What are/were your wedding plans?

[PearlyLemons 13]

I understand it's difficult to make plans whilst going through the valley of Immigration and so this is a bit of lighthearted fun .

Those who are already married, feel free to post - it'd be great to hear all about it.

As for us? We were originally going to have a medium sized wedding (around 50-60 people) at a formal venue with a cake, food and cheesy music, but alas, savings just do not stretch that far! So, we have decided on a small civil ceremony at a courthouse (just immediate family present) in his town( we were planning on getting married in Indiana, where his parents are because at that time he was moving around places a lot but he is now in one spot) and a meal at a nice restaurant and we are still planning on having a cake. I'm actually pretty happy with this - I was getting stressed about planning a wedding when I don't have an exact date (we are waiting for me to be allocated an interview) that I would arrive in the U.S. Our small wedding is a much simpler and hassle free event to plan and can be arranged at short notice.

What is everyone else planning on doing?

Edited July 10, 2013 by Jeff&Emmy

[Nich-Nick 3,354]

I threw together a lovely Sunday afternnoon "tea party" for about 15 people in six days from when we arrived from England. (Except only the groom drinks tea, so a coffee party maybe?)

I have a friend with a lovely big house and huge covered patio with waterfall so asked him to provide the location.

A county judge I've known since kindergarten came to be the officiant. I wrote his script since he doesn't do weddings but legally can.

My only cost was a small 2-tiered cake. I love wedding cake. Oh and some flowers from the grocery store that I used to make a centerpiece.

Friends brought crystal, china, and silver forks to make it posh and seem special.

One friend made punch. Another brought six bottles of champagne she had left from a party. Our favorite coffee shop provided two favors of coffee free.

It was very casual/comfortable. No music, bouquets, fancy dresses, or time shedule. We visited and had coffee/tea first. The men watched the end of a NFL game. Then we gathered on the patio and married with our friends standing gathered around us. The two of us spoke a few words to the other from our hearts. We did vows we agreed on and wrote together. (They were in the judges script.) Then we cut the cake, toasted with champagne, and visited more with our friends.

It was a nice afternoon and had enough touches to make it special and memorable, yet laid back and comfortable at the same time so no stress at all. It was more personal than in a judges office.

Edited July 10, 2013 by Nich-Nick

[lynndy38 64]

First of all congratulations on your up coming wedding!!!

My US husband flew over to the UK for our wedding, we travelled up to Edinburgh, Scotland with 5 family members, got married at the registry office then went onto The Royal Scots Club for a meal. It was simple yet amazing......I was so fussy about showing my husband Edinburgh as it is an important city for my family so be able to marry him too was just a dream.

We had a party for the rest of the family and friends when we returned home from Scotland. We did all of this in a wonderfully exhausting week!!!!

[BOS_LHR 829]

Aww this is a nice thread!

My husband and I got married in Boston. We would've preferred to elope, but our families didn't like that idea at all, and we thought it was better to have their support given our situation. It was all planned in about two months. We had 9 guests: parents, siblings and their spouses, and my grandma. Our officiant was a justice of the peace, lovely woman named Leslie that I found online through her hundreds of rave reviews. We had the ceremony in Fan Pier Plaza, which is a pretty park on Boston harbor. It was a free venue for us since we were only there for half an hour and didn't have any furniture, decorations, etc. We had a perfectly beautiful day for the outdoor ceremony (luckily!), got lots of nice photos in the park, then had our reception aboard the cruise ship Odyssey. The Odyssey was docked just across the harbor from where we had the ceremony, which was pretty cool -- one of my favorite photos of us in the park has the ship visible in the background. We had a nice brunch and harbor cruise with everyone wandering around above decks enjoying the open bar, lol. We kept it pretty low key and were both really happy with how things turned out. We were even happier to have the wedding done and run off to the White Mountains together for our honeymoon, though!

[lost_at_sea 995]

My husband and I were originally going to get married in the US at the city hall in SF, but we changed our minds when we decided to try the DCF route.

We planned and booked the wedding in the space of 3 weeks in April, whilst also having to travel to Austin and Warsaw for work! It was a pretty mental 3 weeks, if I'm honest.

We had a very small civil ceremony at Camden town hall in London - my best friend was a witness and husband's best friend flew in from SF with her wife to be his witness - no other guests or family. Then we took our witnesses over to St Pancras hotel and had champagne there and some more photos taken in the beautiful building there (photographer was booked 3 days before, and she was great!), and then took them to dinner.

That night, we threw a cocktail party for our friends in London in SoHo, which was really nice. It was the first bank holiday weekend in May and was actually the one sunny day we got. It was warm all evening.

That was it!

I bought a tea-length white dress for almost no money, which I loved, worn with a pair of blue low-heels I already had, and he already had a perfect tailored suit that we bought a new tie and shoes for. My mum sent me a brooch to wear and a matching tie-clip for him, which was very sweet of her. I made my own bouquet the night before (I've always fancied floristry as a back-up career if the web thing goes down the pan).

We're throwing a second party for our friends in San Francisco when we get there, and we've been making personal visits to family instead. We've already been to visit my folks about a month ago, and we'll be visiting his sometime this autumn.

[photomile 101]

We did it. Whole hog and everything.

We had spent months pre planning and discussing as best as we could. The moment I got approved we set a date for November 18th, I arrived September 5th. Within two weeks we picked a venue, paid for it, and got things rolling. We ended up having about 50 people at the wedding, a reception, parties, showers, the lot. And it didn't look half bad either! A plan got put in place and we just went for it.

I still don't think I've slept enough and it's been oh,. 10 months now since I arrived in the USA?

[Stuart and Tina 4]

We decided to get married at the courthouse and plan a dinner out afterwards since we don't want to give a date not knowing exactly when we will be getting the visa. Originally we decided a beach wedding and having all our friends and family have a beach vacation. So we will get married at the courthouse and then so all our friends and family can make plans for our beach party celebration and we will also be having another ceremony at the beach because that was what we want to still do.

[Rose13 30]

We got married first with a very small civil ceremony in the USA (celebrant & witnesses only) and will have a larger event this August.

[Zoe&Chris 5]

I feel that now I have been approved, I can write here (although of course I still wait to have the visa in hand).

I feel like there is sometimes a little judgement on here about planning things. To be clear, I think it is excellent advice to plan nothing until your visa is in hand, but I do know that some people feel they are unable to do this, for many different reasons, and I am one of them. I wanted to share my experience, for other people who are planning a wedding under this stress!

I wanted a big wedding. Not big maybe, but some sizable wedding none the less. I don't know why really but I just did. I bought a fancy dress back in December, and I didn't want to not wear it. I wanted my parents to be there and I wanted bridesmaids as I am going to miuss my best friends terribly. This and other reasons led me to be entirely insane, and plan a wedding for 75 people without yet having a visa. I didn't do anything until NOA2 though, but upon NOA2 i read every timeline and made every guestimate and went for it. Our NOA2 was May 2nd, and I planned on 24th August. My mom is a headteacher of a school and so cannot take holiday during school calendar - so she could only make it if it were August 24th or one day in October. One of my bridesmaids would have missed the October date, so I went with August and I was terrified.

I emailed 20 venues from internet research. My fiance and his mother visited 4 places, we picked one, we signed contract at the end of May! Before we signed I went thorough all the contingencies - I wouldnt book anything until I had it clear what I would do. I decided, if the interview was too late that I would fly out and have the party anyway, then fly back for the interview. This is advised against, but I was prepared to risk it and was planning on getting letters signed to say I hadn;t got married from guests, the venue, everyone. I locked down my facebook account and would have told guests not to post anything. My other contingency was for if I got denied - I would get married anyway! If you get denied, its probably best to get merried and apply for the spouse visa so I saw no problem flying over there to get married, having 3 months there then coming over here to apply for spouse visa (although I would have been super sad)

Anyway, somehow using only the internet I found a photographer, florist, bakery, officant, favours, ribbon and DJ and am getting married August 24th in Phoenixville, PA. They approved my visa on Friday so I am feeling like the luckiest girl in the world. I fly August 2nd so will be in country 3 weeks prior to the big day! It paid off for me and I had some contingency time as my interview could have been a few weeks later and still made it. I'm having a 5.30pm non-religious civil ceremony (haven't decided if I can hack the heat outside yet though), and a sit down dinner. As we are/were both physicists, our tables will be names after fundamental particles and will have cuddly particle mascots. To symobolise our love of maps, I am making paper flowers out of my old UK/France/USA atlases and some old buttons. I honestly can't wait sadly not many people from the UK are coming though, but I understand and will return to have a party with them once I get my green card (allows me to save up for a second party). I was going to have a going away party at my house but I looked up marquee rental and it was too expensive

I don't know if I would recomend you do it on such a tight schedule if you don;t have to, but had I picked a date in September I think it would have been relatively stress free! (London also lets you specify wedding date which I did, and attribute this to my fast interview date ) Anyway, I know I am a crazy person and I made it all more stressful for myself but OMG I am getting married in 40 days!

Zoe

[katieflossom 54]

My husband came to the UK and we had a simple but beautiful ceremony at Marylebone Town Hall. There were just 7 guests, then we all went on for a lovely lunch afterwards, followed by lots of drink and laughter in a brilliant Irish Pub. We stayed in a hotel that night (even though I live in London) to make it feel special.

Very simple day, but it was absolutely perfect

(And my dress was blue!)

[lost_at_sea 995]

We stayed in a hotel that night (even though I live in London) to make it feel special.

We did too! Our hotel was like, 10 mins walk from our flat, but still... small details make big differences!

[Vanitas 310]

Like Zoe (and many others), I also agree that not planning anything is excellent advice. However, in my case as Amy wanted to make sure everything was nailed down ready for our chosen date of 11th May 2014, we decided to take the risk. If for whatever reason I cannot get the visa in time we have Plan B, which is using all the stuff we have sorted as a non-legal ceremony and then I can actually just do the legal part at the courthouse when I do have the visa in hand. It'll incur extra flights and all, but there you go. That said, we should be okay but nothing is ever guaranteed.

So far, we have the venue booked (Roger Williams Park in RI), Amy has her dress, her bridesmaids have theirs. Invites are my next priority to give my UK family and friends enough time to decide if they want (and can afford to) come over as well as then give Amy's family their invites too. Currently looking at reception venues/restaurants and a cake. After that we'll need to look at the rest of it as well, including the attire for my side of things but that's going to be done US-side closer to the time because it saves courier costs and the like for those coming over for the UK and having a role in the wedding.

So far so good I reckon.

[BaBamSam 239]

We're going to have a very quick courtroom thing in California upon his arrival (his mom and brother will be here, but my parents/family probably won't bother to fly out for it).

We are planning an ~actual~ ceremony for September 2013 that will be around 100 people and mostly just a celebratory weekend back in my home state of New York (upstate where things are pretty).

[Jakanna 0]

@

BaBamSam

When you say "actual ceremony" are you just going to disguise a vow renewal as a wedding? I am doing pretty much the exact same thing as you, a quick courthouse thing, where is mom will fly out and be a witness, then planning a vow renewal for the following year. I am just curious how you are going to do the second ceremony, when you will have already said your vows. Only just curious, as I am trying to figure out how to make sense of my "two" weddings.. simply because only our parents will be present during our courthouse wedding, and we want everyone to see the whole shabang, not to mention, all his family will be flying out for our wedding/vow renewal next year and I want it to be as wedding like as possible, but not forgetting how special our the first time we said our vows will be. One of my main concerns is, should I have my dad walk me down the aisle for my wedding next year, even if we are already married??

Thoughts? Suggestions? Thanks!

[Portlandia 15]

We're hoping that my visa will come through in late September, but we don't know yet, we're still waiting to find out my interview date, so it would be WAY too stressful to organise a proper wedding based on uncertainty (and also too stressful to try and organise it from a distance!). Plus the Pacific NW is not at its best in winter, and it's really important to me that my friends and family are able to be there. My parents and my best friend will be there whenever we have the wedding, I know that. But I don't want people to come over at a horrible time of year just for one day.

So we've decided to do a courthouse wedding when I get there (so we can apply for AOS and I can get my EAD to work, and meet the K1 visa requirement), and then are planning what we consider to be the "proper wedding" - i.e. making our vows to each other in front of our family and friends at Easter 2014. That means that my parents, my best friend and her family (including my goddaughter and godson), along with most of my closest friends, (and my fiance's out of state friends with kids in school) will be able to attend, and will also be able to make it into a proper holiday and do other things while they're there - skiing in Canada / sunning themselves in California / hiking in the Cascades. And it might entice a few of my other good friends over as well! We've booked the venue already (on the beach, just out of Portland, a few of my fiance's extended family have been married there, it's beautiful), one of his friends has a band who will play, one of my friends will take the photos, the rest we'll sort out after I move (oh, and we've already picked our cake supplier too - I guess that says a lot about our priorities!).

It feels odd in some ways, we'll wear our wedding rings after the courthouse wedding date, and we will feel married at that point, but we're rationalising that with our belief that a wedding should be a community thing, that there is something additional, something special, about making that committment in front of family and friends. And part of the traditional wedding ceremony asks those present to support the newlyweds, and that's always been a beautiful part of the ceremony for me, and we want that too.

Now I'm not the kind of girl who had her dream wedding planned since the age of 15 or whatever, but I guess I always thought that if I did get married, I'd be surrounded by my family and friends (and his). This whole process has really put a spanner in the works (when I was 15, I didn't consider the possibility of marrying an american!), so we're trying to make the best of it. If that means having two weddings - one legal, one "real", then so be it.