2. Some issues that may arise during the initial stages of planning
your wedding may be due to lack of knowledge to do with
traditional wedding customs or disagreement as to what traditions
are necessary or relevant to your wedding. Discussions may come
up during conversations within the family or with close relatives
and/or future in-laws and this Ebook will help you to prepare for
these conversations.
***
This Ebook will explain the traditions of weddings and help you
and your partner to decide what you may want to incorporate into
your wedding. You do not have to follow this Ebook step by step,
by all means this is totally your wedding and every wedding is
unique. This is just a basic guideline to help you along the way.
3. Wedding Budget
Who is Paying for What?
This is a big question and is usually one of the first to come up during the conversation of the
newly engaged couple and the family of either the bride/groom or both.
Traditionally, as to generally what people understand, the bride's family must pay the majority of
the wedding budget. However, this rarely applies these days as people are marrying older and
have more money saved up, but it is interesting to note all of the costs that the bride and her
family were once held responsible for.
Please remember: This is all based on traditional etiquette of the wedding budget and does not have to be followed.
The Brides family would traditionally pay for the following:
• All Reception Costs
• Church or Ceremonial hire fees
• Grooms Rings
• Invitations
• Flowers (including ceremony & reception)
• Music for the Ceremony
• Transportation for the Bridal Party
4. Wedding Budget
Continued…
The Grooms family would traditionally pay for the following:
• Brides Rings
• Clergy Fees
• Bridal Bouquets, Corsages and Boutonnières
• Rehearsal Dinners
• Transportation for Groomsmen
The Bridal Party traditionally pay for the following
• Their own attire (Bridesmaid Dresses, heels, Accessories)
• The Bridal Showers, Hens Night or Kitchen Teas
The Groomsmen traditionally pay for the following
• Their own attire (Suits (rented or purchased), Shoes and other Accessories)
• The Bucks Night
These days, most newly engaged couples would pay for a lot of the above and previously mentioned
items themselves. This must all be discussed with the respective parties and families and it must not be
assumed that they will know what they are expected to pay for.
5.
6. Invitation Problems
If you do not want to have children involved or invited to the wedding
ceremony or reception, you could possibly leave the children's names
off the invitation and don't mention them throughout it. Friends and
family can also pass the word around that children aren't included,
but this may be difficult as they may not know every guest and some
guests may not fully believe them unless it come directly from the
Bride & Groom. More suggestions are when writing the invitation,
you could possibly write the following:
- Adult Reception
- We hope that the (number of) of you will be able to join us
- (Number of) seats have been reserved in your names
If someone hasn't responded to an invitation, one week past the
'Reply by' date, call them. However, you may be upset or concerned,
but be calm and ask politely, as the wedding may not be as important
to them as it is to you, so it may have slipped their mind.
Guests over the age of 18 should generally get their own invitations.
This is polite, and generally, when children are this age they may
already be living their own lives and not communicate with their
parents in regards to their whereabouts all the time.
Send parents and wedding party invitations as a keepsake, but
remember they don't have to reply, unless they want to.
You should ensure you put a return postage on your RSVPs.
7. Guest Etiquette
The following information is what you can expect from a
guest who will be attending your wedding.
- Guests must send back their reply before the RSVP date.
- Guests who decline the invitation, do not have to send or
give a gift.
- If a guests arrives during or before the procession, they
should wait for the bride to go down the aisle before
entering.
- If a guest arrives late for the ceremony (after the
procession), they should walk down the outside aisle and
find a seat silently and quickly.
- Guests are to buy a gift for the couple and the gift should
be so both can use.
- Guests should've cash as a gift if the wedding is out-of-
town, so they do not have to worry about transporting all
their gifts home (which would or could be adding costs).
- Guests are to make own lodging and transportation
expenses. However, that is totally up to you.
8. Wedding Gifts
Etiquette dictates that registry
information shouldn't be put on the
wedding invitation. It's left up to
friends and family to inform everyone.
However, gift information can be on an
insert within the invitations. If your
client has a personal wedding website
with information for bridal party and
guests (and gift registry information),
they could include an insert with the
link to their website in the wedding
invitation.
It is considered rude to put 'cash only
gifts', or other wording meaning the
same thing on the invitation.
9.
10. Groomsmen & Bridesmaids
Groomsmen
The groomsmen are there to support the groom
throughout the wedding planning process. They are
helping through what can be a very nerve-racking
day. Planning and helping to organise the bucks
night and any DIY duties that may happen on or a
few day prior to the wedding.
Bridesmaids
The role of the maid of honor and the bridesmaids is to
serve the bride as their right-hand women and to assist
the coordination with the other bridesmaids, of the tasks
the bride is not usually involved in, such as, kitchen tea/
bridal shower and hens night. In other words, it’s not
just an honorary position, but one that requires
planning, attention to detail and a lot of patience.
11. Seating Plans
Do not make things uncomfortable for you, or your families. Do not seat relatives
together if they have bad history or are known to not get along. Try seating tables
together by their relationship to the bride and groom or by age if there is a mix of
relationships.
The head table or bridal table is not so strict when it comes to who sits where. It is
more common to have the bridal party on the table than the parents of the bride and
groom, but this is totally up to what works best for your wedding. You can have all
female on one side and all male on the other, or you can go boy, girl, boy ,girl. Again,
this is totally up to what you decide.
To make this more private, sometimes couples will have their own table for just the
two of them, or have their table raised above the rest of their bridal party and guests.
Remembering, that what you decide has to be able to fit in the venue and this is
something you should check first before organising your seating plans.
12. Flowers & Favours
Do not make things uncomfortable for you, or your families. Do not seat relatives
together if they have bad history or are known to not get along. Try seating tables
together by their relationship to the bride and groom or by age if there is a mix of
relationships.
The head table or bridal table is not so strict when it comes to who sits where. It is
more common to have the bridal party on the table than the parents of the bride and
groom, but this is totally up to what works best for your wedding. You can have all
female on one side and all male on the other, or you can go boy, girl, boy ,girl. Again,
this is totally up to what you decide.
To make this more private, sometimes couples will have their own table for just the
two of them, or have their table raised above the rest of their bridal party and guests.
Remembering, that what you decide has to be able to fit in the venue and this is
something you should check first before organising your seating plans.
13.
14. Speech Etiquette
When you have a wedding, everyone knows there will be speeches. It’s just going to happen.
Whether you are confident enough to speak or to have someone dear to you, speak about you,
and/or your loved one, these tips will help you make the process of this, as less stressful and
nerve racking as initially thought. There is no correct order of who does there speeches, but
there is a preference and an order of etiquette you could follow.
1. Best Man (toast to the couple and honouring bridesmaids; may have a joke here and there
about his relationship with the groom or the couple).
2. Groom’s Parents (Usually just the father - toasting the uniting of the two families).
3. Bride’s Parents (Usually just the father - toasting towards the couple).
4. Maid of Honour (toast to the couple and honouring groomsmen; may have a joke about
her relationship with the bride or the couple).
5. There are a few options in which the couple may speak; Bride and Groom together or
separately; Before dinner or in-between courses; or even at the end of the night prior to
their grand exit. The focus and purpose of this speech is to thank their everyone for
coming and to all family, friends, organisers and planners (if you have a band or wait staff,
even the chef, it is always nice to be recognised) that helped make the special day happen.
15. Wedding Cake Traditions
The cakes traditional taste and richness was a
symbol of fertility back in the Roman times. It is
traditional for the Bride and Groom to cut the cakes
first slice together to ensure a ‘fruitful’ marriage.
This does not mean that you have to have a fruit
cake as the flavour for your wedding cake, this is
just traditional. If you have a specific flavour in
mind or have a preferred taste, then you can
definitely explore this. Some cake stores or venue,
in which provide cakes, will allow you and your
partner or family and friends to join in having a
tasting of flavours to choose your ideal wedding
cake flavour.
16.
17. Cancelling or Postponing
Generally the engagement ring should be returned (Not Exchanged)
All the gifts should be returned with a brief explanation why it was
cancelled, including engagement or pre-marital gifts. However, it is
known that if a gift is engraved or personalised it doesn't have to be
returned and obviously not be exchanged.
Out-of-town guests should be informed first so that they can change or
cancel their travel and lodging arrangements.
If a wedding is only being postponed then of course every guest has to
be contacted. Etiquette say that another invitation should be sent with
the new date.
18. Second Marriages
If the bride has been married before or has
children, it's perfectly acceptable for guests to
wear white.
If the bride has been married before or has
children, she's not supposed to wear a veil or
have a train attached to her dress or carry
orange blossoms. (Its a sign of purity and a
virginity thing!)
The second time around, parents are not
obligated to pay for anything.
If the bride gets along with her ex-husband
and his family, and it's fine with her fiancé,
then it's acceptable to invite them to the
wedding.
19. -Tig Ellis, Wedding Planner
“Whatever you dream, can be true. It just takes a lot of
Patience and Planning”
That’s what we are here to do!
