Q & Advice

Rachel and Scott’s ridiculously fun and beautiful California wedding

Photo by Handlebar Studios

Each time you go to a wedding, meet your friend’s parents for the first time, or find yourself in the break room with your work colleagues, you have an opportunity to strike up an enriching conversation with someone new. In these situations, though, it’s scary to think about things getting awkward, uncomfortable, or downright painful. The best way to avoid this? Simply be the change you want to see in our general approach to small talk.

Be open

This can be especially difficult if you consider yourself an introvert, but fear not. The simplest measures can help you rock any party (or grocery store line, or break room hangout). For example, if someone says hi, follow up with a smile and ask the funniest thing they saw that day. Did you forget an umbrella? Make a joke about your drenched hair. Simply showing your humanity and friendliness (and sometimes laughing at yourself) will make you super approachable and easy to talk to. Find more tips on body language and other small measures here.

Ask thoughtful questions

Nothing is worse than the “What do you do? Where are you from?” conversation, and lord knows that events with lots of strangers are chock full of them. Intentions might be perfectly admirable, but more than one of these per day can get exhausting. This TED Ideas article suggests that when you’re getting to know someone, ask them specific questions and give thoughtful, even surprising answers. Why not get weird? You might hit it off with someone you never expected. 

Focus on others

Did you just find yourself in the bathroom line with the groom’s aunt Rita? Ask about her favorite memory of him, or a time he said something funny as a child. Ask Rita where she’s from, how far she traveled, and what the most surprising part of the trip has been. Putting the attention on others will make them feel comfortable and the conversation more enjoyable. This one works great if you’re trying to score a date with that attractive someone across the room, too! 

If you find yourself looking for more party tricks, these blogs contain countless tips for event etiquette (and lots of pretty pictures to enjoy as well!).

Wedding planing is stressful. Wedding planning during the holiday season? Well, let’s just say that it can reach epic crazy levels. With engagement season almost upon us, we thought we’d share some helpful tips on some ways to kick off your wedding planning without rocking the boat with family and friends.

Invite different people to different events with no hurt feelings

These days, the average wedding is three days long with four events, and the reality is that not everyone is invited to all of the events you are organizing. For instance, the rehearsal dinner typically has a smaller guest list than the ceremony and reception. In the UK, it is common for the ceremony and dinner to have a smaller guest list and for a larger guest list to attend a post-dinner celebration party. But inviting guests to different events with style can be tricky. On your Glosite wedding website, all of your guests will view the same website pages, but we give you to the option to specify who is on the guest list for each of your events. When each guest views your Events and RSVPs pages, they will see a customized view with details about only the events they are invited to. This prevents guests from having any you-are-not-invited-to-this-event blues.

Paper vs. Email Wedding Invitations

So you’ve decided that email wedding invitations are the way to go. After all, they are streamlined, cost-effective, eco-friendly and save a ton of time. But, what if Great Aunt Mertle just won’t hear of it. She wants a paper invitation to press between the pages of her scrapbook. Don’t worry – we’ve got your covered. Each of the designs in our wedding invitation and wedding website design boutique has a matching paper design that can be ordered. This way you can send a handful of paper invitations to older relatives or mix and match an email save the date with paper invitations for all of your guests.

Modern Wedding Sangeet photographed by Binita Patel

Addressing Save the Date and Wedding Invitation Envelopes

Addressing envelopes is tricky business. How an envelope is addressed indicates exactly who you are inviting to the wedding (“The Smith Family” vs. “Mr. John and Ms. Jane Smith”) and also sets the tone for how formal or informal your celebration will be (“Mr. Mark and Mr. Christian Jones-Harper” vs. “Mark and Christian.”) To provide some tips, we’ve written the ultimate guide to addressing wedding invitation envelopes.

Writing the Wedding Invitation

Once you’ve figured out the envelopes, you have to give time and thought to what will actually go on the invitation. We hear from couples that one of the most challenging parts is determining what will go on the invitation “Host” line – this is the part that starts with so-and-so invite you to enjoy the wedding day of… Traditionally, the bride’s parents paid for, and thus hosted, the wedding. But what if you are paying for your own wedding? Or there are two brides (or no brides?) Or everyone’s parents are chipping in, along with Great Aunt Mertle (now that she’s receiving her paper invitation.) Messy, right? To help weed through the murkiness, we’ve written a two guides to cover exactly what to say on a wedding invitation and how to nail that wedding invitation host line.

Photograph by Alan Phillip, featured in 2Brides 2Be

Addressing “cultural” differences

It’s no secret that a marriage is a blending of different families – and with this comes a blending of cultures, personalities, and traditions. By cultures, we are talking about more than nationality, regional, religious, and lifestyle identities to include any different ideas of “the way we do things around here.” You know what we mean.

Blending cultures can be truly amazing and fun, but sometimes it requires a little bit of explanation or background detail so that one person knows where the other person or tradition is coming from. This is perfect content to add to the FAQ or special pages of your wedding website. Use this space to explain what guests might experience at your wedding. It might include foods, outfits, traditions, language, music or anything else that could be unfamiliar to them. Providing some information about who, what, where and why will prevent any guests from feeling out of place and give them something to look forward to experiencing at your celebration.

Allow guests to edit names and emails

One of the most awkward situations is having a guest show up to your wedding and not seeing their name spelled correctly on the seating chart. Or maybe you sent an email update a week before the wedding advising guests about a dress-code change, but someone didn’t receive the email because it went to an inbox that they rarely check. No one likes to feel left out, unloved or awkward. On your Glosite, you can enable a feature that allows your guests to edit names and email addresses for themselves, their household members, and any +1s. Use this feature – you’ll be glad you did!

Do you have other tips to share? Be sure to let us know in the comments. We wish you happy and peaceful planning.

Tis the season of food people! Yes, we’ve got menus on the mind around here. If you’re planning a wedding celebration, a dinner party of any gatherings where people will enjoy some fabulous morsels, then we bet you are thinking about it too. But what about your guests that need to think twice about what’s on the table? It’s a fact of life that some people have restrictions on what they can put in their bodies – sometimes by choice and sometimes because of very serious medical conditions. For this reason, we always recommend including an RSVP question on your wedding website to specifically ask your guests about any dietary restrictions or allergies that you need to be aware of.

For those of us who don’t have food restrictions or preferences, this world can seem daunting. So today, we are going to do our best to cover some of the food considerations you might see come back as a response to the all important “Do you have any dietary restrictions?” RSVP question.

Vegetarian / Vegan

Vegetarian guests do not eat meat or animal flesh. This includes soups that have a meat-based stock. Some guests may refer to themselves as pescatarian, which means they eat fish, but not animal meats or flesh.

Vegans follow a plant-based diet and do not eat animal flesh, and also restrain from eating animal products. This includes eggs, dairy and other animal derived products (for instance, certain types to gelatins.)

Sweet Potato Bruschetta, recommend in One Green Planet’s Guide To Vegan Wedding Foods

Kosher

Kosher diets follow the rules of Kashrut or Jewish dietary law, which dictates what foods may be eaten and how they should be prepared and consumed. Meat and diary foods may not be stored, cooked or consumed together. There are restrictions on the types of animal meats that can be consumed. Specifically only animals that chew their cud and have cloven hooves are allowed, which prohibits animals like pigs, rabbits. Kosher foods are also slaughtered and prepared in specific ways. Dairy must come from a Kosher animal and be processed in a Kosher facility. Non-meat and diary items are also subject to Kosher law, including wine.

Halal

A Halal diet specifies foods that are permissible for Muslims to eat or drink under Islamic Shariʻah (law). It includes both the types of foods that can be eaten, as well as how the foods are prepared and primarily applies to meat and animal tissue. Common restrictions include not consuming pork, blood, animals that are not killed in a Halal way, and alcoholic beverages.

Halal wedding menus by Silver Spoon Catering

Nut allergies

There are numerous types of nut allergies. Two of the most common are peanuts, which are legumes, and tree nuts, which includes almonds, Brazil nuts, cashews, chestnuts, filberts/hazelnuts, macadamia nuts, pecans, pistachios, pine nuts, and walnuts.

Shellfish allergy

Like those with peanut alleargies, individuals who are allergic to shellfish can have extreme reactions. This allergy can include shelled marine animals like shrimp, crab, lobster, clams, mussels, scallops, and oysters, as well as octopus, squid and squid ink.

Free downloadable food allergy place card printables by Marry This

Celiac disease (gluten-free)

Those who follow a gluten-free diet do not eat barley, rye, triticale (a cross between wheat and rye), or wheat. Sone common food that they do not eat (unless they are specifically marked gluten-free) include: bread, cake, beer, cookies, crackers, croutons, french fries, pasta, salad dressing, soy sauce (and other types of sauces), potato chips, some soups/soup bases.

Photo by Robert Betz, featured on Gluten-Free Living

Lactose intolerant (dairy free)

Individuals who are lactose intolerant can not digest lactose, which is the sugar primarily found in milk and dairy products. Common foods that lactose intolerant guests will avoid are cheese, milk and ice cream. Lactose is sometimes found in bread, baked goods, salad dressing, candy, as well as foods that contain whey, curds and dry milk/dry milk solids.

Dairy Free Naked Wedding Cake by The Organic Wedding Cake Company

If you are working with a caterer, it is essential for you to keep them updated about anything your guests’ can not eat. They are the experts and they will have many ideas about how to keep your guests both safe and happily fed. If you are planning a DIY potluck, working with a local food truck, or supplying your own food, then searching for alternative or complimentary food items for your restricted guests will certainly bring smiles to their faces. If your celebration includes any buffet tables, and you know you have guests with certain food restrictions, it is helpful to label foods or let them know about ingredients that could be harmful. Some guests with severe allergies may prefer to eat before coming or bring their own meal/snacks.

The important thing to remember is to communicate with guests so that you and others involved in the food preparation are aware of any concerns. Taking the time and thought to ensure that all of your guests are able to enjoy the day will mean the world to them.

it’s great to use technology as a hack for saving time and money (like inviting guests via email wedding invitations, sharing information with a wedding website, collecting RSVPs online, or crowdsourcing your wedding photos with a hashtag.) But technology can also present a host of privacy issues for both you and your guests.

If privacy is a concern for you, here’s are some tips on how to protect yourself from all kinds of mischief-makers and wedding crashers to keep your wedding details and your gust list data nice and private.

1) Choose a Wedding Website service with tight privacy controls

You’ll want to make sure that only the people on your guest list have access to any private information on your wedding website. The most secure sites give the option to have all or some of your pages behind a guest login. This way, only guests who are on the guest list can access your pages. For an added layer of security, you’ll want to password protct your pages. At Glosite, we allow guests to choose their own password – which means they are less likely to forget it and that it is more secure than everyone having the same password to share.

2) Choose a more generic wedding website URL

Stalkers can be clever, so make their life harder by choosing a non-obvious wedding website URL. Choose a more generic website URL rather than one that contains your names, venue name, or specific wedding date. Some great option are a URL that includes a loose description of the location (e.g., “Beach” or “Mountain”), your initials instead of full names, or your theme. For instance “beachlovebirds2015.glosite.com”  or “LmarriesM.glosite.com”

3) Keep your website out of online searches

It’s easy to find almost any type of information online these days, let’s not make it easy for those who aren’t on your guest list to see your wedding details. If privacy is key for you, it’s important to choose a wedding website provider that will allow you to prevent your website and all of its content from being searchable by Google, Bing and other online search engines. This will add an extra layer of protection on top of having your content behind a login and password.

4) Ask guests to be careful about social media and photos

Many of your guests will want to share their join and excitement online. If this makes your nervous, then don’t be shy about asking guests not to post information or photos on their various social media accounts. If you are crowdsourcing your photos, use a third party service that has build in password or privacy settings, such as  a service that requires viewers/participants to be approved, rather than a hashtag.

5) Ask your photographer to respect your privacy

Your wedding photographer will be a master of their craft and your photos will be beautiful, so it’s only natural that your photographer might want to show them off online. If this is not something you are comfortable with, be specific with your photographer about your wishes. Ask your photographer not to submit your wedding photos to blogs or publications – or to only share photos that do not feature your faces, guests’ faces or any identifying details you wouldn’t want the general public to know about.

Do you have other tips about how to maintain privacy on your wedding day? We’d love to hear your ideas in the comments!