behind a cut, so you don't get bored...

[brightbluegirl]

Well, I've been stressing out about it, but things came together a bit on the weekend.

Andrew and I have almost 100% decided that we'll do the ceremony in Kelowna, at his parents house. His parents have a nice home - a gorgeous view of the lake and mountains, and it's kind of secluded, too. We're just going to wait one more week for an email from my brother's girl, to make sure she didn't find any awesome cheap Vancouver places.

Guest Party Favours (or whatever you call them) will be a daisy and a toy. We originally thought kinder eggs, except those aren't vegan.

Andrew's parents have offered to pay for and make the food for the ceremony, they said all we need is to send them a list of recipes, and his mom will start cooking things and freezing them, now. They may ask for some monetary help nearer to the ceremony, if they have to run out and spend a lot of money last minute. However, if we decide to get a caterer, they will put $1000 towards that.

The celebration will be non-alcoholic. Available drinks will be juices and etc.

Hmmm. I may have to think on that more. My Dad may really really really really want alcohol there. Knowing my mother, I don't blame him. My future mother-in-law suggested having champagne for toasts, but nothing else. Plus, there ARE a lot of B.C. wineries... hmmm.

My mother thinks I should ask my father for $1000. Instead, I'm going to find out how much table/chair/dish/tablecloth/napkin rentals/daisies/toys/decorations are, pad the budget a bit, and present it to family and ask them how much they will put towards it. My mother has made $1000 noises, we'll see.

There will be no dj (ick), we will create mixed cds for the day. 6 or so should do.

We bought our patterns! woohoo! Now I have to lose more weight. Dammit. Quick Quick, let's get it over with!!! Aargh.

Friends will help with setup and teardown and such.

We're going to register at IKEA. And a home and garden type place.

What am I forgetting?

Comments

[malaka.livejournal.com]

flowers?

[freakykitten.livejournal.com]

daisies! They're on the list.

I want lots and lots and lots and lots of daisies. Everywhere! But I'll settle for just some.

[malaka.livejournal.com]

and i adore you but could we be *any* more different? heh.. our main focus was how to get as much booze for the reception for the cheapest price. seriously, and we were going to sacrifice food for alcohol, because we know we come from a lot of drinkers and that makes it fun (to us ;).

[freakykitten.livejournal.com]

I know, I was thinking about our different styles too. :D

hey

[fanlain.livejournal.com]

it sounds beautifully simple to me. i like it. daisies and toys! cool!

Re: hey

[freakykitten.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I like it too. We didn't really want it to be anything like a wedding, but that's what it's becoming. I think, given the family that will be there, that there isn't much of a way to get out of it, without causing ourselves more stress than necessary. Pick your battles, and all that.

I'd rather just have a big party, with good food, and a pretty dress. And still get presents. :P

But we'll do what we can with what we have!

Re: hey

[blowtorch-betty.livejournal.com]

That does look an awful lot like a wedding, why are you opposed? (just curious)

We're kind of on the opposite end of things. We're married but didn't have a wedding. We started planning and it was a big pain in the ass. Friends too far away, weird family situations and whatnot. We decided to avoid the whole mess and went down to city hall.

The downside being, of course, no presents!

I don't really regret it, but a honeymoon would have been nice. We were completely broke and I couldn't leave the country anyway so we went to best buy and bought a TV and VCR on credit and rented movies. Romantic, no?

Anyhoo, back to you. Sorry! On the topic of alcohol, I do like the idea of having something to toast with but ultimately it's up to you. People don't need alcohol to enjoy themselves, although they've likely been programmed otherwise. What are your motives for going dry?

I'm sure the ceremony will be beautiful. How could it not out there?

What are you going to wear? I do regret not having a dress. My best friend is a designer and we had it all planned out.

*sigh*

Re: hey

[freakykitten.livejournal.com]

Well, it's all convoluted. For one, I really want everything about the celebration to be ours - chosen by us because it fits, not because it's traditional or conventional. I also have issues with marriage in concept because if gay people can't have it, I don't want it. That IS getting better, but not as equal as I would like. And of course, we are not into any organized religions (although I agree with the concepts of understanding and compassion that are prevalent in buddhism).

Originally, when we realized that we had committed to each other for life, i.e. started talking about children and life goals and getting a house together and such, we wanted to have a celebration of that commitment, and we wanted to share the celebration with our loved ones.

But now it's become this... thing. An unwieldly, non-revolutionary, same as everyone else thing. And I don't know what to do about it! Or if it's even worth getting out of.

On the other hand, we *are* just going down to city hall, and getting our certificate and such. Everything with friends and family is going to be ours - there will be no minister or other person taking charge, it will just be us. We're going to tell each other how much we love each other, in public. We've decided we'd like symbols of our commitment, so we chose silver rings, (we talked about tattoos, piercings, necklaces, bracelets, etc, and settled on rings after all - it's not that I won't do things that are traditional - I just won't automatically do them without serious thought about what it means to me), but when it stopped being about personal stuff, THAT'S when we got into trouble...

Our parents said "well, you HAVE to invite these people, or they'll get offended."

They said "You can't make the reception pot-luck, because people will get upset they have to bring food AND a present"

and so on.

But a party is a party, I guess, and a party for 80 people is just going to be big no matter what, and is going to require some planning, especially when the people range from granola-type vegans to conservative seniors. You do what you have to.

I'm making my dress, but it's nothing fancy. Royal blue (fabric to be decided later), with an a-line floor-length skirt, and a fitted strapless bodice with beading on it. I'm going to take out all the piercings in my ears, and "sew" shiny thread through all the holes, and put pretty beads on the thread. I'm not describing that right... 1 thread, 3 holes, lots of beads, different length loops between each of the holes. Does that make sense? Oh, and sparkles. There will definitely be sparkles.

Alcohol isn't a big part of my life, I treat it like other drugs, that is, sometimes it's fun to have some. It's not a priority though, and since we're trying to cut costs, I thought we could just ignore the whole thing. All of my friends agree, and his family hardly ever drink, but my family really like alcohol, which could cause stress. I can just see my father getting more and more irritated because he can't have a beer or two or six. That wouldn't be pleasant for me... so we're looking at how much having alcohol would cost. We'll see...

(And I like talking about you, too! I'm sorry you didn't get to have a dress, or at least a party. Parties are fun. I'm glad you did SOMETHING to commemorate it though... what movies did you watch, do you remember?)

Re: hey

[blowtorch-betty.livejournal.com]

Last november the massachusetts supreme judicial court ruled that the state had six months to legalize gay marriage. So many people are up in arms about this it makes me ill. I have no idea what might ultimately happen but at least some people in powerful positions have their priorities straight. I guess we're pretty much waiting for the "old guard" to die off at this point. Then again, there are a lot of scary young'uns too.

I particularly despise the Defens of Marriage Act. Who in the hell are you to tell me my marriage is threatened by someone else's? Give me a break, people are such fear mongers they're either screaming their heads off about things they have no understanding of or, more commonly, have their heads planted firmly in the sand.

Egh.

On to happier things!

Though we knew we wanted to spend our lives together the main reason we made it official according to gov't spec was because of immigration. I can totally see your point of not doing the traditional just because you're supposed to. I wear just one ring as opposed to the usual ring and band.

I can't even begin to imagine planning a party of that magnitude, you're a brave woman.

The ear thing sounds cool, you'll have to post pictures. I don't remember what the movies were but he might, he has a freakishly good memory. I tend to use him as an external memory bank for a lot of things which means it really sucks when he's away.

[dextra.livejournal.com]

a date?

ps- http://www.coast.ca/about/careers.cfm?id=41 (brother in law is head of marketting there)

[freakykitten.livejournal.com]

July 17th!

I hope you save your pennies. :D Of course, that would take a lot of pennies. :(

Thanks for the link, too!