Wedding ~ Family Considerations
Again, we have to go back to the idea that the engaged couple want the wedding of their dreams, and yes, it is possible to get really, really close!
A wedding is more than the marriage of two people.
Those two people have ties to their families too, and in gathering these family members together to celebrate this important occasion, in a sense, the whole family assembly is being made a part of this marriage, kind of like the families are being united in marriage too.
Just as a quirky aside, I always found it odd that in English, unlike in some other languages and cultures, there is no word for the relationship between the parents of the bride and the parents of the groom. When referring to her, I call my daughter's mother-in-law "my daughter's mother-in-law", whereas my Ukrainian counterpart would simply refer to her as my "svaha".
Because of this wedding, all these family members will probably be called upon to join together at other future special occasions, too - baptisms, bar mitzvahs, graduations, birthdays, anniversaries... by golly, they might just want to get together socially on their own just because they happen to like each other!
...all because two people have decided to get married.
No Cleaver Family
Now, I'm sorry to rock your world, but in the decades that I have worked with families, I've discovered that there is no "Cleaver Family - the family in the old sitcom Leave It To Beaver". Each family is as individual as snowflakes and when you're planning the perfect wedding, this fact needs to be recognized and allowances need to be made - perhaps plans altered a little - to accommodate that fact.
Looking at our fictitious couple, Sarah and Mark, for example, we see that Sarah's parents have been somewhat amicably divorced since Sarah was a young child, and her mother having been remarried several years ago.
The marriage of Mark and Sarah is supposed to be joyous. Sarah wants her biological father to walk her down the aisle, but her mother and step-father are footing the bill for the wedding and they say that if they're paying for the wedding, the least Sarah can do is ask her step-father - who has been actively involved in raising Sarah - to walk her down the aisle.
Sarah has to consider her family situation. A solution is to ask both men to do the honours - one on each bridal arm - since they have both been involved in her life, or maybe to ask her mother to accompany her to the altar. Sarah and Mark may want to fly in the face of tradition altogether and walk down the aisle together to greet their families, arm in arm. There are so many creative solutions to problems that initially seem to be almost insurmountable.
Much more on family considerations while planning the perfect wedding, right here.
