Now as tradition would have it, it’s usually the bride-to-be who takes charge of the wedding, but then there is nothing traditional about nzgirl.
Jenene our managing director is getting married but instead of dragging out her childhood scrapbook and planning the day, she has passed the reins to fiancé Ken.
Now you can understand any girl being a little nervous at the thought of their boyfriend planning such a momentous occasion so we’ve asked him to keep a column on his progress. Fingers crossed he’s got it under control.
Firstly, let me apologise for not writing this wedding column sooner. Gemma, nzgirl's editor, has been pestering me for the last month (or three) to give an update on how the wedding planning is going. I can assure you that the lack of a column in no way means there have been problems with the wedding, in fact quite the opposite. You see, since the last column both Jenene and I have been a bit slack in organising, well, anything really.
We both fell into the easy trap of thinking that there were months and months until the wedding, so there was no need to rush anything.
Now I’m sitting here just under four months until the big day making a list of all the things we still have to:
Book the videographer
Design and produce wedding stationery (invites etc)
Organise a suit to be made, along with shirts and hire suits for the groomsmen
Give the wedding venue our ‘want list’ for the catering
Get the florist organised (definitely Jenene’s job)
Organise the music (a string trio for the ceremony and a band for the party)
Book the bus to transport guests
Organise a marriage certificate
Organise the New Year’s Eve party for two days after the wedding
And possibly most importantly – organise and book the honeymoon
Ok, so there’s a fair bit to take care of, all in the busiest time of the year leading up to Christmas. Given all these things on my list are still to be done, there’s possibly not much for me to write about right now. But one area where I will share a few of my thoughts is wedding stationery.
Since getting engaged, Jenene has bought a number of wedding magazines. She always says they’re rubbish, but keeps buying them.
Anyway, I have to admit to flicking through them in moments of boredom. Most of them have some sort of section on wedding stationery (invites and the like). Quite frankly, what a load of rubbish they all are.
Why is it that everybody who gets married feels the need to produce a wedding invitation that looks exactly like every other wedding invitation ever made? I’m putting my hand up to say, “stop the madness!” We’re individuals, so let’s have a wedding invitation that reflects who we are.
So, Jenene and I have bounced around a few ideas ranging from commemorative tea-towels (it would be great to know our family and friends are using our faces to dry their dishes), to commemorative teaspoons (because we’re both a couple of stirrers).
I personally think either of those ideas is golden, but let’s be a little realistic for a minute. The other day we were at a jeweller who makes very funky cufflinks made out of crests (like school crests, town crests or family crests).
This got us thinking about making our own personal crest. Most of our parents have a family crest tucked away in a cupboard, but why rely on a traditional crest? Instead, let’s make our own. We can design something that reflects who we are as a couple, and where we’ve come from. So that’s the plan. We’re going to make our own crest and use that as the basis of our wedding stationery, but maybe also as cufflinks for me.
And who knows, we may just do those commemorative teaspoons after all.
Now as tradition would have it, it’s usually the bride-to-be who takes charge of the wedding, but then there is nothing traditional about nzgirl. 