Weddingbee boards

Receiving line?  Or no Receiving line?

I love the thought of greeting everyone for the congrats and hugs and all that - but it really does take up so much Precious time.  If we want post wedding photos, which I do, then we will miss alomost an hour of our reception.  We can possibly shorten the ceremony to make extra time, but isn't that the main event?  I also don't want to lose out of dancing?  What to do?  

I really don't like receiving lines.  You spend a lot of time waiting, especially if you're at the end of the line, and you might not really know some of the people you're waiting to talk to that well, so it can be awkward- for example, if you're a friend of the bride and get held up in front of the groom's mother.  Also, I feel pressured to say everything I want to say to the couple very quickly, and it doesn't feel very personal or special, and I feel like they JUST heard "Congratulations" and "You look beautiful" from everyone else, so it doesn't mean as much to say it again.

BUT, that's just my opinion, and I know that a lot of people love them.  My mom is appalled that we don't want one because it's one of her favorite parts of a wedding.  She doesn't mind waiting in line because she just chats with whoever else is waiting with her.  She also said that it was one of her favorite parts of her own wedding because she got to really see everyone who loves and supports her and didn't have to worry about not getting a moment with anyone, or rushing to talk to people who might leave early.

@abbie017:  Everything is in one place.  Only the Ceremony will be through a different door on the same level.  

@KatNYC2011:  We will have about 20 tables, 180-200 guests is the expected. I just worry about missing someone.  I hate when I have to chase down the bride and groom and interrupt a conversation so I can hug them and tell them all the mushy things we say after a wedding.  But I also dislike the time it takes to do a receiving line  

@hosannac:  I think that is a great alternative, I might ask our venue about it.  As is we plan to have the grandparents and Great Aunts and Uncles escorted to a seating area and the catering/venue ppl will move chairs.  I'm only renting 200 chair covers so the chairs need to be moved to tables.  It only takes a short time if the bottoms are off of them :-)  I'll ask about that though.

@MissBananaBread:  Ya, I hate that too.  But since we are hosting our wedding, its not necessary to have parents or wedding party a part of it.  We were only planning to do this.  

We are doing a receiving line into the ballroom but we aren't doing a cocktail hour. As people leave the ceremony we will have butler passed champagne handed to our guests waiting in line. It will be just us and with 100 people we are hoping it takes about 20 min, then later we will go around to some tables but won't feel bad if we don't get to everyone. 

We ate quickly and then visited the tables, you don't have to skip eating.

@reebee:  I just always hear how the bride doesn't get to eat anything.  I am spending so much time figuring out this menu I want to sit and enjoy it.  Plus, it is the food that we had our first few dates.  (Our official first date was in Europe)   I want to sit and enjoy or wait to eat it later - I don't want to rush.  But everyone is right it is more important to get around to everyone.  

Polite hostesses, say traditional good manners, greet their guests when they arrive, regardless of whether the event is formal or informal; and polite guests make a point of greeting their hostess as soon as they arrive. If you have eight to thirty guests, you can do this just by being in the room and noticing who arrives. If you have more guests then the most gracious way to fulfill your responsibility is to stand by the door and receive them as they arrive.

Polite guests know to move along through the line, but if they show a tendency to linger you can move them along by introducing them to the person next to you in line, who murmurs "How do you do" and in turn introduces them to the next person. At the end of the line you need a circulating flock of society mavens -- the Aunt Brigade is ideal, but if your college girlfriends are more plentiful than your aunts and are socially sophisticated, they can fill in. They pick up each person as they exit the line and introduce them into a conversation circle of other guests, stay to chat two or three sentences, and then circle back. The Aunt Brigade should also be on the watch to intervene with particularly loquacious guests who are slowing down the line, and discretely extract them with an "Oh, there is someone I so much want you to meet", and drag them out of the way of the line they are impeding.

Completing the receiving line doesn't relieve the polite hostess of all her obligations. She still must circulate through the room to actually receive all those congratulations, gushing hugs, and childhood reminiscences, and the Aunt Brigade (or Girlfriend Cadre) need to be on duty too, rescuing the bride from overbearing relatives and introducing wall-flower guests to one another. You do this during the cocktail hour and subsequently during the dancing, not during dinner unless it is a buffet or stand-up cocktail affair. Formal etiquette does not allow people to wander around during a seated dinner (not even to get drinks or to, er, wash your hands. Go before you sit down.) But during dancing, it's the hostess's duty once she has opened the floor, to introduce gentlemen to ladies who have no partner for the next dance, and to dance with as many of her gentlemen guests as possible.

Frankly, I have trouble understanding why so many brides want to bew hostess at their own wedding: they take on a great many duties that were handled with so many fewer conflicts back in the day when mothers hosted and brides were guests of honour. But the responsibilities come with the privileges of being hostess, and claiming the perqs without undertaking the duties would leave a bad taste in my mouth.

We are definetly having a receiving line.  FI and I are members of a very close knit church, so we are putting a notice in the bulleting inviting anyone who wants to come to the ceremony only.  So, the receving line is our only time to thank those people, who won't be invited to the reception.  We are also going to have our guest book there.

@aspasia475:  Thank you for your guidelines on ettiquite.  I fully understand the neccessity of greeting and spending time with our guests.  I really want to spend as much time with each of our guests as possible.  But I am still unsure if the Recieving line is the best use of that time. 

@Miss Ke Aloha: What other way have you thought of, to greet your guests as they arrive? 

Besides getting help from the Aunt Brigade to keep the line moving, you can also speed it up by minimizing the number of people receiving theguests. At a minimum it should be the hostess and the guests of honour (if any). So you could do it with just you and your new husband: that resolves most of the issues of the guests' who are waiting to be received not caring tobeet half the people in the line, and not knowing what to say to bridesmaids and groomsmen.

@aspasia475:  We would only have the two of us in a receiving line.  No need to have everyone else.  But we do have some photos to take after the ceremony also.  I don't want to feel rushed, I want to enjoy the people who have traveled to be here for our special day.  Our wedding and reception are in the same place so we do not have the travel time or extra time before cocktails and reception begin.  I still don't know what we will do. 

With that many people your receiving line could take up alot of time.  I would just go around the greet them table to table.  I've been to weddings where the bride and groom was able to eat and still go around the greet everyone at the table.

We will be lining up outside of the sanctuary at the church and greet people as they leave to go outside for our grand exit. I think its a way to make sure we get a few moments with each person

We'll do table visits, but also try to talk to many people during cocktails.  We're doing photos before, so that will cut down on time spent away from the reception.

Even my dad, the pastor, suggested NOT doing a receiving line :)

@doily:  If we were having a wedding in a church or a different location we would do the  same thing.  But it is in all one location.  It was supposed to make things easier but instead I feel like the timeline and organizing everyone at what time and location is so  much more difficult.   

We might still do a recieving line just the two of us, or maybe we will go with what someone suggested as to excuse people row by row.  At this point, I'm done with figuring this part out - I'm handing it over to someone else and decide later.  Trying to figure out the flow of people right now is just too much.