Yeah I have definitely been in situations where there was no other option - especially as an expat. I’ve had to put several months’ rent into a bank account that would immediately go to my cosigner should I default on my rent JUST so I could get an apartment. Like...I had multiple months’ rent up front, a job, good…

You know, I tried to do this very thing. I told my bridesmaids that they could choose a color together if they wanted, or just decide on a style/formality level, and then started an email thread for them to do just that. And then...they picked out a dress together and all wore that one.

I agree with you, but I could totally see an aunt having a blind spot toward her young and beloved niece and taking out her resentment on the sister who raised her.

The irony in this comment is even better.

Also, every one of those people has a secret reason their wedding was so cheap: my parents have a huge, gorgeous backyard that we could use for free; my best friend owns a restaurant; my sister is a designer/seamstress; I have connections in the catering industry; I don’t actually like parties and only know 10 people…

It sounds like a lot of your friends (and maybe family) were close enough geographically that they were happy to pop over for a dinner. That is awesome for you. Me, I live in a different country than most of my friends and all of my family. My husband’s friends and family are scattered and none lived closer than an…

For me, it was that my now-husband just did not understand event planning. So where I would have been totally fine with the backyard-wedding-dress-made-of-lentils, he wanted something more traditional. But because I have some experience planning larger events and, at the time, had more free time due to workloads, I…

I think that friend and I are mutually over at this point, sadly. After I posted this last year, it became clear that the reasons for which she had decided to marry this guy were...less than admirable. Basically, he was “madly, deeply, soul mate-style in love” (he is that kind of guy; you know, abrupt infatuations and…

Oh God, we didn’t realize that they had extended the process (in March!), so we almost didn’t make the cut to get our letter of approval. I had looked it up back when we were first planning, and I luckily decided to get a jumpstart on it, or we wouldn’t have gotten married at all. Was your letter weirdly joyless and…

Done. Would you like the terrifying human-animal hybrids to be in the form of jackals reminiscent of old enemies, or nightingales with the achingly beautiful voice of faded friends? Also, we’ll need a list of which loved ones’ loss will pack the biggest emotional punch - you’ll want it to be someone you’re close with,…

Oh you’re tossing your actual bouqet, no sorry, you have to buy an extra toss bouquet and then one to preserve

White flowers are the color of dead love, if Anne of Green Gables is to be believed (and she absolutely fucking is).

Uggghhh, at our wedding, the venue FORGOT that we had specifically demanded an open bar (they had a weird setup where the bar in the main room we used was all alcohol we had provided, but sometimes that room was closed when they were changing from drinks to dinner or dinner to dancing) and started charging our guests.…

Well, there isn’t assigned seating at parties, but most parties also don’t involve a full dinner and aren’t a wide mix of people of different ages who maybe don’t know anyone else. We did assigned seating at our wedding because my husband felt that he had been to a couple of weddings where he didn’t know many people…

Ugggghh, the week of my wedding, we went out to dinner with some family friends who were in town for the wedding. So, as I believe you and I have discussed, I am also an American who got married in the UK (yay us!). Basically everyone who came to our wedding passed through London at some point, and it happened that we…

During the wedding planning, I was complaining about the theme question somewhere on Jezebel/I Thee Dread, and another commenter and I started joking about founding a company that fully themed your wedding. My favorites were “Reality Show Wedding” (guarantees: no discreet photographers, but paparazzi all up in your…

I had a wedding. I really, REALLY enjoyed my wedding. I will defend my choice to have a wedding until the end of time, because it was really fucking fun, and I got to see so many people I hadn’t seen in years, and one of my friends hooked up with one of my now-husband’s friends, which was hilarious and phenomenal and…

The same thing happened to me. I was all about the maybe-we-don’t-even-have-a-wedding-but-if-we-do-it’s-small-and-nontraditional idea (that was too many hyphens, but I started and couldn’t stop), and he wanted to get married in a church with ALL the traditions. I was totally fine with it, but really uncomfortable with…

I feel like I would have gotten a giant, light-up ring from those machines in the grocery store, put it around my neck, and busted it out every time someone argued that I needed one. Then, if they persisted, I would turn it on. Maintaining eye contact the whole time.

I’ve been to Stockholm once (for a conference nearby, and then I couldn’t resist extending my stay a couple of days!), and I really liked it. My only major concerns are cost (I live in a fairly cheap city right now) and building a new social network, which isn’t specific to Sweden. We lucked out like crazy in the…