Ok. I've been thinking about writing this post for a long time, but was waiting for the right moment to do it. And this feels like the right moment, whhheeee!
I'm starting to get busy figuring out what the next steps for APW. Some of those steps are things like wresting my soul back from bl-gger,* after the Rather Unfortunate Incident. Other steps are things like maybe getting some of APW on real live paper (I so prefer reading things in paper. Sometimes I rub the Sunday New York Times on my face and then lick it), and figuring out how to expand this conversation that we are ostensibly having about weddings into other things. That last step might be a little harder to take, but we live to dream.
So. I was hoping you all might be willing to answer two questions for me in the comments, since I often find that with your outside-my-head view, you see the big picture of what's going on around here a little better than me.
Questions for your consideration:
- Why do you read this blog?
- If you had to sum up this blog in one sentence, what would that sentence be?
I could do this over some closed-form survey, and I probably will throw a survey or two at you over the coming months. But I think this will benefit from your magnificent group brain. I'm really interested in hearing from loyal lurkers (yes, you can stay totally anonymous) because I find that you guys often read the site for surprising and thrilling reasons. Also, if you are NOT planning a wedding, could you especially answer these questions? Pretty please? And all you loyal lovely commenters must answer, of course of course of course (smootch).
So really all I can say is please, please, please. It's a big favor to me, but if it were possible for me to love you from the bottom of my little heart a little more, I would after you do this favor. But it probably isn't possible. So there is that.
*edited out in case they are WATCHING ME. They are so on notice.
Categories: Uncategorized
Answers:
1) Because it is the only space I have found which manages to join together the doing-making-planning and the incredible emotional heart of having a wedding and then being married and in doing so makes the entirety both simpler and greater than the sum of those two parts…
2) Sanity in blog form
Sarah
December 10, 2009 3:03 am
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1) You talk about important things in weddings and marriage.
2) A Practical Wedding is a wedding blog you can go to, not just as an amazing wedding planning resource (which it is), but for a sigh of relief with the rest of the wedding industry is driving you nuts.
December 10, 2009 3:46 am
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1. i read this blog for perspective, for someone to say the things i feel but can't put into words myself. For something to take to heart and use for life, not just weddings.
2. This blog is a place for real women, real people, who have real conversations about things that matter, over and above matching, personalised wedding favours.
December 10, 2009 3:55 am
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1)because I got hooked when I was planning my wedding and now I can't/won't stop reading. (by the way you are the only wedding blog still in my feed…all the others have gone!) Also I like the fact you talk about more than the fluffy stuff in a sensible and normal way.
2)smart women talking about smart stuff disguised as wedding talk.
December 10, 2009 3:58 am
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Because I will go live with my love next month, and while I'm in no hurry to get married, it's nice to jot down ideas & solutions and read about different point of views on the matter. I even sent my boyfriend a few posts of yours.
(ps: you also write very good and sensible posts. you are in my daily readings via feed :-)
December 10, 2009 4:00 am
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1. Because you are an intelligent, thought-provoking woman who expresses themselves incredibly well, who I happened to find because you were blogging about your wedding. But really you are blogging about your life, and I will read your blog no matter what you blog about, because you say stuff that make me email your posts to people saying "Yeh, what she said".
2. An awesome blog by an awesome person that just happens to be mostly about weddings and what it means to be married, but in an awesome way.
December 10, 2009 4:01 am
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1.) Because you are somehow both the anti-WIC and anti-Blog and anti-anti-Bride, which in the real world, I think we just call "sane". Because you encourage us to be ourselves and there is no right or wrong way to do this wedding thing. (Especially because most of us know there is no right or wrong way to live our lives, the fact that sometimes we get so wrapped up in the "right" way to have a wedding is ridiculous.)
2.) It's a wedding blog that just makes SENSE.
December 10, 2009 4:14 am
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Loyal lurker here…
Your blog is the only one which doesn't make my chest tight about everyone else's amazing weddings and how mine is not going to measure up. It is almost painstakingly non-judgemental (reading sites like the Knot or even esb give me heartburn sometimes). You also talk about marriage, which most other blogs seem to ignore behind a blizzard of either WIC or alterna-WIC details.
I enjoyed your posts before you got married, but I must admit I'm enjoying them even more since you got married. To echo the commenters above, there are important life issues being discussed here that are not addressed on other wedding blogs which are more focused on "the details". I appreciate your thoughts and posts on these issues. In fact next week (after my fiancee has recovered from the nightmare end of the school term) I am going to show him your post about things you discussed with your husband and rabbi before marriage and how valuable you both found it. (I suggested "pre-marital counselling" once before and he recoiled.) If you hadn't written that post I would have nothing to guide the discussion that I am hoping to have (in the absence of getting him to come with me to counselling).
December 10, 2009 4:15 am
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1) I found this at the very end of my wedding planning and have continued to follow it because of the marriage related posts and still enjoy reading about weddings.
2) A wedding blog that chooses to emphasize the importance of the MARRIAGE that is taking place while still acknowledging that the wedding is a special day that requires a lot of thought.
December 10, 2009 4:31 am
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I started coming here while I was planning my wedding to help me stay sane and to read about other women who wanted to plan a wedding without losing themselves or their partner to expectations, whatever those might gave been for them. It was a place where I could find my thoughts written out loud. A place I could say, exactly! That is it exactly. It is still that place for me as I figure out what the words wife and marriage mean to me. I love the variety of opinions and the variety of methods used to accomplish the goals of getting married and having a marriage.
I would describe this site as a place to come to discuss the role of weddings and marriage in our society.
December 10, 2009 4:33 am
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I have never commented before, but am a faithful RSS reader :) Here goes…
1. I read this blog namely because I am engaged (but I started before it was official, shh!) and it is refreshing to step back from the chivari chairs and STDs and things to remember what it's all really for. We're planning a long engagement, so getting caught up in the details doesn't make any sense at all, but hearing advice and getting good things to think about concerning weddings and life afterwards is fantastic to me. This is the best wedding "porn" on my reader, and believe me I have a lot of it :)
2. Breath of fresh air
December 10, 2009 4:41 am
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I have totally put the cart before the horse….BUT. I'm not engaged yet, but I'm highly confident that I'm getting engaged in the near future and I've started a Google Wave about it (hilarious). Anyway, I've been amassing as much information as possible (dresses, flowers, advice, etc). I keep getting more and more links in my "words of wisdom" section from you. I've read your "Promise" post several times; I just discovered your premarital counseling post; I love your wife-word posts. I don't even always agree with you, but I feel like I'm having a good conversation with a friend about this stuff. As someone else said, it really is a breath of fresh air. I like reading about millinery netting and crinoline as much as the next almost-engaged-and-thus-married girl, but I love reading your posts. They make me think…weird for a wedding blog!
December 10, 2009 4:52 am
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Its the only wedding blog that doesn't make me feel inferior :)
December 10, 2009 5:15 am
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Hi, I've been lurking for a while and never commented yet, but felt I should now. I started reading because I was trying to plan a wedding that followed what we wanted and not what everyone 'expected' and was taking a lot of flak for that. Plus, I found it really difficult to find ideas/discussion about how to do your own thing, without it being all about being 'different' for the sake of being different, if that makes sense? We got married 6 weeks ago and it was the best day of our lives and the overwhelming response from our guests was 'that could only have been your wedding – it was so you – we get it now' which is just what we were aiming for. Now we are married, I still come back here (and again, it's the only 'wedding' blog I'm still reading) because like most other people here, despite the fact that our wedding planning took so much time and effort for the last year, it always truly was more about the marriage, than the wedding, and now I enjoy pondering what it means to be married and a wife. In short, it feels like you are going through the same stuff as me and it's nice to hear (read) someone else talk about the things I'm already thinking about. So thanks very much – keep it up :-)
December 10, 2009 5:26 am
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I started reading because I was planning my wedding. My wedding was 2 weeks ago and I deleted all the other wedding blogs from my reader, but not yours because nowadays you've started having really interesting conversations about marriage and what it means (and how a conversation about marriage != a conversation about parenting, which THANK YOU).
December 10, 2009 5:40 am
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1)Because I'm planning a wedding and APW is the place that not only inspires me and makes me think about what is important to me in both a wedding day and a lifetime of marriage, but also because it is the one place that tells me on a regular basis "whatever works for you is fine" and "you don't need to have/do X to have 'real' wedding" (and trust me, I need to hear that! Regularly).
2) A place to hear and discuss weddings, relationships, marriage, being an adult, goals, and life in general with sanity.
December 10, 2009 5:47 am
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1) this is one of the few blogs that tell the "real" story behind weddings and wedding planning. You keep this bride-to-be sane and you make me realize that it's okay to be myself and not try to live up to anyone's expectations.
2) APW is an amazing wedding blog that allows brides-to-be to get great advice on not only marriage, but life itself.
December 10, 2009 5:51 am
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1) I love that each time I look you're talking about something different that I never would have addressed (even though often I'd have thought about it). Plus you have such an easy writing voice. It's wedding talk, but not as we know it :)
2) Thoughtful and fresh insights on all the stuff that really matters with weddings and marriage which people often forget.
December 10, 2009 5:56 am
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I read because what you write is real — I'm no longer planning a wedding — and haven't been for over a year — but yours is the only wedding blog i continue to read – because you're not about *weddings* (even though you are, sometimes) – you're more about *life* and living one that is true to who we practical brides are – and a couple's wedding is *one* expression of living that true life – marriage is another – and i believe you've transitioned beautifully into discussing marital issues *as well as* weddings. so, to break it down: you're real, you're honest, you bring up really interesting and though provoking content, and you're sassy. i like that. it's entertaining, and i feel like we're friends even though we've never met!
(2) a lovely respite that encourages self reflection and joy-seeking in wedding planning, wedding doing, marriage, and *life*
xoxo
December 10, 2009 5:59 am
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1) I read because when I began wedding planning I started drowning myself in blogs and APW seemed to be different from all the rest. I still look at other blogs, for pretty inspiration pictures mostly, but APW always reminds me about the junk that doesn't matter. This junk ranges from my bridesmaid who wants to wear crocs to affirming that it's okay if I don't care about my non-coordinated paper products. And to think about the marriage, the life-time relationship, itself and not just the wedding DAY.
2)A place for a weary blogged-down bride to catch her breath and clear her head.
December 10, 2009 6:00 am
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1) I am a 53 year old bride-to-be. Yours is one of the few blogs I can count on to really give practical wedding and marriage advise.
There is no way I am going to start this phase of my life out in huge debt for a one-day event. We are totally in love and we deserve a beautiful wedding to celebrate the significance of this union.
However, we do not need to shovel tons of money out for "stuff" that someone else has decided is important to a wedding.
Your blog is a breath of very refreshing air in a wedding world gone mad with details!
2) One sentence summary: A Practical Wedding is a smart blog for those interested in the true important matters surrounding weddings, marriage and life in general!
December 10, 2009 6:02 am
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1. I read APW because I hate weddings. There, I said it. I thought I hated weddings until I was in the position to plan my own to my loving and devoted partner of 10 years. What I hated was all the "have to" things. You have to wear a veil, you have to have a maid of honor, you have to have special matchbooks. After more than a month of insanity, I stumbled upon Meg and APW – and cried. You mean, I don't have to do any of that stuff? You mean, my wedding can really be about our marriage? You mean, we can have a great party that celebrates our excellent past and better future? And you mean I don't have to do anything I don't want to?! GENIUS!
I love marriages and I love my soon-to-be husband, but I'm learning to love weddings- of all kinds.
2. APW is about focusing on the end result of a wedding – a meaningful day and a start of a healthy marriage.
thanks meg!! Karen
December 10, 2009 6:03 am
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dear meg,
i got married last year. {seems like forever ago!}. i was realistic with my budget and didn't go overboard. i'd like to say that i had the common Midwest wedding {ceremony = church and reception = reception hall/hotel ballroom}. i still have a wedding blog and i even do a little calligraphy on the side for brides & their wedding invitations…so i like to think that i'm still in the loop/in the know w/ the wedding industry. you know what's been pissing me off lately? i see a BEAUTIFUL wedding featured on one of those "big time" wedding blogs and i ooohhh and ahhh all the way thru the post…til i get to the bottom. then i see that her dress was from vera, shoes from jimmy choo, that she had a super expensivo wedding planner and her wedding flowers cost more than my honeymoon did. and, to cap it off, it was a destination wedding in bora bora or something. i mean seriously…its gotten to the point where i feel like my wedding wasn't good enough. i didnt spend spend spend and i absolutely didn't do enough DIY projects {that would have taken $$$$$ and too much time}. And you know, this blog is one of the FEW out there that let brides know that ITS OK to have a morning followed by a light lunch rececption. It's ok to have your wedding in a park and not hire a string orchestra and a limo driver. More brides to be need to hear these practical words. Otherwise, its too easy to feel like you have to spend a lot of $ and have the prettiest wedding just like all the couples featured on the blogs. Its just not about the day…its about the act of committment. love you, love your blog. i'll now go back to lurking :)
December 10, 2009 6:10 am
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I was married in October and this is the ONLY wedding blog I continue to follow. Why? Because the way you (Meg and Team Practical) approach and talk about weddings transcends the wedding material hysteria (photo booths! favors! matching stationery and monograms and bridesmaids and..and..!!) and truly gets to the heart of why we put ourselves through this sometimes trying process: love, partnership, faith, soul, commitment and hope for the future.
December 10, 2009 6:11 am
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As of August 1st I was no longer planning a wedding. I was now a wife, but I still come here, every. single. day. So to answer your questions:
1. I read this blog because I love your "voice". You're passionate about your thoughts & what you have to say, you're articulate, you're real, & you help to keep us grounded. I tend to think you have a great sense of humor too. You also ask great questions.
Most wedding blogs tend to stop seeing us as people, (specifically intelligent women) and just see us as "brides". A lot of times other sites important wedding questions consist of "what are YOU putting in your OOT bags??". Its bullsh*t.
I also love when you feature real weddings. While over blogs point out the pretty favors, you point out the blissed-out B&G; having the time of their lives. LOVE.
2. APW is a refreshing dose of sanity in an insane world of wedding planning.
December 10, 2009 6:13 am
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Well, I'm not planning a wedding – not yet, at least. My boyfriend and I know that's where we're headed. I'm excited to get married to him and have a wedding but we're just not there yet.
I read this blog because it makes me feel so lucky to have a guy to whom I want to be married. We will have a practical wedding and all this inspiration is like a big warm hug. This site reminds me that a wedding is just that – a wonderful day. It's not something to make ourselves sick over, nor should it send us to the poor house. I love reading your blog and getting a peak into the myriad ways people have chosen to express themselves and their love on their wedding day.
More than anything, however, I love the way you write about marriage. It's honest and so refreshing.
Sum up this blog? If you are planning a wedding, this is the place to go if you care more about love than perfection.
December 10, 2009 6:14 am
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1) I read APW every.single.day because, well, I'm planning a wedding. I'm also trying to plan a sane wedding–I love the fact that I can come here and get a daily dose of REALITY. My view on weddings has changed soooo much since I started reading this over a year ago. Let's face it: I'm a perfectionist, and I love details. Since reading this and thinking about our own wedding, (Yes. OUR wedding. Not just MINE), I've come to realize that while we want to have a kick-ass party, we also want to BE MARRIED. That's really it.
2)APW has given me hope that deep, meaningful conversations CAN BE HAD about weddings. And it doesn't talk down to me or make me feel bad for making certain decisions about our wedding. PARTICULARLY the money aspect of the whole thing…thank you.
December 10, 2009 6:14 am
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1) This is the first site I check in the morning and the last one I check at night. Why? I don't have a sister, but if I did, I like to think she would sound just like APW. This is exactly the kind of I've-been-there-too-you'll-live-through-it conversations I need to hear to balance out the crazy, and not just relating to the wedding crazy, but the life crazy.
I love that each graduate makes me cry a little and not because I'm overwhelmed with details and the sort of crap that makes every wedding look the same, but because their words are so true and the photos so achingly wonderful that I actually can't wait until it's my turn. Everything here just reaffirms my belief that in the end, it's about the relationships and the marriage.
2) An antidote for the crazy, frustrating, overwhelming expectations that come with relationships, engagements, weddings, marriage and, well, life.
December 10, 2009 6:24 am
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1. I am neither engaged nor planning a wedding, but in the early stages of sorting out how *I* feel about the whole thing. This involves not only a personalized, feminist, sane, practical wedding, but the same adjectives about a marriage and life together. I think you accomplish that by being open about the issues.
2. Awesome feminist blog. (I feel like feminist=equalist who isn't afraid of being themselves, no matter what that means).
December 10, 2009 6:24 am
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I read APW because you talk about what is most about a wedding/marriage. You don't try to convince us that if we don't pick THE BEST bakery for our cake (or have a pie display made from grandmother's recipes)that our wedding will be ruined. You don't try to convince us that we have to have a DIY photobooth, four piece string quartet, fake mustaches, or a 20 person bridal party. You remind us that it's ok for our weddings to be ours and no one elses.
December 10, 2009 6:28 am
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I read APW before I was engaged and now that I am engaged I'm obsessed. Because 1) weddings are the beginning of marriages and only APW seems to recognize that 2) in the current economy, being currently unemployed and marrying a teacher it's nice to have somewhere that would agree that 'to have and to hold' is as important as place cards and favours (seriously, fuck favours, no one is getting favours) and 3) I LOVE the wedding graduates and real weddings. Not just thin, beautiful maniacs with insanely expensive photographers and unbelievable mountain top weddings (although those are awesome) but also random people who got married in a church hall or a state park and wore a dress they stole from their mother or got for a hundred bucks. I like seeing that their weddings were beautiful and all those smiling lovely faces. I like being reminded that even though there will be no favours and my little sister might end up taking all the pictures that we will be married and there will be love and that the wedding can be beautiful.
So there.
December 10, 2009 6:31 am
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1. My wedding day is March 5, 2010. I began reading as wedding research (pretty dresses! lovely cakes!) and now that everything is decided, I've stayed. So when I freak out and start believing what I hear from people who don't understand my wedding, I can come right back to the center.
2. A forum for discussing wedding theory and ways weddings can become more meaningful in our materialistic culture.
December 10, 2009 6:33 am
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i started reading wedding blogs b/c my sister in law is getting married this coming june. i wanted to help her come up with ideas. but all the "pretty/styled" blogs were giving "inspiration" overload, so I stopped reading them. yours is the only one i still follow. it is b/c you write well and i enjoy your personality. and the weddings you showcase make me smile.
your elevator question is too much for my tired little brain right now–but keep at it!
December 10, 2009 6:33 am
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1) I read this blog because it reminds me that to go with my gut on our wedding. I'm the kind of person that does not care about details, and here that is ok.
2)This blog is about weddings and their reflection of and relation to life.
December 10, 2009 6:36 am
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I am a loyal lurker, I suppose. Though I'm making a more conscious effort to comment and join communities that I appreciate… so here goes.
1. We are planning our wedding for next June, and I started reading wedding blogs almost immediately after our engagement. Now that we have our important factors decided, (you can read about some of it–I'm a slow blogger–at http://justoneveryspecialday.blogspot.com)
I've stopped regularly visiting other wedding blogs (it makes me feel uneasy to see a ton of wedding porn), but yours remains. I am not a detail oriented girl, and I don't enjoy thinking of ways to do my own centerpieces. So I think we'll throw some daisies in some Mason jars the day of, and call it good. Your blog tells me that it's okay to do that, but it also tells me that it's okay if I do care about centerpieces. What ISN'T okay (and I think this is the best thing about your blog) is to prioritize the wedding over the marriage to the point that I'm willing to argue with my dear fiance about centerpieces.
2. I would sum up APW as a wonderful conversation about weddings, marriages, women, etc… facilitated by your honest and thoughtful posts.
Thanks, Meg!
December 10, 2009 6:38 am
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I'm not engaged or planning a wedding so…
1a. I first came here as a bridesmaid, looking at the flowers-invitations-omg-pretty blogs and drifting through the wedding part of the internets.
1b. They're all out of my reader now except you, Peonies and Cate Subrosa. I think the reason I've stayed is mainly because your posts are interesting (especially to a social anthropology student who's been to 4 wedding this year), and you're interesting. The blogs I keep reading – in any genre – are the ones where I feel interested in the author like a friend. I have quite a few Internet bffs who don't know me from a bar of soap, and you and Peonies and Cate are 3 of them :P
1c. My partner is all 'no we need to finish uni & work and stuff and there's no rush and leave me alone I need to work on my thesis', but I want to be moving forward with him more as partners than the boyfriend and girlfriend thing. This seems to be closely related to the conversations you're having here about marriage – how to be two people together and also yourselves.
complicated…
2. um… it's a blog about marriage and weddings, trying not just to talk about weddings but also /how/ we talk about weddings and think about weddings, as real, normal, mostly-sane people, not just as The Bride but in the context of our whole lives.
PS – I think this blog has probably had a huge difference for how I'll eventually do my own wedding – and it'll match my lifestyle and core beliefs much more closely (I'm just talking about the wedding that's in my head, because I don't know what my partner's thoughts on my ideas are yet – see semi-rant in part 1c).
PPS – sorry for the essay – I'm writing a thesis atm :P
December 10, 2009 6:43 am
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1) I am NOT planning a wedding, though I am on the *brink* of getting engaged. I think I found this site as I was wistfully trolling the internet daydreaming about a fun-picnic-family-reunion wedding, and SO excited to announce to my family/friends that T and I are in this for the long haul. Anyway, I started with The Knot, puked, and somewhere in wedding-blog-land, ended up on your page. Your blog, and a few of the ones you link to, are the only wedding things I read now. I love to think about my future wedding, but even more so, I love to think about my future marriage. You and I think the same, so you're like the cool big sister I can learn from (and if I de-lurk more, talk to)
2) A Practical Wedding is a place where smart women can talk about weddings, marriage, and how it all fits in to who we are as individuals.
December 10, 2009 6:47 am
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I read this blog everyday for perspective. I also read because of all of the amazing women that are featured, and the wisdom that they share. I also just really enjoy your (Meg's) voice and the way you speak about things. I started a wedding blog to help myself through the planning process, but recently decided to end it because a) it was becoming more of a hassle than a help and more importantly, b) I felt like my voice was not coming across in it. (I felt like I was sounding like I only cared about bridesmaid dresses, flowers, and shoes and that is far from the case.) I anonymously stalked APW for a while, posted under my blog name for a hot minute, and now I'm probably going to become a loyal commenter as, well, me.
December 10, 2009 6:50 am
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Whoops! I forgot Dana at Broke-Ass Bride – sorry Dana, you're cool too! (And it was actually open in the other tab when I was writing my comment too!)
December 10, 2009 6:50 am
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oops, still had my old blog name as my username. Changed it.
Also, Meg, you might want to go to wordle.com and use all of the user comments here and make a word cloud. Sounds silly, but the words that are used the most often in the comments will really stand out and possibly help you craft a sentence or two that describes APW. (I'm guessing: perspective, marriage, wedding, sanity, women, real, intelligent, honest,)
December 10, 2009 6:57 am
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1-you talk about weddings in the context of actual life. not as this grandiose end-all, be-all event.
2-you discuss weddings as the means to being married. the marriage is the goal. the wedding and reception are an acknowledgment of reaching that goal.
3-it's incredibly refreshing
December 10, 2009 7:02 am
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When I came across APW, I was in the middle of wedding planning hell. I was surrounded by bridal magazines and The Knot-like websites and people asking me all kinds of questions about all kinds of details. Then, on a slow day at work, I came across this blog and it was like I could breathe again. Finally, someone was saying that if I didn't care about it, it didn't matter. It sounds so simple but you have no idea how dramatically it changed my thinking. I read because you saved me from insanity, I read because you remind me that its ok that our table cloths are borrowed from our church and our centerpieces are grocery store flowers in mason jars that came from my mother-in-law's basement, I read when someone looks at me like I'm crazy because my fiance is planning with me, I read when I have a stress-induced freak-out about what still needs to be done, but mostly I read because this "wedding" blog is not about the wedding, its about the people behind the "bride" and "groom" labels, its about their commitment and love for each other, its about their lives together (before and after the wedding), and its about the friends and family that support them. Our wedding is in about a month but I will definitely not stop reading APW, because the wedding is the beginning, not the end.
Sorry this is so long. : )
December 10, 2009 7:08 am
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1. I read this blog because it's sane — even more so than many of the other blogs that claim to be sane. I also read it because it in no way makes me feel inferior for the wedding that we chose to have; in fact, it makes me proud of my wedding. You somehow manage to balance sanity with wedding planning (and now marriage), and it's quite lovely.
This is also the only wedding blog I continue to read because you moved on to real life conversations and not about decorating.
2. A real conversation about weddings and marriage.
P.S. I hate calling APW a wedding blog because it just has never felt that way to me.
December 10, 2009 7:08 am
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1. Because this is one of, if not the only, place where I feel like I am reading about what the wedding is really about rather than all the stupid crap that we obsess over. And it makes me feel empowered to tell the people who give me their overbearing opinions about my choices that I'm glad that's what they like, but we chose something else because what they like wasn't as important to us and our day. (AND THANK YOU FOR THAT, because that empowerment has been what has gotten me through the first half of our engagment)
2. The only advice you really need when planning a wedding.
December 10, 2009 7:09 am
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1. This blog mixes wonderful advice for planning a wedding along with all the things that no one ever talks about – aka how to live, love, and what it means to BE married. Your style seems to match that of what I am aiming for – somewhere between the WIC and totally indie, alternative wedding. You tend to find a good middle ground between reality and fantasy. Fantasy weddings aren't bad…just not always practical! So I like the conversation about finding the balance. What is being true to myself and what is listening to the WIC?
2. A conversation about weddings and marriage that gets down to the nitty gritty of what being married means and how to have a wedding that won't make us crazy (or broke).
December 10, 2009 7:11 am
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Lurker here! I am a loyal, every day reader and I love your blog so much. Here's why:
1)I'm not technically engaged yet, but we've been living together for over 2 years and have had many a conversation about getting married. I'm not one of those girls who has been dreaming of her wedding since she was 5, and I started looking around the internets so that when engaged day arrives, I'm not totally clueless about what goes into a wedding. Most of what I found was a bit disturbing. Yours is the only realistic, sensible, and sharp-witted wedding blog I've read where I didn't start feeling nervous about all the stuff I'd have to do some day. Even the self-proclaimed "anti-bride" stuff is still telling you that you must have coordinated antique silverware or some sh-t like that. I want to have a lovely wedding someday, but I cant' stand all the nonsense items and fees the WIC tacks onto your day just b/c it's a "wedding". Things like the very notion of a cake cutting fee, or my salon charging me more than they would to style my hair on any other day of my life, make me engraged! For real, WTF IS THAT? But because I will, of course, eventually have to deal with these things, I read your blog. It's a little island of sanity in a concept gone insane! Plus you link great, affordable, and pretty "wedding elves" and I love seeing what you choose. And your posts are funny and make me laugh. And most importantly, you encourage open dialogue on real issues and often mirror the thoughts in my feminist brain (your list of things to discuss at pre-wedding counseling? THANK YOU). In short, you rock, and keep it up!
2) APW is a both a wedding resource and a life resource, a feminist blog that acknowledges the importance of your wedding day and the beauty of your bond to your partner, and gives you smart suggestions on how to deal with the challenges you might encounter along the way.
December 10, 2009 7:11 am
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1) I read APW because it is normal, practical, sane and about being a strong woman, strong wife, and contributor to a strong marriage. I'm getting married next October and had my dream of the big white puffy wedding for the longest time. Until my fiance proposed at Fallingwater and suggested we use Frank Lloyd Wright houses for our table numbers. Silly as that sounds, it spun me on my ass because FLW is about simplicity, beautiful lines and NOT big white puffiness. Our wedding should be an appreciation of architecutre that lasts a lifetime, just like our love. So I went on a search for simplicity and found APW. It's the only wedding blog I read. It keeps me sane and grounded and reminds me that I'm more excited to be Matt's wife than his bride.
2) A blog that will ground you in reality and inspire you to do great things.
December 10, 2009 7:12 am
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1. I read this blog because I don't care much about weddings (though I'm having one in a few months) but I really, really care about marriage. Your posts and the intelligent women in your community have given me the courage to really think about marriage and start conversations with my partner that I otherwise wouldn't have. It's also a great relief to know that there are other feminists out there (yes I said it) who struggle with what it means to be a wife, to have a career, to start a family, etc.
2) This is a blog about modern relationships seen through the lens of weddings.
December 10, 2009 7:14 am
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I started reading this blog because my best friend was getting married. I was on the prowl for some great ideas. But eventually I found that this space was a place to find calming bits to share. I found it actually calmed me in the wedding planning process as well. And now that she's married… I just can't stop.
APW is a sigh of relief and clarity in weddingblogland.
December 10, 2009 7:18 am
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I read the blog because it's refreshing to see other people who value the marriage more than The Big Day. Two years later, and that doesn't get old.
APW is a great blog about planning a wedding to start a marriage, not the type of wedding that leaves you in debt, crying in a big heap of tulle over table confetti and mismatched flowers.
December 10, 2009 7:19 am
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