely?

If you are flying, you can usually make arrangements with your airline in advance. First-class cabins have large "coat closets" that can be used for bridal gown storage. If your plane does not have a first-class area (on airlines such as Southwest), it is highly recommended that you package the dress in a large box and ship it to your destination in advance, carefully packed in tissue to hold its shape. Regardless of the method you choose, look into having your gown pressed at a local cleaners upon your arrival. Your hotel's concierge can help with this."

So there you go. If you want to bring a Cinderella goes to the ball dress to an elopement, just tuck it in steerage with the cellos and the pomeranians!

Organic corsets & Bustiers

Why not? (the picture shows 19th century corsets).

Organic, fair trade, hand-made - 'formaldehyde-free silk vine inserts'.
And you can wear it AGAIN with another SKIRT! see Rene Geneva

I've added it to our organic wedding dress suppliers over at agreenbride.com.
And see the Medieval gown maker, A Very Merry Seamstress, (in NY), who will fit your wedding dress with a bodice-pattern called a 'sloper' -- a new term I just learned.

Non-sexist wedding vows

The whole issue of "obey" in the wedding service keeps popping up. I answered this again on Yahoo (here's a copy) explaining that the original churches who used this form, the Catholic and the Anglican/Episcopal, have now dropped it. So there's no reason for anybody to tell you to include it in the ceremony.

If you want some alternative vows, both modern and traditional, which emphasize the equal, cooperative, reciprocal bond of marriage, see this FAQ post on vows.

You may also enjoy our updated Medieval Ceremony, which takes out both "Obey" and the religious references. We updated the medieval request for the bride to be "buxom and bonny in bed and in board" (fun!) with a charge to groom to be "hale and hearty at bed and at board" - it only works if both people promise!

How long is a wedding ceremony?

I answered this on Yahoo Answers (and it won :-) so I posted it our wedding FAQs - it's a run-down of the timings for a basic ceremony. Hope it's helpful!

See also: Minimum Ceremony for a Legal Wedding