@oregon101 I think it’s great your D and SIL did it their way and with much success! Sounds like it was a lot of fun.
@VeryHappy , I’m glad you posted the particulars of what was bad about the wedding you attended because I had a small panic attack after reading your other post about it. I’ve been stressing out about the reception for months. Dh is amused by my angst.
Our venue’s dinner buffet offerings were not sufficient so I requested two proteins, four veg, two starch & bread. There will be something for guests with various dietary restrictions since within the family and wedding party alone I needed to consider diets for gluten intolerance, diabetes, Crohn’s, IBS, lactose intolerance, etc. There will be a good variety of hors d’oeuvres, too. I requested a soft drink/sweet tea/water station for anyone who doesn’t imbibe, and the bars will be open for the full 5 hrs.
We’ll be on an upper floor, but the venue has two large elevators that are clearly marked and near the stairs. Too many of us have mobility issues.
I’m expecting criticism from my in-laws as well as from some of FSiL’s relatives, but we can’t please everyone. The bride & groom want a buffet dinner to more easily accommodate food restrictions, but some relatives think that anything other than a plated dinner is tacky.
I’ve also heard hints that dh & I should be paying for his siblings’ hotel rooms. My reply to dh was that it’s an invitation, not a summons, and they could have declined if they didn’t want to come.
Love your last paragraph, Silpat!
It sounds like you’ve considered everything quite thoughtfully. I have no idea what they were thinking at last night’s wedding! And the MOB is a good friend of mine. I think the bride and groom handled most of the details, with the MOB and FOB just writing the checks. Of course I’m going to tell the MOB how beautiful the bride looked, how much fun it was on the roof deck, blah blah blah.
I wish etiquette didn’t call for this sort of thing.
I saw significant problems at my daughter’s wedding earlier this month, but she has received nothing but compliments about the wedding from people who attended. I wish I could truly know whether people are simply being polite or whether they didn’t see the problems that were so evident to me. I would also like to know whether they saw any problems that I didn’t notice. But I will never get that information.
It is why you can’t just write the check and have your kid plan the whole wedding. They do not have the experience to take everything into consideration. The bride and groom who planned the wedding that VH attended probably didn’t think it was a big deal not to provide seating on the roof deck for the ceremony because they probably thought it would be unusual and cool. They probably didn’t think it was a big deal to have guests go up and down 3 flights of stairs. I am just a bit surprised their caterer and venue owner didn’t help them plan it better.
No point in giving negative feedback even if it would be honest when it’s too late to fix anything, IMO. What point would it serve now?
I wouldn’t give negative feedback especially if it is not going to help and would only cause hurt feelings.
I think the problem is that the venue is laid out the way it is. There’s nothing you can do with a hundred people and three floors. All hundred didn’t fit on one floor at the same time. I don’t know if the caterer was provided by the venue or if they were separate. I suspect they came with the venue.
I simply wouldn’t have chosen that venue!
Uh oh. That’s just what’s happening to us in two weeks!!
We did all the planning and wrote most of the checks for our huge wedding. To the best of my memory, the wedding and reception were close to perfect and I’d do it the same if I could have a do-over turning the clock back to 1985. It really depends a lot on the couple and how much experience they gave managing logistics. Some have considerably more experience in planning and carrying out large events than others when they get married.
@oldfort is correct, many of the bride and grooms have no experience in planning parties for the crowd size many of the wedding have. I posted at the start of this thread about my son’s wedding almost 2 years ago. The wedding reception was being held in a art museum, and the kids thought it would be cool to have just a few high top tables and no chairs 
after quietly explaining to my son that his grandparents as well as many guest over the age of 40, would not be comfortable standing for 4 hours. Forget having to juggle their dinner plates and drinks. Turns out the brides mother was also explaining that adults need tables and chairs!
While there was not seating for everyone, there were enough people getting up that if you wanted a seat, you could find one.
The questions just keep piling up:
Most of D’s and FSILs guests will be coming from out of town, including the groomsmen and the bridesmaids. What is the etiquette. Are the parents of the bride supposed to pay for their lodging?
Transportation from the airport - which is about an hour - am I supposed to arrange this? What if people are arriving at many different times?
Transportation from the hotel to the venue? Are we supposed to rent a van/shuttle bus? Or should guests be expected to rent cars and transport themselves?
The county courthouse or Vegas is looking better all the time.
We are not paying for lodging for the bridesmaids for the night before or night of the wedding. We are getting a house for them for,the two or three nights prior…as that is when they will do the bachelorette party. We will probably pick them up at the airport. Most of them have SOs arriving the day before the wedding who are renting cars.
Our wedding venue is across the street from where we have hotel rooms blocked. No shuttle needed. If folks choose to stay elsewhere…they will need to drive.
Most of our wedding guests are from out of town, and many will be flying. Airports are at least 45 minutes away. We will not be providing transportation from the airports to anywhere. This can be arranged through the hotel.
We never paid for anyone’s transportation or lodging, nor did S who’s 3 D’s have all gotten married in the last several years. Sis DID get special rates at two hotels for each wedding and let guests know about the two hotels with special rates (one was moderate and one was lower priced).
At least four of my S’s groomsmen and at least two of the bridesmaids were from out of town and neither the MOB nor my H and I paid for their hotel rooms or provided transportation from the airport. Some took their own rooms, some stayed with friends in the city, and I think others booked Air BnB accommodations. None expected any of us to provide their lodging.
We did provide transportation from the hotel in Manhattan where we had a block of rooms to the venue which was 14 miles away in the Bronx. Being in NYC, many of the guests did not have cars, public transportation was not convenient to get to the zoo at night, and cabs/Ubers were quite expensive. We offered a bus for the bridal party in time for pictures and another for guests who had replied yes for transportation. Many not staying at the hotel did come to the hotel to get the bus. On the return, we had an early bus departing about 90 minute before the end of the wedding and another at the bitter end…it all worked out very well.
@TatinG, there are no requirements - you can choose to provide what works for you, your budget, and your family.
We are providing transportation for all events, but we are not picking up or dropping people off at the airport. We are also not paying for the wedding party’s lodging. D1 was and will be a bridesmaid at most of her bridesmaids’ weddings, and that’s what her crowd is doing.
When H was very young and poor, one of his buddies had a wedding in SF and booked and paid for lodging of H and the other young 20+ year old guys who were “ushers” for the wedding. H was from HI and knew the guys could barely afford the airfare and couldn’t otherwise have attended. That is the only event H or I have ever attended or know of where lodging was provided to some guests.
Oh, I take that back, I was maid of honor for a friend’s wedding and we attended as tail end of our honeymoon. The couple insisted we stay with the bride at her condo while we were in LA.
The bride and I had a habit of staying with one another when visiting the other’s state.
We would probably provide transportation IF things were happening far afield. BUT in our case, the welcome event is happening at the hotel we blocked rooms at. The reception is across the street, and the brunch is at the hotel. It’s all sort of in the same place.
I think it depends on one’s own resources and the resources/age of the attendants. If they’re established, they are more likely to be able to afford it. Recent college grads, it might be a push and given that we’re comfortable, I could see us helping out with some of the expenses.
My kids are older and established. So are their friends. We have not been asked to pick anyone up at the airport.
I rented condos for my family so we can stay together and so the cost would be low for my mom on a limited budget. They are paying me for their share but it was very, very reasonable.
One of the things they may be least prepared for is meeting the needs of elderly people and families with young children. That’s an area where they might benefit from input from our generation.
On the other hand, we older people aren’t always right, either. When my daughter and son-in-law told me that they were not going to have a bridal party, I thought it would look conspicuous and weird. I remember suggesting that they might want to have at least have one person stand up with each of them, but they said no. Now that the wedding’s over, I realize that their decision was perfectly fine. Nobody cared or even particularly noticed that they stood up alone. Moreover, the lack of a bridal party greatly simplified the wedding planning (for example, we never even had to think about whether we needed to pay for the bridal party’s transportation and lodging). My daughter and son-in-law were right and I was wrong.