So - my wife and I (we're lesbian) have been married for 9 years, but we had a civil elopement with no family or friends present (we married civilly in another state pre-Obergefell decision, and could not afford a wedding at the time - our whole shindig was $200, including the cost of the marriage certificate).
We didn't have nice dresses - just cheap clearance workwear to get married in. We always intended to get around to a bigger shindig later. Our families still give us no end of crap for not actually having a 'wedding'.
Fast forward to now - we've changed religions (converted to Judaism) and my wife's father has dementia. We are now finally planning the wedding we didn't get to have due to circumstances and finances a decade ago and want to do it before her dad isn't lucid enough to participate. (And before someone nitpicks as I have seen in other threads, this shindig will involve signing a religious marriage contract (Ketubah) and the other mandatory religious ceremonial components of a Jewish wedding (modified because we are same-sex - a reform cantor will be officiating), so yes, it *is* actually a wedding, not just a vow renewal).
We did not have any of the pre-wedding components of a wedding the first time around either - no bachelorette party, no bridal shower, etc before our civil wedding. I plan to do a welcome brunch for out of town family or some sort of sip and paint do before the ceremony next year but that is about it. (I generally dislike being the centre of attention, and it seems odd to do those other pre-wedding things when I've been civilly married for almost a decade).
I also keep seeing that I shouldn't purchase a wedding gown on ettiquette sites but seeing as that I got married in a $20 clearance workwear dress from Ross Dress for Less that doubled as an interview outfit after the fact - I kinda feel like I'm entitled (and so is my wife) to wear whatever the hell we want (also, I'm her second marriage and she's never gotten to wear a wedding gown for either of her weddings). Kinda want to see other's thoughts on that topic. Since we're having the religious do (at a synagogue, no less) would it be weird to wear actual wedding dresses?
We are not asking for gifts (don't need them but if someone wants to give us cards, well wishes, or money I won't say no). This is planned to be a decent sized do, with about 120 people. We're planning to do most of the normal wedding stuff at the reception (though there will be no garter toss and no bouquet toss because I really find that stuff kinda tacky. We will have a first dance and a father-daughter dance for my wife (my bio dad is not invited and I feel awkward about dancing with my mum for that), and a thing with families with kids since we have a now adult daughter. Also we are planning the normal Jewish reception stuff, like the hora. (We're also skipping some things like the bedeken. I won't be wearing a long ass veil anyway due to having *very* short hair - I found a wire headpiece on Poshmark that looks kinda kippah-esque and will have that on instead).
But yeah - is anyone else here doing 'I Do - Take Two' for religious/cultural, or vow renewal reasons? Curious about other's thoughts on this. I can't be the only one planning on doing the religious wedding after the civil one. (FWIW - This seems to be a thing that is less common in the US where I live now - I grew up in Europe (I'm from Germany) where this is normalized because many countries have a requirement for couples to civilly marry and then have a religious ceremony separately if they choose to). We've gotten some weird comments when discussing planning with friends though so I'm just kinda at a loss I guess. Seems like Americans may have some odd cultural hangups about this sort of thing? Let me know what you think.
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