Why hello there

Did you miss me?

First, the confession: I've blown my budget.  This whole exercise, therefore, is a crock.  I realized that unless I cut my wedding down to 50 people, there was no way I could come under $10K, which is both depressing and insane.  Anyway, my dear mother has offered to help me with my poor little wedding by covering anything above my budget while still planning for the same thing: 200 people for ceremony and non-alcoholic cocktail reception + immediate family and wedding party for dinner.

Second, the good news: My bridesmaids all said yes and they've been a big help so far.  We scouted some locations for the ceremony and I decided on Fort Scaur in Somerset because it has some nostalgic sentimental value for me personally and it's got a gorgeous view of the harbor and the sound.  I found a dress!!  I love it, but I won't post a pic though because I don't want my future hubby to see it.  I can tell you that it is an ivory lengha with gold beading and it is beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.  I've decided on Lido for the intimate dinner and my fiance and I are going to nail down our menu choices this weekend and I'll hand in the deposit on Monday.  He's realllly excited about the menu.  My bridesmaids have also all agreed to wear yellow (two actually requested it) which makes my life so much easier since I wanted to have a yellow theme going on.  One of my friends is starting a catering business specializing in sweets and will do my wedding cupcakes at a very reasonable price.  Another friend has offered to help me out with wedding stationery.  And possibly the best news is that one of my best friends switched her date to September, opening up a Saturday in June that we have scooped up.

Still to be done: I need to confirm Fort Scaur with Parks, sign the contract and make the deposit at Lido, and start scouring caterers.  Finding my bridesmaid dresses will probably be a bit difficult, so I need to figure out a plan of attack for this.  I need to book a back up location in case of horrible weather, but I think I am going to forego a tent for the wedding/reception as it won't really be necessary to shield from the heat in early June and the part of Fort Scaur that I want to use isn't really tent-able.  I want to do as much of this as possible before I go on my business trip next week, but work is super busy this week/next week so wish me luck!

Back in love with Lido

I had a breakdown and started emailing every caterer I could find, determined that I could find one that would be inexpensive.  Well, I did.  Quality Catering has a pretty impressive menu at very low prices.  So I showed this to my fiance to see what he thought about having our wedding at Botanical Gardens instead of at a hotel or restaurant, since getting the food catered by this company meant that we could afford to have full dinner for 200 people instead of just cocktails for most and then dinner only for family and the wedding party.  He freaked out!  Basically, he thought that the food must be awful since the prices are good and I wasn't considering a slew of other charges we'd incur (which I was) and that I have no concept of how much effort would go into having a catered dinner instead of a hotel reception and that everything would look cheap and tacky.  When I showed him that it would definitely be less expensive and that we, along with our wedding party, would certainly be able to set everything up, he told me he didn't want to have dinner for 200 people because "it wouldn't be like a wedding".  Seriously?  Anyway, whatever.  It's his wedding too and if he doesn't want to have dinner for 200 - even if it would save money in the end - fine.  The only problem is that I am going to be the one who has the disappointed friends and family who feel left out of my big day.

I had already set up a site visit with Lido, which was my original choice anyway.  I went this afternoon to have a look around and fell in love with it all over again.  It's so pretty down there right next to the beach and I know the food is good in the restaurant and the service is decent.  The problem is that I think it will be over my budget.  The sales rep from Lido is meant to send me an email with options so I can have a look through and make a decision.  Based on the prices I already know from Lido, however, it's looking like this will put me at around $14K for the ceremony, cocktail reception with canapes, and dinner for 50 people.

Which brings me to the argument we had about my parents not paying for my wedding.  They have strict religious beliefs, which cause them to not be in favor of my marrying someone outside of my religion period.  For that reason, they are not paying for my wedding, which I expected.  My fiance, however, is getting very upset about this because he's taking it as a personal affront.  If I am going to cater to 200 people, I'm going to need some help from my parents.  And since many of those 200 are my mum's friends and family, I'm going to use that as my case.

We might have a winner...

I finally talked to the consultant at Coco Reef after several rounds of phone tag.  The prices were actually more expensive than I was expecting, but the savings come from not having an additional set up charge on top of the rental, not needing to rent a tent because the terrace is already covered if we need to move the ceremony, and not needing to pay an additional rental fee for the ceremony location on top of the reception location.  The max they can accommodate for a sit down meal is 150 people.  With the buffet luncheons starting at $55 a head, I can't afford to sit everyone down for lunch, so it will have to be a cocktail reception, which might make us able to have more people if needed, as we could only have a few tables for the older people and standing/mingling for everyone else.  We would have to finish by 4pm to make way for them to set up for dinner.

I think if we still wanted to do our intimate dinner later, we would choose Lido for that part only.  It's not that far away, and at least I know that we like the food at Lido.

I'm going to email the consultant at Coco Reef to see if I can do a site visit today.  They won't have their menus confirmed until next week, but to be honest, I'm sure any canapes will be fine.  If I like it, I can go ahead and book our venues, which will make me so happy!

Not much news

Heard back from the wedding consultant at the Fairmont Hamilton Princess, who was very helpful.  The prices, however, are more than I'm looking to spend.  It's the most expensive place I've looked at so far, so I sent her an email saying that it is sadly out of my price range.  :(

I hadn't heard back from Coco Reef yet, so I called this afternoon and called again this evening and left a message.  I'd really like to settle on a venue before going to Toronto so I can get started on the next phase of planning.  All my guides and countdowns etc. tell me I am way behind the eight ball.

I just finished watching the season premiere of Grey's Anatomy, which featured a very unique wedding: the bride wore red, the ceremony took place inside a house, and the guests all stood during the entire thing. Small, simple, special.  While I think I want something more traditional than that, it's nice to get some perspective on how different and scaled down a wedding can be while still being a special occasion.

Break

Just a quick post tonight to say I took a bit of a breather tonight.  No wedding stuff.  Okay, almost no wedding stuff - I shot off a short email to the wedding consultant at Fairmont Hamilton Princess to follow up on my request for information that I sent last week.  And I might have checked out some cute magnets that can serve as save the dates, but that's only because they were in the email newsletter I get from The Knot.

What I did instead of wedding obsessing: worked late, swept the hurricane debris off my balcony, put all my patio furniture back outside, scrubbed down the glass, ate dinner and vegged in front of the TV until my fiance finished work, at which point I talked to him on Skype.  I even tried not to talk about the wedding to him, although it did come up when I mentioned I had emailed the Princess.  Still, it was brief and more of a side note, so I feel like it doesn't really count!

A timely post

Just came across this while looking for something completely different: http://newportweddings.blogspot.com/2010/09/hurricanes-and-weddings-whats-tented.html

As Bermuda is just coming out of a hurricane (Hurricane Igor, a direct hit), I think this post is particularly relevant to anyone planning an outdoor wedding in Bermuda.

To invite or not to invite, that is the question...

My guest list is out of control!

There is a core group of about 50 people, made up of my and my fiancé's closest friends and family who I want to attend no matter what.  But then, there are also extended family members who I know would want to be there, other friends who I see on a regular basis, current and former work colleagues who have been out with us or had us over to their homes, friends who have invited us to their weddings, people who attend my mosque who I see every week and have known me since I was a teenager, not to mention all the extra people our families want to invite.

Where to draw the line??

Another difficulty arises in that I have way more friends and associates than my fiancé does.  In fact, I also have way more family than he does.  It's to the point where his list is running about 68 long and mine is running about 168.  We cannot have that many people.  And I feel guilty about dominating the guest list.  However, when you consider that many of my friends have become his friends too, and that it's not my fault I have more family, that guilt starts to melt a bit.

In my sorority purpose, 2 of the lines are:

"To cultivate acquaintance with many whom I meet;

To cherish friendships with but a chosen few..."

While, ironically, I only have one of my old sorority sisters on this list, those two lines have been ringing in my head.  I am pretty darn good at cultivating acquaintance, but do all those people really need to come to my wedding?  If I already know who my cherished chosen few are, is it wrong of me to limit the guest list to just those people?

My cousin, who was recently engaged told me that everyone else has 364 other days of the year to see me.  And quite frankly, I don't think that anyone who has not made some sort of effort to see me or at least talk to me in the past 364 days should be on my list.  I also don't think that people who just happen to see me frequently because we run in the same social circles or go to the same places need to be on the list.  It's Bermuda - you are going to see the same people all the time because the island is just that small and interconnected.

The tough part is that, inevitably, people are going to be offended.  At the end of the day, though, it's really about my fiancé and I enjoying our special day with the people we love the most.

If you have any tips on cutting the guest list, I would love to hear it!