All About Weddings

We went to eight weddings in one summer, each one prettier than the last. Having said that, at many of them we were looking at our watches waiting for the evening to end. Knowing that we had a couple of weddings in our family in the next year (it turned out to be three in the next nine months!), we took a hard look at what we were planning and made a family pledge to make these weddings really FUN for our family and guests. Once we made that decision, our planning changed. And based on the fact that we had to turn off the lights at the end of the evening and send many people home, we believe we succeeded.

Here are a few suggestions to increase the fun:

• Limit the wedding-night speeches to two people and try hard to hold them to less than five minutes; all the rest of the speeches could be given at the rehearsal dinner with a more intimate crowd.
• Offer a few “special drinks” in miniature glasses, creating the “Ooh, what’s that?” effect at cocktail receptions. Or decorate your drinks: think about how much more inviting a drink is when it has a lovely, juicy strawberry, a slice of lime, or a chunk of fresh pineapple on the rim of the glass. Even a colored straw or a stirrer can carry the initials of the bride and groom and make everything more festive.
• Have guests walk in to music so that dancing begins as the doors to the ballroom open. At so many wedding receptions the night is half over before the dance music begins. It sets an uplifting mood to “rock out” as you enter.
• Pass mini milkshakes, black cows, ice cream sundaes, and even mini banana splits. Try mini cups of gelato, mini bags of French fries, or sliders. Just about anything can be made in miniature, and people enjoy eating miniatures of almost any kind.

• Offer great-looking dessert buffets. You can feature foods from a particular area of the country where your bride or groom are from. For example: Georgia—peach cobbler, Florida—Key lime pie.
• Serve the bride or groom’s favorite dessert, be it banana pudding or apple pie. If they love chocolate, an entire chocolate room can be enticing. The obvious start is a great chocolate cake surrounded by mini cupcakes; but also think of chocolate-covered pretzels; chocolate-covered fruits, nuts, and marshmallows; five kinds of chocolate ice cream, giant chocolate-covered turtles, chocolate milk shakes, and malts. Make it super fun and memorable. It can be elegant, glorious, and fun all the same time.
• Feature a candy display, glamorous or whimsical, all one color or in a mixture of colors. Or you might have a server offer selections of gourmet candies from an assortment; provide mini candy boxes and invite guests to choose four truffles from a fabulous display case. Invite guests to take home an assortment of homemade treats, in a custom box of course. For the few who don’t love chocolate, have waiters pass mini cheesecakes or fruit and sorbet in small waffle-cone baskets.
• Spend a little bit less on the meal and more on the fun pass-outs that happen later in the evening to move from a lovely wedding to a GREAT exciting party. Or you can fill buckets with takeaways: think sunglasses, boas, hats of all kinds (cowboy hats, straw hats, flashing glitter hats, baseball caps either themed to the location of the wedding or with the logo of your favorite sports team or college—or create a logo themed to the wedding), light-ups, jewels, flasks, custom T-shirts, cigars (chocolate candy or the real thing), pashminas, and hundreds more. Just take your theme or colors and run with it. If your wedding color is purple, have fun with purple. If it’s gold and white, go a little crazy with gold and white. People love to be treated as kids, and everyone loves (good-quality) free stuff.