Wedding Bells Blog
intimate
Backyard Wedding Here We Come!
I’ve never been to a backyard wedding but I imagine it would be quite beautiful and intimate. Having just moved in to 
our first house, I thought, “What better way to celebrate our wedding than to invite friends and family to our home for the affair?” As mentioned before, I want our wedding to have a real homey feel and I can’t think of a better way to do this then to have the celebration in our own backyard (literally!).
During a recent conversation with my hubby-to-be, he expressed disdain at the thought of having a backyard affair. Knowing that I absolutely love to entertain, he didn’t want me to work extremely hard on our wedding day, i.e. stress over the menu and jump into the kitchen to help with meal preparation or obsessively clean the house until it’s spotless. After much debate, he relented and I assured him that I would hire an outside caterer to prepare delicious fare to our liking and promised not to be too uptight about cleaning.
Our backyard is not all that big. We have a raised deck extending from the back wall of the house approximately two-and-a-half metres deep and the grassy area below is about eight by 15 metres. Mind you, there are also some trees lining the fence so that takes away some premium space. But I think it can be done, and because our guest list consists of 40 people, we’ll just have to squeeze everyone in.
Regarding the decor, I think the following items are a must:
- Simple white archway
- White folding chairs for our guests
- White roll out carpet to serve as the aisle
- Some sort of covering in case of rain (Tent? Umbrellas?)
Following the ceremony, a true formal sit down dinner is impossible so I think a menu of our favourite finger foods will suffice. Not hamburgers, hot dogs, or other typical backyard party food (I don’t want to pull a Britney Spears) but classy hors d’oeuvres that can be quite filling, like meat skewers, deviled eggs, mussels, crab cakes, shrimp, etc. Or is this completely tacky? Thoughts? We can have a table set up on the deck or along our fence and guests can be free to eat, mingle, chat and pose for pictures throughout the evening. I think it will make for a very relaxing and comfortable atmosphere for our guests and the thought of all of this coming together is getting me very excited!
We will, of course, have plenty of alcohol and the reception can take place both indoors and outdoors so our guests don’t feel crowded. We will create a playlist of our favourite tunes and play them throughout the evening. No DJ required (one less thing to worry about)! Maybe we’ll even have a karaoke machine (sorry, that’s just the Asian in me coming out)?
Has anyone out there been to a backyard wedding? What elements worked? Didn’t work?
By the way, we picked out our rings! I went with a stunning three-stone white gold diamond ring and Bojan with a two-tone white gold ring with diamonds. Picture to follow in my next blog! Also, picture of the backyard to follow in next entry (winter weather does not do it justice).
Tags: backyard, blogger search, intimate wedding
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5 Responses to “Backyard Wedding Here We Come!”
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I think a backyard wedding will be great! I wanted one for the same reasons as you. I think a backyard wedding will have a really personal and homey feel. However, then I decided I wanted a cirque theme more. Hard to rig performers in a backyard!
I love karaoke. I wish I could have karaoke at my wedding too, but it doesn’t exactly go with the theme. I say go for the karaoke, but I know everyone else doesn’t always share my enthusiasm for karaoke.
Also, finger foods are great. Typically I find I enjoy appetizers and finger foods more than entrees and I think it definitely can be enough food. Make sure you have vegetarian if you know any veggies. Once I went to a wedding that was only serving meat on sticks and I was starving by the end of the night!
A backyard wedding sounds so beautiful! I suppose the great thing about having it in YOUR backyard is that if mother nature doesn’t want to play nice that day, you can move the party in doors. Renting a nice white tent/canopy is also a great option. And nice would it be to be able to scoot your boys to play with their things if they get antsy? Genius! I don’t think that finger foods are tacky at all, I think they’re quite fitting for the occasion.
Your ring sounds beautiful! I’d love to see Bojan’s ring because we’re still shopping around for Mark’s.
I attended a backyard wedding for my friend last year. It was really nice — intimate, casual, and great comfort foods.
I think it sounds lovely. Although preparing for rain could be a big thing – a coworker of mine had prepared an outdoor wedding and it absolutely bucketed on the day of – fortunately she was having an early evening wedding, and her local church accommodated everyone at VERY short notice, as it was too muddy to even consider continuing with the outdoor option – and cold usually comes with rain, and I wouldn’t want that to ruin the day for you guys! And classy finger food sounds just delightful :)
A wedding hosted in your own home will have a beautiful personal feel for your day. Make sure you include a cleaning service in your budget so you aren’t the one cleaning the week of. You will have enough to worry about.
When talking flowers ask your florist to use containers you own. That way they have a place in your home, this cuts down on the expense and why buy more if you don’t need to.
And remember to think of pumps instead of high heels that will go through the grass. Enjoy your day!