What are you all up to

Weddings are hugely profitable for hotels, etc….. It seems quite the norm nowadays for couples to be together, buy a home, have children, then decide to get married, I suppose that financial stability is coming later in life for many. £35-50k is probably the average for many weddings. It’s a proper money making roulette when you drill down into the details. Every bow on a chair costs, any deviation from a menu choice, even to cater for veggies, vegans, children is usually charged for, numbers are usually limited, so that’s where Aunty May and Uncle Joe often miss out. Last three weddings we have been to, I volunteered my craft skills to save the brides a bit of money. I made the head dresses for two, did the flowers for another, and helped out with all sorts of other things that the venues wanted silly money to provide. It’s something I feel honoured to do for our lovely families, and they trust me to deliver thankfully. 

When our daughter got married (2016) they decided they only wanted a small main celebration with close family as they were paying themselves, and additional friends for the evening do.

However her in-laws had different ideas, and a large family of aunts, uncles and cousins!  Not inviting them all was apparently not on, so the in-laws paid for all the "extra guests" , which I believe came to about £15k.   😮

On our side we had only close family, as agreed, 10 people plus us.  We gave her the same cash gift her brother got, which she used to pay off some of her mortgage.

The whole thing was at the "House for an Art Lover" in Glasgow, a humanist ceremony. OH made her veil, and I made a quaich for our grandson (8) to carry the wedding rings in, our grand-daughter (4) was a flower girl, they both did very  well.  The bride made the cake herself.

Our second son’s wedding was a fairly expensive affair.  A beautiful small church wedding near Leamington Spa and a large reception at a gorgeous hotel near Stratford on Avon (Welcombe Hotel).  This was in 2004 and the price seemed astronomical to us even though they did a lot themselves, DIL made all the invitations and OH printed for them.  I made and decorated the wedding cake, I did quite a few in those days.  Like others ours was a local church and the village hall for a wedding breakfast, nothing in the evening much, we just went back to Mum’s for a family get together.  

We were married at a time when the bride's parents traditionally paid for everything. Church, traditional three course dinner at a hotel. No "evening do" (though my family went to the pub after we had left for our honeymoon). 

Mum and Dad paid a lot of our wedding, but OH and I made a list of things we wanted, deemed essential, then we went with desirables next. We did a lot of the catering for our wedding as well, the kind of food both our families enjoyed (We weren’t veggies at the time). Mortgage came first though, and we had a proper honeymoon, straight from the evening do. We came home straight to SILs wedding, and a well booby trapped house🤣

Sounds lovely, some special keepsakes from the wedding. Had we had the garden we now have, I think we might have gone with a marquee. It’s really good if you have talented folks who can do certain aspects of a wedding, and help out, but I can fully understand those that just hand it over to a wedding organiser, there were moments on our day when things did get stressful, not least getting a three tier cake to the venue😱 Cake got there ok, but we had a puncture coming home, so that ate into our get your glad rags on time. Mum was a nightmare floating around, Dad was rigid with nerves, and my Sis only arrived home (working away) the night before. But it all came together and we had lots of fun, which is what we wanted.

Things I have kept…..dress, veil, headdress, loads of receipts for things, my bouquet is dried somewhere. We have some nice photos, although I came close to murdering the photographer at one point, he was a nightmare. I still have the hubby as well, slightly worn, engine occasionally dodgy, but he ticks along nicely still🤣

Our wedding was a normal one for the time. Families from both sides meal after the church service then the evening do after that.

Our son's both had civil ceremonies, neither of the brides wanted church services. The did both wear wedding dresses. Family at the ceremony and meal afterwards, then evening do for friends. 

My parents paid for our reception but we paid for everything else. With our children they both paid for their own. Happy to say we are all still married today, 52 years for us, 19 years for eldest son, 17 years for youngest. 

The last wedding we went to was OHs great niece. The whole day was in a hotel venue, the bride was over an hour late (she was staying in the hotel) then after the ceremony the couple vanished for over 90 min doing photos of just them.

After that we were all ordered outside in 2 lines to throw confetti. All very orchestrated, nothing natural about the day, just a lot of standing around waiting. I know the day is supposed to be about the happy couple but we thought it went to far.

To be honest it was the least enjoyable wedding we've ever been to. I felt for the catering staff as it was running so late. Sadly the meal that promised something nice was dry and uninteresting due to the lateness.

The evening do was also a let down as once again the happy couple vanished to do more photos of themselves. To this day we haven't seen any of them. There has been no thank you notes, for the gifts they received. If this is modern day weddings then I'm glad we had ours at a time when it was about family, friends and the happy couple. 😊

Raining today again, please will someone put a stop to it I have things to do. 😫

All our wedding experiences have been nice thankfully. Food a bit wanting at one, (we got a McDonalds on way home🤣 me in full hat and heels🤣) and getting your head around just how quick civil weddings are takes some doing, particularly around the money spent, but they have been very well thought out and family orientated. Next one is going to be in a very old church, then a lovely very old big house. 

There's a McDs in town and it shares a carpark with a supermarket. We were shopping and noticed a Bride, Groom and about 6 guests all dressed up to the nines sitting outside having their meal with a photographer recording the occasion, a cake on the table and a bottle of Prosecco being popped. At least they all looked happy about it. We gave them a toot as we went by.

Ours was a low key affair at a registrars in Bury. We got a taxi, a Mustard coloured Datsun Cherry!, to the hotel. Just 5 guests. Too complicated a story to explain. We were due about 20 friends at night but there was a blizzard and only 2 made it onto the Lancashire hills, and they lived locally. We were happy and didn't need a big wedding to prove anything. Best thing I did in my life. (Marrying OH not getting the Datsun Cherry, but even that was memorable).

Had, for us recently, eventful last couple of days.

We all decided it would be a good idea to get a wheelchair for MiL in order that she could get out and about. The possibility of shopping for clothes clinched the deal. So we toddled off to an Ableworld and bought one. It took 3 trips and another one for me today but Mil has reluctantly joined the "old club" (her words not mine) at 91.

She has mentioned M&S twice today.

We've had awful weather again. Garden too wet to do anything.