How to Please Everyone?

Tim'a atheist and told me he'd feel like a big liar if we had a church ceremony, which is fine by me since I haven't attended church since I was 17. no amount of badgering from my family will get me to change on this. I'm sure my mom thinks we should get married in the church she did, but I'm not about to make Tim feel uncomfortable just to please her.  I haven't come out and told her Tim was atheist because that would really upset her, but I've made it clear that we do not want a church wedding.  She seems to be accepting of it...if only I could get her to accept the purple dress!

And go ahead and call me a Bridezilla if you want, but I don't feel as though Tim and I need to compromise on what we want or let others have what they want if it's not what we want.  We're the ones paying for it, anyway!

Tim'a atheist and told me he'd feel like a big liar if we had a church ceremony, which is fine by me since I haven't attended church since I was 17. no amount of badgering from my family will get me to change on this and tell Tim we're having a church ceremony.  We even want to omit all mentions of God from the vows, because Tim doesn't feel comfortable promising to something he doesn't believe in.

With my courthouse ceremony, we were given two sets of vows to choose from (or we could write our own, but like most of my wedding I couldn't be arsed). Neither of them had any mention of God, so if you guys just do a courthouse deal you might end up being able to avoid the whole 'God or no God' issue, depending on what county you get married in (if you even get married in the US)

With my courthouse ceremony, we were given two sets of vows to choose from (or we could write our own, but like most of my wedding I couldn't be arsed). Neither of them had any mention of God, so if you guys just do a courthouse deal you might end up being able to avoid the whole 'God or no God' issue, depending on what county you get married in (if you even get married in the US)

Lancaster is a pretty religious county, but a friend of mine is ordained to perform weddings and she has no problems taking out God, so as long as she's available when we want to get married, it shouldn't be a problem.

I think one of the things you could do to include family members is to allow them to make decisions about the things that you don't really care about.  For instance, you already know for certain you want a purple dress so put your foot down and say "I'm not wearing a white dress; end of discussion."  But, if you don't really care what kind of flowers you have (as an example), tell your mom "Hey I want some purple and white flowers.  Can you be in charge of picking those out for me?"  This way she feels included in the process, but you are not compromising something that is really important to you.  If you don't care about the type of napkins, what type of music is played, the food/appetizers, etc...put her in charge of those things.  Keep the things that are important to you within your control, and allow the family to be involved with the other details.  In the end, just keep in mind that you will probably won't be able to please everyone, no matter what you do.  So you can (unfortunately) expect that someone is going to be upset or disappointed regardless.  If everyone does end up happy in the end, bonus!  Keep in mind this is your family though.  They're not going to stop loving you because of the color of your dress.

Yah - it's all star lanes I love where you're having yours as well SP -did I read in the paper that it was getting loads of grant money?

Oh, awesome - that place always looked so cool when I walked past it on my commute to work, but I never ventured the whole way inside!

And yeah, Bletchley Park is finally getting some serious funds! The manor house and gardens (where they do the weddings) are already in great shape, but about half of the codebreaking huts are just falling apart and covered by tarpaulins, and even the ones you go into are just bare concrete floors and really neglected. It's amazing it doesn't have a higher profile as a site of extreme historical significance, and it's such a fantastic day out even in the state it's in now (a £10 ticket gets you unlimited entry for a year, and a 90min guided tour, oftentimes by people who actually worked there in the war!).

Oh, awesome - that place always looked so cool when I walked past it on my commute to work, but I never ventured the whole way inside!

And yeah, Bletchley Park is finally getting some serious funds! The manor house and gardens (where they do the weddings) are already in great shape, but about half of the codebreaking huts are just falling apart and covered by tarpaulins, and even the ones you go into are just bare concrete floors and really neglected. It's amazing it doesn't have a higher profile as a site of extreme historical significance, and it's such a fantastic day out even in the state it's in now (a £10 ticket gets you unlimited entry for a year, and a 90min guided tour, oftentimes by people who actually worked there in the war!).

Are you getting married at Bletchley Park?  Tim and I had a fabulous time visiting there!

Becca,
Congrats on your engagement and good luck with the planning!  I'm worried about most of the same things if and when I get engaged - it can't be easy - no matter what - when families are separated by an ocean.  Boyfriend and I are non religious and both of our families are rediculously Catholic so I feel your pain there too.  A million times, good luck!!!
Make sure to post pictures - a purple dress sounds amazing!!!!  Do you have it picked out already, or just the color?? 
Best Wishes and...
Congrats, congrats, congrats!!!!!!

I don't know.  I'm kinda on your Mom's side on this one.  I don't know what your shape is but I'd be afraid I'd look like a giant grape walking down the aisle in purple.  Is it really purple purple?  Couldn't you have purple trim or carry purple flowers? 

No.

I think the purple is going to be gorgeous--just as an aside, while I was dealing with the shenanigans that wanting to wear a brown dress created, my friend (who also happens to be a top salon stylist and flies all over the world doing celebs and royalty's hair) told me that colour is the new white and that it "would be gorgeous, darling". (Yes, he really does talk like that!) So I say go for it!
I found that compromising where I didn't care (for example, chair covers--I could give a toss, my mom thought they were essential, ehh, whatever) was the best route and holding firm was the name of the game.  Honestly? NONE of it really has to do with the wedding.  The stress of planning such a big public event just seems to bring out those little holes in people's psyches.  I'll recommend indiebride again (just google search for it), they are a caring and AWESOME community and really helped me come up with a funky and fun time.

To make you feel better, my mother and my sister had this conversation. In front of me. At my dad's birthday dinner.

Sister: I don't know what to wear! It's a mid-afternoon wedding, but I want to dress up.  But I can't be as dressy as if it was an evening wedding.
Me: Wear whatever you want.  Honestly.
Mom: Well, you don't want to show up the bride. And Jennie's dress is pretty basic.
Sister: Yeah, I don't want to look better than you.
Me:  Just don't try and marry Pete. That would really freak people out.

Sorry so long--but in the end, everyone had a great time! My mom can't stop talking about how fun it was.  And I LOVE my brown dress.

I think the purple is going to be gorgeous--just as an aside, while I was dealing with the shenanigans that wanting to wear a brown dress created, my friend (who also happens to be a top salon stylist and flies all over the world doing celebs and royalty's hair) told me that colour is the new white and that it "would be gorgeous, darling". (Yes, he really does talk like that!) So I say go for it!

While I agree that coloured wedding dresses can be gorgeous (darling!), I think it really depends on the person wearing the dress. I went for an ivory one because I'm not exactly slim (and because I loved the dress, of course). In the wrong hands, I think colours can look absolutely dreadful. You have to be very very very careful with them. It's so easy to go awfully wrong.

The other thing to keep in mind is that what might be trendy in 2009 may look really dated in 5 or 10 years. And you're going to want to look at those wedding photos forever!

Honestly? NONE of it really has to do with the wedding.  The stress of planning such a big public event just seems to bring out those little holes in people's psyches
 

This is very true.  When I got married to my now ex, my mother wasn't controlling at all, but my father suddenly wanted me to become SuperJew bride and wanted me to have the whole traditional Jewish wedding thing (never mind that as a teenager he wouldn't bother taking me to services on the holidays or Sabbath when I was really interested in going).  Also never mind that at 35 I was now what I'd call spiritually ecclectic, my fiancee was Hare Krsna and his family was Catholic.  It was a huge stressful thing, but in the end we sort of tried to please everyone *a little bit* with a co-efficiated wedding (Rabbi and Hare Krsna priest) with music ranging from Jewish, Indian, trad Irish etc.  It was a really fun wedding, I don't regret it, even though my dad wasn't happy about it, I still felt good about including what Jewish elements I could.  My dress was blue and lavender and a reproduction of a Medieval style dress in a Waterhouse Pre-Raphaelite painting.  My dad actually thought the dress was beautiful, that's what made the biggest impression on him.

Anyway, I guess what I'm trying to say is be true to yourself, but try to get across to your family that you love them even if it has to be in a small way, like others have said maybe letting them have their way on stuff that doesn't matter to you.  But yeah, be true to yourself.   

Chary, I agree, there's certainly a danger when you go "trendy" (my own parent's wedding for example--can you say powder blue tux with ruffles? Yes you can!)--but my dress at least was super, super basic--it just didn't happen to be white.  I just don't look that good in a variation of white as it is--so it was a relief to go a little outside the norm.
Here's a picture of the dress--I'm the one in brown--the rest of the people in the background are some of DH's school friends who came over for the wedding!
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/BiZaHQFf5T5y2Ta-IJRVsw?authkey=Gv1sRgCP31tOah0IXbmwE&feat=directlink

The other thing to keep in mind is that what might be trendy in 2009 may look really dated in 5 or 10 years. And you're going to want to look at those wedding photos forever!

I see what your saying chary, but for my own personal self, I believe all styles look dated and horrible 10-15 years on, but somehow it all comes round again and looks retro or good by about 20 or so years (except maybe horrible 1980's huge puffy sleeved affairs!).  My medieval style dress may look seriously ridiculous in another few years, but eh--I felt like a Queen on the day, and that's what counts.  When my (now) hubby and I have our spiritual ceremony I plan to wear a Regency style dress--got the pattern for it, just need to get it made into a dress).

Jenny, you looked gorgeous!