Jakanna

We haven't chosen our officiant yet, I'm waiting until we are back in the US to do that.
Javier is a fluent English speaker and we agreed to say the vows in English, considering my Spanish is pretty much at a beginner's level. I have only learned Spanish from living in this country. The only reason we are doing a bilingual ceremony is to make everyone who is coming (especially his parents, who don't speak any English) understand what is being said and feel comfortable. I don't want them to feel lost and I want to feel that they are a part of our special day.
This reminds me that I really need to practice on my Spanish skills. My speaking ability is terrible!

Oh boo
I hope something opens up for you soon
We're probably going to have a November interview (as long as they send packet 3 already!) but we're planning our big wedding to be in May... we have the option to postpone if necessary, but hopefully it won't come to that.

I don't want a bouquet/garter toss either. LOL... I just feel so *on display* and it's just not me (Especially the garter toss - I'm going to be wearing a tea-length dress, so he'd basically have to expose me to the crowd to get at a garter! LOL)
I think we're going to do the pick a seat not a side thing too. And oddly, even though I'm the foreign one, I think it'll be mostly my family at the wedding, and a few of our scattered friends (ie locals and travellers). Tom doesn't have a big family, and doesn't anticipate many people coming to the wedding, so it'll make things look more even if we just scrap the seating traditions.
I can't remember who mentioned pink vs. red on the last page of this thread - but Tom's very first thing that he said when we started planning was "absolutely no pink" (which sucks because turquoise and pink are my two favourite colours) - so we ended up compromising and our scheme is turquoise and red
I'm in love with our wedding plans too!

Wow, to the person who said I can't call our ceremony and reception our "real wedding", mind your own business? I realized we will already be legally married but yes, the wedding will be the second one with all my family and friends. Many people on the site do it that way and i have the right to do it how we WANT. We are both overseas and we do NOT want a winter wedding, so we are doing it that way. You can't tell me it's wrong because that's the way WE want it. It's OUR wedding. My fiancé is from Honduras and many people do it exactly like that, so it's a normal type of behavior. I WILL tell my family it's our wedding and that's the wedding anniversary that we will celebrate, and you don't have the right to tell me that we CANNOT because YOU think it's wrong. It's not your life or your wedding or your money!! We have people coming fr overseas, we had to give them time to buy tickets and it's just the way it has to happen. Don't come at ne with a holier than thou attitude just because you don't like my (pretty reasonable and understandable) plan. And don't tell me to WAIT to go to the US so we only have one wedding, we have things to attend to before then so it's impossible.
Ok, back to the NICE and fun things with this thread.

You had already expressed your opinion once, and that was enough. There is room in this thread for all kinds of different viewpoints, and yours is what is important to you but it is not the final word on the subject. I'm surprised you've gotten this far on VisaJourney and in life without being able to realize that it takes all kinds to make a world. Please calm down and stop judging people for making different decisions than you would make. Thanks!
---
I'm meeting next week with the photography company I want to use! They'll show me portfolios for different people they have available, and I'll get to pick one. Wish Aaron could be here to go to the meeting with me, but one of my bridesmaids is going, so that will be fun. Are any of you registering for gifts, and if so, is the international spouse participating somehow?

Even though I'm not the person you quoted, I'm going to reply because I'm doing the same thing.
It does seem very harsh, and unnecessary criticism - just because you don't agree with the courthouse + real wedding after, doesn't mean it's not a very real thing for us.
The way my fiance and I are looking at it - both ceremonies are meaningful in separate ways. We are planning our legal date shortly after my POE, and though it is VERY real for us, we are still considering that to be a part of our paperwork. Yes we will be legally married, and we are DAMN happy about that.
But we want to celebrate with our families and friends as we're joined as one in front of them. And that is not going to be any less meaningful for me because I signed papers at the courthouse a few months earlier. In fact, my fiance and myself have felt the commitment that marriage takes ever since we got engaged. A piece of paper makes it legal, but celebrating in front of friends and family makes it recognized by the people who are actually important to us, not just the government.
AND, FYI, many years ago, when my parents were still living in Italy, Italian churches did not have the legal right to marry a couple - so if a couple wanted to get married in a church, they had to first go to a courthouse to sign their papers, and then their ceremony was days (or months) later. I'm pretty sure it was JUST as special to them as it will be to us.
(BTW, my fiance and I plan to mark our legal anniversary with a nice dinner or something special to commemorate the day, but we will celebrate our first anniversary on May 18, 2014. The day of the wedding ceremony)
I'm sorry if you don't agree with that... but hey, it's my wedding, not yours

Yay! This is a happy thread!!
Tom and I have decided to do a small, courthouse wedding first (we're hoping for 12/12/12, though it may be too early, because the Montreal consulate can be REALLY slow - we got engaged on 11/11/11, so I think it would be totally fitting). We're going to have my parents and his dad there, and probably go for a nice dinner or something.
Then we're planning the "big" wedding to be May 18, 2013.
We've already booked the venue - http://postcardinn.com/ (we have a clause in the contract that will allow us to push the date to any time in 2013 without any consequences). We're going to get married outside in the courtyard, and have the reception upstairs in the ballroom. It's going to be a retro/50's/rock and roll themed wedding.
I've booked my photographers (friends of mine who actually are based in the Tampa area, but are originally from the Toronto area, oddly enough!)
I have my bridal party set - 3 groomsmen, 2 bridesmaids, 1 maid of honour (my best friend since we were 6 years old!)... and either 1 or 3 flower girls (we're having issues with my brother, and still have no idea if he, his wife, and my two nieces will even come to the wedding), and my ring boy is going to be my little nephew who is going to be born on Monday!! (My niece is going to pull him in a little wagon LOL)
I bought my dress back in June, and it is supposed to be ready in December.
I'm super crafty so I want to make a lot of the elements, like our invitations, I'm hoping to make paper flower bouquets, and a few other elements (and hopefully if I get down to Florida in December, I'll have from December to May to work on all this stuff!)
I get so excited when I think about all this stuff It's the one bright spot to all this ridiculous paperwork

We're going to have a very quick courtroom thing in California upon his arrival (his mom and brother will be here, but my parents/family probably won't bother to fly out for it).
We are planning an ~actual~ ceremony for September 2013 that will be around 100 people and mostly just a celebratory weekend back in my home state of New York (upstate where things are pretty).