Alternative ideas for weddings and elopements
Photography by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
I didn’t have a traditional wedding. I know many couples right now are mulling over all kinds of different ideas for how to shape their wedding or elopements. With talk of re-opening Ontario from the covid-19 shutdown, it does look like weddings will happen this year, but with some restrictions on the size of events. The rules haven’t been laid out just yet, and tbh I think there will be a very big sigh of relief once the full plan is in place and people can start planning again. I know I’m waiting with baited breath.
Things have been changing in the wedding world for a while now. Couples are starting to realize that a wedding doesn’t have to look any particular way. They can shape and mold their wedding to fit what makes them happy, rather than just sticking with they feel they ought to do. I’ve heard of one couple looking at this whole covid-19 situation as an opportunity to start fresh, they get to have a do-over of their wedding plans, and make sure it’s exactly what they want. Now more than ever, I think it’s important to ensure that you’re looking outside of the box to find a solution that works best for you. Sometimes you just need someone to empower you to make the decision you already know you want to make, but you aren’t sure if it’ll work. I am a big believer in being an advocate for my couples, so that they can have the day their hearts are set on. So let me be your advocate and tell you what Joel & I did.
Photography by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
Our wedding -
Joel and I wanted to elope. That was the idea that sparked joy in our hearts (he would probably tease me for the way that I just phrased that). When we announced our plans to our parents, it clearly become obvious that there would be some disappointed loved ones if we went ahead with that plan. So we had to pivot. Much like you have to pivot now. We opted for a very small, intimate weekday wedding on the shores of Georgian Bay with just our immediate family and a handful of friends who we consider family. There were 22 people in attendance in total, that includes our officiant and our photographers, all of whom are friends. We woke up together, made breakfast, went for a swim, Joel bought a tie at our general store, we got ready and had our first look in our home. Then we ended up in a small conservation spot close to Joel’s parents place. Somewhere we still go quite regularly. We tried to rent it out, but you weren’t able to at the time. So we showed up, got married, popped some Nova 7, and celebrated, all while people were walking their dogs or fishing off the beach. It was perfect for us. After all of this we ended up at my in-laws where Joel’s mom had prepared a 10 course meal for everyone and we ate on picnic tables on the deck. You have to love an Italian mother-in-law. For oh so many reasons!
Having such a small affair allowed us to really be present, to spend time with each person we loved, and to skip a lot of the intensive planning. I love a good spreadsheet, and facilitating events for other people, but as soon as we started getting probed with questions from friends and family about this, that or the other thing, or giving suggestions on what we should do, my anxiety would flair up and I’d shut right down. I want to please everyone, and when the suggestions rolled in, it became clear that I wouldn’t be able to if I started listening to everything everyone said. We’re also both not great with being the centre of attention, so pairing it down to such a small group also allowed us to alleviate a lot of the nerves associated with standing up in front of a crowd.
Photography by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
If we have a super small intimate wedding, how do people stand? Won’t it feel sparse?
We’re still not sure what the numbers will be for gatherings in Ontario. BC has said 50, Alberta only 15. Once Ontario announces how many people you’ll be allowed to include in your wedding in 2020, you can start making those arrangements. Don’t forget, you’ll need to take into consideration your vendors in your headcount as well. Anyone who is on site will need to be counted.
As I mentioned, ours was 22 including all of our vendors. We had originally thought about setting up chairs on site for our ceremony, but it seemed silly with so few people there. Plus I couldn’t get over the idea of one person getting stuck behind someone taller than themselves and not being able to see. Can you imagine? A super small, intimate wedding and you still can’t see? Ugh! So we invited our loved ones to surround us in a semi circle. They all stood. It wasn’t a particularly long wedding, and we didn’t have anyone there with mobility issues, so that worked for us. I loved having a ceremony in which people weren’t in rows, they were surrounding us. This didn’t feel sparse at all, it felt so full to look around and see a face in every direction.
Photography by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
What if I choose a weekday, will people still come?
Oh heck yes! I loved getting married on a Thursday. As someone who usually works predominantly on the weekend, it made sense to me. It also made a lot of sense because the conservation area we were getting married in wouldn’t let us reserve it, so we knew it would have less people there on a weekday in September than on a weekend. No one gave us grief about choosing a weekday. I know it was more complicated for my sister and brother-in-law to take off work because they’re teachers, but they managed to sort it out, and it meant they got a four day long weekend. For many people, as so many months of weddings were cancelled in 2020, they may run into conflicting dates, so choosing a weekday means you’re lessening the change of them having to choose between you or someone else. Also, and this may make me sound like a total jerk for saying it but here goes, if you’re really hoping to have a super small guest count choosing a weekday will limit how many people CAN come or how many feel slighted for not being invited. Think of it like a destination wedding in that respect.
Photography by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
What if I want to get married now, but I still want to celebrate with family & friends?
You can. We did too. We have a huge friend group and we love them to bits. Plus the dance party is my favourite part of any wedding and Joel loves music more than basically anything. So we opted to have a backyard dance party with about 150 friends and family. We even went super untraditional and made it potluck. Lemme tell ya somethin’… you want the best food at a wedding? Make it potluck and invite all your foodie friends. They all brought their A game and most brought their favourite family recipe. It was amazing! I still think about that dinner, and we still get comments about how amazing that was. We had our celebration on the Saturday after our wedding, so the same week but with a day in between for us to get our shit together and to not have to stress about the celebration while in the midst of getting married. Leaving yourself some space between the two events is something I would highly recommend, whether it’s a day, a week, a month or a year. It allows you to keep the celebration going and gives you the breathing room to focus on only one at a time.
Photography by Inna Yasinska
What do we do on the celebration day that makes it feel like a wedding?
We opted to wear our wedding attire again. I had a second dress for the dancing portion of the day, but that was because I had a very delicate vintage lace dress and I knew I would destroy it on the dancefloor. Plus my second dress was a vintage sundress I got for $50. We had a "vow renewal” on our dance party day. It wasn’t anything like our original ceremony. We had one of my closest friends “officiate”, but we gave him free rein to add some style to it. There were references to Kevin Costner and definitely a Roald Dahl quote in there. We didn’t share vows, exchange rings and we weren’t pronounced, but you could do any or all of those things if you wanted to. A lot of our guests said that it was nice to be part of a ceremony with us because it allowed them to feel connected to our marriage. That was special to them. We most definitely had a kiss, and we did kick start the dancefloor with our (second) first dance.
You could also play a video or a slideshow from your actual elopement or intimate wedding. That way your guests can celebrate those moments with you and feel like they got to be there. Another idea would be to have your vows printed out and displayed somewhere at your venue. My friend who officiated created this beautiful poster with our vows on it and we had that as our guestbook. It’s a really nice art piece from the day and having our friends and family sign those vows was almost our way of having them give their blessing to our union and say they’re here for us. Once upon a time the people at your wedding were the ones who were there to support you when times got tough. Stand by your relationship and be there to counsel you when you needed it.
Photography by Inna Yasinska
Should we celebrate with family & friends now or wait a year?
You’ll have to do what’s right for you. If you choose to wait a year, you may have a closer version of the original celebration you had been planning, and that might be nice. If you’re too impatient and don’t want to wait to celebrate for a whole year, you can trim down the size of your guest list to the amount that the province dictates (whenever they announce that number) and hug them til you’re blue in the face. Or you could even opt to have a zoom dance party to celebrate now, and push back the official and in person celebrations til next year. I can tell you one thing for certain, whenever you do decide to celebrate with friends and family, it is going to be the most joyous get together after everything that has happened!!! Being cooped up away from people you love, not being able to hug or high five anyone, it’s really bringing into sharp focus just how important people are in your life and how much you love them. That energy is going to be magical!
Photography by Me & Steve Stemmler of Tara Lilly Photography
How can I honour my friends and family if we decide to elope?
Take the time to talk to them. Make sure they know what your decision is for your new wedding, and that this decision was not about excluding them, but about making sure they are healthy and protected. You could ask each of them to write you something that you can read on the day of their wedding so that you feel like they’re there with you. You could also run a facebook live of your ceremony so they could be there with you. You could write to each of them individually and tell them about your day and how much you love and missed them there. Never underestimate the power of a handwritten letter! I know it seems so dated, but I still come across letters from decades ago and fall into them. You could keep photos of your loved ones on you while you’re getting married.
After the elopement is over, there are ways you can honour them too. You could also create a photo album of your elopement and give one to each of your immediate families so they could share those moments with you. In a way, that would give them even greater access to your wedding celebration than actually being there because they’d get to share in moments that they wouldn’t have witnessed on your wedding day. Moments like you getting ready, or during portraits. You could also hire a videographer to come with you. If you choose to elope, I would push for this option more than ever. Ask me for recommendations. I have them.
Photography by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
I’ve made my decision, what’s next?
Whatever you decide to do moving forward, if your plans have changed in any way from the original you’re going to need to reach out to your guests to let them know. Just like you’re sitting here holding your breath and waiting for some answers from the government so you know how to proceed, so are your guests. There are plenty of ideas on the internet of beautiful or clever ways to share with your loved ones that your wedding will be postponed, or will look different from the original plan, or both. If you have a wedding website, it’s not a bad idea to share on their how your plans are changing and why. You can even leave your guests a little love letter on there.
Top image by Jennifer Moher & Hugh Whitaker
Bottom image by Steve Stemmler of Tara Lilly Photography
Whether you decide to elope, have an intimate wedding this year, postpone an entire year to have the wedding you’ve been planning, or something altogether different, make sure what you decide to do is what’s right for you. This really has been an opportunity to press the reset button, so it’s a little like a gift. I mean, a gift that has probably caused sleepless nights, stress, frustration and definitely not the kind of gift you had your heart set on. But a gift nonetheless. Take it and run with it! Get creative and hang onto the fact that “love isn’t cancelled”.
