A wedding day is a day of joyous occasion for the bride and the groom, but it’s also a day that you are surrounded by all of your loved ones to celebrate. They travel from all over, buy expensive plane tickets, a new outfit, a wedding gift, a hotel room, and take time out of their lives to stop and celebrate your love story. After all of this, they show up and are joyful and excited to be there, and even though people seem to forget, your guests should be celebrated too. After all, a lot of the people in attendance shaped your life and helped you on your journey to arrive on this blissful day. Here are a couple ways to ensure your guests are comfortable, happy, and feel appreciated for coming to your wedding.
Transportation
Wedding guests sometimes have to travel to be in attendance. Having a block of rooms is nice so they can all stay together, but if it is not close enough to your venue for them to walk having transportation is a good idea. This will help them have a safe way home, save them from renting a car, and also help them avoid the frustration of Google mapping a new city (we all know how that can go..”Turn left at the street you just passed.. rerouting..rerouting”).
There are some different options when renting transportation for wedding guests. First, depending on your budget, you can rent a trolley, which is great for pictures and can hold up to 30 guests. Another option is renting a school bus (throwing it back old school) for a much more reasonable price and it can hold about 40-50 guests. Either way your guests will be appreciative!
Around 8 hours should cover you time wise, round trip. You will need to schedule pick-up times that should be included with the invitation to your guests, be sent out via email, or included in your welcome bags (if you choose to have them). You will also need to have a slew of time slots throughout the night.. 9pm (the early birds).. 10pm (the “gotta get home for the babysitter” crowd, but I wish I could stay).. and lastly 11pm (the “where’s the after party?” crowd) so your guests can leave when they want.
Below are some local Kansas City transportation companies:
- Kansas City Transportation Company
- Showtime Transportation
- Horizon Limousine
- Frist Charter School Bus
Photo by Jonathan Canlas Photography
Food
Keep. Your. Guests. Fed. They’ve probably skipped lunch and squeezed into that new dress so as wonderful as it is that you’re taking pictures on the lawn after your ceremony, all they are thinking about is when/what’s for dinner (and I can’t blame them, I’ve been in their shoes). If you decide to take pictures after your ceremony and you have a cocktail hour, provide appetizers (not that I’m biased but FAF might have some of the best apps around – our homemade chips with ranch are out of this world!), or at minimum nuts or popcorn.
Dinner is also important. At Fresh Air Farm, you never have to worry if your guests will go home hungry, but if you decide to go with another venue make sure you choose something that everyone will like. Country-homemade is what we serve here at the farm, but we always have multiple options of sides/entrees to please everyone’s taste buds.
After dinner is over and your guests have celebrated with toasts and danced the night away (and didn’t leave you hanging on the dance floor) you should reward those loyal friends who stayed with you until the night’s end with a late night snack. Happy meals, personal pizzas, and s’mores are some of the creative things we’ve seen here (our awesome homemade chips work for this category too ;)). You can also check our upcoming blog post for ideas for late night wedding munchies.
Photo by Katie Day Photography
Photo by Katie Day Photography
Acknowledgement
Although you are filled with excitement and want to throw your arms around your new hubby and do the gangnam style dance, make sure that you make a huge effort to say “hello” and “thank you” to everyone who came to your wedding. You can do this by having a traditional greeting line, or what I prefer (so people don’t have to wait dreaming of what our homemade quesadillas taste like) is when the bride and groom go around to different tables or social circles to have a short genuine conversation telling each person how much it means to you that they came. After the dust has settled, you’ll be glad you missed the cha cha slide to visit with your great aunt Marge and your cousin Jerry who you haven’t seen in 2 years.
Photo by Jonathan Canlas Photography
Photo by Katie Day Photography
Photo by Turner Creative
Although this special day is the celebration of you and your fiancé don’t forget about the people who love you most.
These are just a few ways you can show your wedding guests that you care. For more ideas keep up with our blog, and check out our Pinterest/Facebook pages to see what our creative brides think up next!
