This post looked promising to me.

http://viewmorepics.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewImage&friendID=98473300&albumID=2115946&imageID=28521295

(sticks tongue firmly in cheek…pierces own cheek accidentally)

(psst! NtB is lacking access to Word Press today, so there will be another Twistie article over at Manolo for the Brides today)

But if I ever have to get married again, I’m calling a resort in the Caribbean and saying “I’m coming with a dress and the groom. Here’s my credit card number. Make the rest happen.”

That’s what I’m doing for the wedding/honeymoon, but I’m having a remarkably traditional reception. Why? Because my dad’s in a wedding band. (An awesome one, btw.)

I’m wearing a black-and-white party dress that looks ridiculously fabulous on me. It was $30 at Filene’s Basement. The groom is wearing a charcoal-gray Brooks Brothers suit that he got on fantastic sale. I really don’t care what anyone else wears, since there will be no wedding party to speak of. (We’ll have been married for a week and a half already . . . why bother?)

But let’s not talk about engagement rings . . .

Count me among those who bypassed a great deal of the WIC…which is somewhat ironic when you consider that I now write for a wedding planning blog. Still, over at Manolo for the Brides, we are firm believers in the concept that if you’re not having a good time with your wedding, then you’re doing something wrong for you.

A wedding (at least here in the US) requires two consenting single adults (we’re working on that bit about making gender irrelevent), a license, a legally-authorized officient, and one to three witnesses, depending on state law. That’s it. Everything else is a matter of tradition, fashion, innovation, or imgination.

When I married Mr. Twistie, there was never a question of me stepping foot in a bridal salon. See, I was making my own wedding lace, which meant I needed a custom gown. Luckily, I had a good friend who could do almost anything with a sewing machine who was willing to recreate the perfect Regency-style gown for me using my lace trim. I wore my mother’s Dress MacDonald tartan arisade and my scarlet Scottish dancing ghillies. I worked out my headpiece on the morning of my wedding when I realized that while I’d bought several things I thought I might use, I’d never actually decided which ones I was and wasn’t using. I just knew I disliked wearing a veil, so I bypassed it.

We had a beautiful ceremony in the redwoods followed by a low-key picnic reception. My father and I made nearly all the food, the flowers were simply hand-tied sheafs of long-stemmed cheap and cheerful flowers I found at the local open-to-the-public florist’s supply house with a few red roses added in because they’re the flower Mr. Twistie always gives me. We had all our formal photos taken before the ceremony so we wouldn’t have to wait to get to our own party. No rented cars, no rented tuxes, no diamond rings, no ring at all for Mr. Twistie because he doesn’t wear any jewelry under any circumstances, period.

We had a great time at our own wedding, and fifteen years later friends still tell me it was one of the nicest weddings they’ve ever been to. Not bad for roughly two grand.

Whatever color you want to wear, whatever the gender of any attendants you have, whether or not you have a cake (Mr. Twistie hates cake, so we had fruit tarts instead), whether you carry real flowers, fake ones, or none at all, whether you speak traditional vows or write your own…all of that is pure window dressing. Once you accept that, it frees you to use, ignore, or adapt tradition to fit both your budget, your beliefs, and your tastes.

I think the worst thing the WIC harps on is the idea of ‘the perfect day’. It won’t be perfect. Something will go wrong. Compromises will have to be made. Letting go of perfect is the best thing a bride can do to keep herself sane and happy during the wedding planing process. It allows you to laugh when something trivial goes wrong, and prevents the post-wedding let-down I’ve heard some brides describe after they’ve invested too much emotionally in that one supposedly perfect day.

Both of us live in Israel while my parents were in England and his in America so we had the stress of organizing the whole thing (in 3 months, for various reasons, although *not* of the shotgun variety!), but everyone was so flipping delighted that we were getting married that we got free rein on just about everything! Also, a stunningly beautiful wedding here is about a tenth of the price it would be in our countries of birth, so money was far less of a problem as it might have been. We found a gorgeous ‘orchard’ events place just outside Jerusalem, the whole thing took place outdoors, the ‘canopy’ we were married under was under a sort of trellis thing that had grapes growing on it, we had 250 people, the funky band I wanted, great food, a wonderful photographer, my a capella group performed two songs, one arranged just for me by the director of my favourite song… it was a truly perfect day.

The dress was probably the most stressful thing. I’m not really a plus size now, but I also wasn’t a normal size – a real hourglass, with a G cup bra size and larger hips but relatively tiny waist, and I knew I’d probably find nothing here to even try on. At 146lbs at the time I was still in some of the largest sizes in regular shops here – lord knows what plus size women do (there is *one* plus size shop here. ONE) When i was in plus sizes living here i did all my shopping when i visited england, and that’s hardly got a huge choice.

Anyway, for the dress I went for a seamstress and designed my own dream dress – good thing I didn’t see the rivendell.com site or I might have ended up spending too much because medieval/fantasy is *just* up my street. But I did my own variant of the medieval princess look. I wanted long sleeves not just for modesty reasons but because I love love love long flowy sleeves. The problem with designing your own dress is that what you see in your mind’s eye is not necessarily what you’ll get when it’s done, and you can’t change your mind at that point. But luckily I was happy with mine in the end even though it was only ready TWO DAYS before the wedding! Here there are many places where you can get a dress custom-made to your design but then they keep it at the end, which makes it $1,000 instead of $2,000 (I imagine custom-made seamstress dresses would cost more in America etc than they do here so it’s not a cheap option). My dress needed big ‘ol hoops, which I wasn’t going to buy too, and where would I store them and the dress anyway, and I agree with Meowser – even if I have daughters, who says they’ll ever have my relatively unusual figure or will want my dress?! Although my 10 year old niece did say immediately when she saw me that she wanted to wear my dress when she got married. :-) I told her she coudl have one designed exactly as she wanted it. I guess if she turns out to have a figure like mine she can always go back to my dressmaker and rent the dress! I didn’t have time to go and try on different styles to see what I liked but the dressmaker had a few things that helped us decide together on shape of skirt, position of waist etc.

I knew, incidentally, that no matter how many people told me that brides lose weight from stress I wouldn’t be one of them, and I was right – I was exactly the same size when we got engaged as I was when we got married. Of course I’ve no idea if I’ll ever be that weight again now I’m five months pregnant and fast packing on the pounds!