The other side

Dancing by ourselves...

Just a quick note to dip my toes back in the blogging water post wedding (I was going to say post marriage but that sounds like it's over already...).  I suppose I left it this long to get some perspective so I could have a go at being the wise owl I always want to be about stuff... hopefully that wont prevent me from write crazy happy joyful posts too!

Anyway. The wedding.

The wedding was emotional and beautiful and enriching and the best party I've ever been to.  It was also a bit stressful, we didn't get enough sleep the night before and everything got a little tense at least once.  In short it was everything we'd hoped for and more, but there are a few things we could have planned or handled better.  For a while after the wedding I was so overjoyed with how it had gone, and so fed up with thinking about the details, that I didn't want to write about it at all.  Now, with a bit of time behind us, I'm looking forward to the opportunity to pick over things a bit.  Hopefully I can share some lessons from the less than ideal bits (once I've mused a bit about what those lessons are...), and also share some of the joy that was in our day.

P.S. being married is so much better than getting married, I love the other side.

The seating plan (oh my)

Image via i love value village and goodwill

I'm fast discovering that seating plans are hard.  We decided to have allocated seats so people don't have that awkward oh god where do I sit canteen moment, and to try and encourage people who haven't met before to mix a bit more, but I'm finding it a bit of a struggle.  I thought we had a pretty good first draft down, but suffice to say that it wasn't acceptable to all involved.  Now I'm in the process of reshuffling everything and it all looks a mess again.  Ho hum.  Arthur and I are trying to do this together, and with help, but I guess you can't please everyone...  On the one hand I don't want to micro-manage people, but on the other hand I want the plan to enhance people's fun not detract from it, which means thinking pretty hard about what will and wont work.

We're ten days away now, and my impatience is getting a bit out of hand I think. I've just had enough of planning, I really have.  I'll be so glad not to have to look at another wedding related list or spreadsheet again.  Am I being incredibly ungrateful?  Probably, but I just want to be married now.  I'm kind of over the wedding, hopefully my enthusiasm will be rekindled when I can put the lists down and start baking and whatnot.  Maybe I should just get on with the lists so I can put them down earlier?  I think I need to stop thinking everything wedding related is supposed to be fun, seating plans just aren't (hats off to you of you disagree!).

To do.

Image via Shanalogic

Did I mention we're getting married in 30 days? Aaaaaah! So much left to do:

1. Write the ceremony (this is the big one).
2. Organise hay bales for guests to sit on during ceremony, and generally lounge on (kind of like some of the ones here).
3. Find Arthur some trousers to wear (!).
4. Find Arthur some shoes to wear.
5. Find and buy beer.
6. Find and buy soft drinks.
7. Collect deposits from people for our Friday night meal, the day before the wedding (everyone is paying for their own meal but we have to pay the restaurant a £10 per head deposit one week before).
8. Make A LOT of paper garlands, like the ones I liked here. (more to come about these)
9. Find 30ish more cups and saucers for coffee and 50ish more dinner plates (we're buying very cheap retro crockery for the wedding meal, again more to come on this!)
10. Make music playlists for: before the ceremony, during the meal, before the band plays, in the band's break and after the band plays.
11. Find out where (near Lyme Regis) we can pick our own berries for pudding at the wedding meal.
12. Pull together some props for our home made photo booth (yay!).
13. Make signs, e.g. listing the menu, directing people to toilets/ photo booth/ cold drinks etc.
14. Write our programme including whats happening during the ceremony and general info about the day.
15. Buy paper for the programmes.
16. Print the programmes.
17. Work out where we can get locally grown flowers from near Lyme Regis.
18. Make a seating plan.
19. Draw/ print up a large seating plan for the day.
20. Write out the name place cards (we're using luggage tags).
21. Figure out who needs picking up from the train station and when, and who's going to do this
22. Taste and buy some local Bath cheeses for the cheese board (we're having our main meal at 4.30pm, so we're having cheese later on in case people get hungry)
    

Okay, maybe that's not too bad. These are just the things we have to do; our families have been amazing and volunteered to take over all sorts of bits and pieces. My sister is making us a postbox for our guestbook type setup (more to come!), Arthur's dad is sorting out wine for us, my dad is figuring out a photo booth set-up, my mum is making bridesmaid dresses, and buying all sorts of bit and pieces we need, Arthur's mum is growing us lots of herbs to put on the tables etc etc. Amazing.

This is, however, only the things we need to do before we actually go down 'to site' the Monday before the wedding, the 'Things to do once we get there' list hasn't even been written yet... So it still feels like there's plenty to do (plus I'm in the middle of the minor task of sitting my uni finals...).

Best get on with it!