never give up

You've found the person you love, picked a wedding venue, and selected a date. Now it's time to invite guests to your wedding! Sending out wedding invitations brings up all sorts of questions, from who to invite to when and how, so we've asked our experts to answer some of the most common wedding invitation questions to help make the process a little easier.

Who Gets a Plus One?

While tradition states that only those who are married or engaged should always be invited with a plus-one, common practice has gotten a little more modern, with the ring requirement being replaced with a "serious relationship" requirement. So if your college roommate is in a longterm relationship or lives with her significant other, you really should invite them as a couple. Did your cousin just start dating someone new? In that case, it's your call — and no one will hold it against you if you invite her solo. The exception: You should invite your immediate family members and your wedding party with their significant other or a generic "and guest", no matter what their relationship status is.

When Should We Send Our Save the Dates and Invitations?

When it comes to your invitations, timing is everything. Traditionally, save the dates are mailed four months in advance, with invitations going out around eight weeks before the wedding date. If you're having a destination wedding, add a little time on the front end: Send save the dates up to six months in advance, and invitations 12 weeks before the event. This will give your guests plenty of time to arrange their schedules and shop around for great flight deals.

How Long Should We Give Our Guests to RSVP?

The general rule of thumb is to set your RSVP date for four weeks after you mail the invitations, giving them time to receive the invite and send back their response. The timing can change depending on the type of wedding you're having. For a local wedding, with very few guests coming in from out-of-town, set your RSVP date for two weeks before your wedding date, allowing up to six weeks to RSVP. For a destination wedding, request your RSVPs back seven weeks before the date which, if you mail your invitations 12 weeks in advance, gives guests five weeks to finalize their plans. This will also give you a little extra time to track down people you haven't heard from to ensure everyone is accounted for.

Should We Invite Guests We Know Can't Come?

Once you've gone through the trouble of setting a wedding date, it can be a bummer to find out a friend or family member can't make it. Traditional etiquette suggests skipping their invitation. After all, a single invitation can still be expensive, and it could be interpreted as soliciting gifts. However, if it's a guest you know will appreciate the gesture and will like having your invitation as a memento, you should still formally invite them to be there with you to celebrate. Chances are they'll be thrilled to hear the details and will want to send you a gift, and that link to your wedding website will make finding your registry that much easier.

Can We Send Digital Invitations?

Online invitations are affordable, easy, and come in gorgeous designs that rival their printed counterparts. However, when it comes to your wedding day, you really should skip the e-vite in favor of a paper invitation sent by mail. But for your wedding-related events (engagement party, bridal shower, rehearsal dinner, etc.), a digital invitation is a great alternative. These parties usually have a smaller guest list, and ordering a dozen or so invitations can be really expensive. Choose a design that still fits in your invitation suite and take advantage of the built-in RSVP function.

With hundreds of thousands of Syrian men killed in warfare, and an uncertain number fleeing conscription and economic hardship, Syrian women are maintaining cultural traditions in the ways that they still can.

The Wall Street Journal interviewed a number of women who have recently hosted a wedding celebration without a groom by their side. According to the anecdotal evidence gathered from wedding industry workers in Syria, it has in fact become very unusual for the husband to be in the country for the ceremony. College student Lava Ibrahim told them, “I remember going to a wedding where the groom was actually there, and I just sat and stared at him. It was so weird.”

During the first few years of the Syrian war, families held off on wedding ceremonies, but now they see continuing with celebrations as an affirmation for the future. It still makes for a difficult evening:

In March, Sandi’s parents and future in-laws threw an elaborate engagement party that resembled a wedding in every way except that her dress was pink and her fiancé was in Turkey.

“It was a difficult situation, and I wasn’t very happy. Even though everything was perfect, something was still missing,” she said. She said her in-laws were eager for the party so they could celebrate on behalf of their son...

“In a war, everything you are living is against your will,” said Oula, a resident of the capital Damascus who works in a company that makes and sells handicrafts and counts three male employees out of 83. “So when they have an opportunity to be happy, they aren’t going to relinquish that. It is in defiance of their circumstances.”

The wedding traditions are very similar to what the women would experience if their husband were by their side, except for the cake—which are usually made to be so enormous that they can only be cut with a ceremonial sword, a task that falls to the groom.

Many of these brides will go to meet their husbands once they have established themselves in a new country. One bride, Siwar, went on to meet her husband in the Netherlands, where they will retake their wedding photo to replace a previously Photoshopped version.

A latest study has suggested that a wedding band could be an effective treatment against cancer as married individuals have reportedly witnessed better life expectancy after cancer diagnosis.

Study researchers found that married people apparently have a marked survival benefit. They found that male cancer patients who are single had a death rate 27% higher in comparison to that for married male patients. In the case of women, the death rate for single female patients was 19% more in comparison to married counterparts.

Study author Scarlett Lin Gomez, a research scientist with the Cancer Prevention Institute of California, said that effects found by them were in reality very significant. Gomes said that they were comparable to a few of the more clinical factors often seen linked to cancer prognosis, such as disease stage or certain kinds of treatment.

Gomez said that besides this, the advantage seems to depend only on the emotional bonds of matrimony, and not the monetary advantages that come along with marriage.

Furthermore, Gomez said, “These patterns were very minimally explained by married patients having greater economic resources. Specifically, we looked at health insurance and we looked at living in a higher socioeconomic status neighborhood. Even though these played small role, they really didn't explain greater survival among the married”.

It is noteworthy that the study has only found a link between marital status and cancer prognosis, and hasn’t proved a cause-and-effect association.

Gomez added that the studies performed in the last 10 to 15 years have shown a similar benefit of marriage for cancer patients, but the advantage has always been chalked up to the love and support an individual gets from their spouse.

She said that people who are married also tend to have higher combined income and better access to insurance. She along with her colleagues then decided to determine if money played a role in the survival benefit of married couples or not.

According to a report in Washington News Wire by Kevin B. Atencio, "Married people with cancer have better survival odds than their single peers – and not for money reasons, a U.S. study suggests.

Unmarried men were 27 percent more likely to die of their tumors, and single women were 19 percent more likely, the study found."

“It seems that the major contributing factor is greater social support, and less social isolation, among married patients,” said study leader Scarlett Lin Gomez of the University of California, San Diego. “Having a strong support system can have meaningful impacts on the odds of survival after a cancer diagnosis,” Lin added by email.

"The University of California San Diego (UCS) report, published Monday in the journal Cancer, shows that the chances of surviving cancer when married are higher than if single. But the study's authors also stressed that sex, race, ethnicity and birthplace have a key role in determining a patient's survival," according to a news report published by SCMP.

"Women seek out help for health concerns more frequently than men, and women tend to remind spouses to see their physicians and live a healthy lifestyle," said Dr. Maria Elena Martinez, lead author of the study and professor of Family Medicine and Public Health at UCS' School of Medicine.

In a report published by the NY Times, "The risk of death among unmarried men was 27 percent higher, and among unmarried women 19 percent higher, than among the married. But even after adjusting for socioeconomic factors, unmarried men still had a 22 percent higher mortality risk and unmarried women a 15 percent higher risk than the married."

“Across different racial and ethnic groups we were able to analyze whether economic resources played a role,” said the lead author, Scarlett Lin Gomez, a research scientist at the Cancer Prevention Institute in Fremont, Calif. “In fact, they play a very minimal role. It points more to social support as the defining factor.”

One of the most romantic days in Canyon County, second only to Valentine's Day, took place Saturday.

The Idaho Wedding Show, a longtime event where engaged couples spend the day wedding planning, took place at the Ford Idaho Center.

Hundreds of people walked through the center looking at vendors, drinking wine, tasting cake and booking party venues. Couples and their families also enjoyed wedding gown runway shows, professional speakers and more.

“It's nice to have it all” Chelsy Ranard, 26, said. “We don't know how to plan a wedding, and by the time we learn and are done, we won't ever do it again.”

Ranard's fiance, David Meyer, 27, said it was nice to be able to go to one place, instead of 100, where couples can find a cake, a place to host the party, flowers, a photographer and more.

“We researched venues for two months before we found the Riverside,” Meyer said. “It's tough to find it all on your own.”

A wedding is supposed to be the happiest day of a couple's life, but planning the ceremony and reception can be the most stressful part.

Meyer and Ranard said even after whittling down their guest list, they still have 350 family members and friends to plan a party for.

Others have to decide how to coordinate a large party centered on themselves while making sure everyone has a good time.

With thousands of people walking through the show, most were couples holding hands and discussing their plans for their perfect day. Some were just engaged and some couples' weddings were right around the corner.

One of the best parts about being a couple at the Idaho Wedding Show is telling people each other's engagement stories.

“We are newly engaged in November, and we are looking at a country rustic wedding with a wildflower ceremony,” Tessi McInnally, 22, said. McInnally and Trevor Stewart are from the Garden Valley area.

McInnally met Stewert over seven years ago, and he popped the question during a trip to Japan during the summer.

Trevor said the perfect proposal didn't work out so well for him because his passport had expired when he went to get on the plane to Japan. He ended up leaving the country a day after his future fiance and his parents.

“I had planned to do it on top of a tower in Tokyo,” he said. “That didn't work out, then the weather didn't work out. So we flew down to Okinawa where it was 80 degrees and tropical. We were at an aquarium and there was a pier and a sunset. And I just looked at her and asked.”

McInnally and Stewart are planning to be married at the Riverside Ranch in McCall. McInnally said she enjoyed the wedding planner show during the event.

While some proposal stories include getaway vacations and a movie-ready setting, some couples enjoy keeping things simple.

Sarah Black, 27, and Tray Tuttle, 29, got engaged on Black's birthday, July 6. The big day is set for May. The two were dating over a year when they decided to spend the rest of their lives together.

“It was simple but sweet,” Black said. “We were driving back from visiting his family for the Fourth of July. We left later than we planned, so when we were on the road around midnight. He stopped the truck and said he needed to check something under the hood. When he put the hood down he was standing in front of the lights with the ring in his hand. He then came around and got down on one knee.”

Black said she knew she was going to marry Tuttle after a few months of dating. The couple comes from different religious backgrounds, but she said they have been able to see past that and grow in their faith together.

“Also he could survive my family,” Black said, laughing. “But we've worked hard on our love foundation.”

THE VENDORS

Tony McDonald, sales manager for the Shore Lodge in McCall, said the best way to be a good wedding vendor is to help ease the stress of planning away from the bride and groom.

“We have everything perfectly done when you arrive," McDonald said. "We have everything were it's supposed to be. So families, mom, dad and everybody can come up and relax, enjoy it and make a vacation out of the whole thing.”

The Shore Lodge was one of dozens of vendors who enjoyed talking to couples-to-be.

Linda Lee, with Sugar Rush Cupcakery and Family Ties cake bakery, has been a part of the the Idaho Wedding Show for 10 years.

“I booked three cakes within the first two hours,” Lee said. “Usually the next week we start booking heavy, but today it's been a lot of people.”

Lee said although the bride and groom are the most important part of the wedding, the food is the most memorable. Sugar Rush Cupcakery and Family Ties bakery can create almost any type of wedding cake or cupcake.

“We can't do cake sculptures because our cakes are too moist and soft,” Lee said.

Your wedding day is supposed to be sacred, but several dreams have been ruined after a Houston venue suddenly closed down, leaving couples out thousands of dollars.

It's a seemingly attractive venue where Karina Villanueva had planned to exchange vows in October.

"It's terrible I just don't wish this on anybody," Villanueva said.

This bride-to-be says what's terrible is how much money she's out -- more than $9,500. She showed KHOU those figures Wednesday in receipts.Her contract with the venue shows she was due to pay this place even more. It's a place that's now refusing to give her anything back.

"It's been horrible," Villanueva said. "Just trying to get my money back and trying to find a new venue that actually has my date available. It's been stressful."

Records show the place is run by Houston Events Center. KHOU tried the venue on Tuesday, but a security guard told us he worked for the bank and couldn't help us.

We also tried a location off Almeda-Genoa, but no one was in the management office

We also tried several times on the phone. The first time, someone told us we had the wrong number. Then seconds later, someone called back identifying himself as Tommy Torres, and he told us the business shut down in December.

Torres added that it wasn't his branch of the business, and he couldn't do anything further. He directed our questions to a lawyer, but he never followed up. We again tried on Wednesday to follow up over the phone, but no one responded.

Another woman who used to work for the Gran Palacio says several brides lost money and knew many of them wanted refunds. That woman says she quit because she didn't want to be involved with a business that would treat customers this way.

"Right now, that's our honeymoon, that's our wedding bands, that's stuff we need," said Veronica Villarreal, who's another of those brides.

She and her husband are out about $2,600, but it's still money she needs.

She works full time and goes to night classes at University of Houston-Clear Lake.

"We're working our butts off so we can have this big lavish wedding with our family and friends," Villarreal said.

They are sacred days now put on hold as these women fight to get their money back. Right now, it's unclear when or if these couples will get their money back. Both tell KHOU they're hiring lawyers and it's likely their cases will be decided in bankruptcy court.

This year's Oscar nominees are regrettably monochrome. Nonwhite actors have been ignored. Prominent starsand creators, both white and nonwhite, are angry. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences presidentwants change.

So what does that change look like?

After yet another year of #OscarsSoWhite, it's clear the status quo will not stand — and change will not be easy. The academy is a fairly static group, with its lifetime membership resulting in entrenched tastes and mindsets. President Cheryl Boone Isaacs could invite no one but members of color next year and the next round of Oscar nominees could be just as white as ever. There are over 6,000 members of the academy. Shifting how such a big group votes will require more than just adding a few new voices.

Before diving into potential solutions, let's be clear: The academy may be complicit, but the real crime is how terribly homogenous Hollywood is. In 2014, 73.1% of all characters in the top 100 films were white. Directors, producers and casting agents must do better at looking for actors of color — an easy play, considering more representation actually makes more money. This is a systemic problem, and pruning the Oscar garden won't do anything when the roots are nothing but weeds.

That said, even if Hollywood suddenly embraces diverse casts in the majority of its hottest films, the academy still has to hold up its end of the bargain. What follows are a few ideas on how they can do that. Not all of them are perfect, some are admittedly radical, but all are specifically designed to shake things up.

Academy membership is a lifetime commitment. But what if it wasn't? What if, instead of adding a bunch of new voters, the academy pruned its membership to only the most active members?

As of 2014, the academy was 94% white and 77% male. The average age was 64. These are not people who are, on the whole, going to fall in love with a movie like Selma. Remember that director Ava DuVernay got blasted last year for allegedly mischaracterizing President Lyndon Johnson's role in the civil rights movement. With only one other nomination, it's still a minor miracle Selma even got nominated for best picture.

Pruning out some of the retired or inactive academy members, many of whom will be among the older voters, would instantly revitalize the membership. Is it harsh to revoke membership? Perhaps. But the academy is not a government agency. Membership is not a right, it is a privilege. It's also not a matter of ageism — those who are still working and thus likely connecting with younger, more diverse voices would stay in.

Then, as the academy adds more inclusive future classes, the voting body would continue to stay fresh and relevant. If Isaacs really wants to change what the academy looks like, she should look at a more complete overhaul like this versus just throwing new tinder on a dying fire.

Taking a page from the Tony Awards, which decide all its nominees by committee, this plan would see the academy convene individual groups for each category. The members of these groups would be required to watch all the eligible films and performances. They would then vote to determine the nominees. The nominees would be voted on by the full academy in order to determine the winner.

This would mean each member would have to watch a ton of movies, which makes this plan kind of impractical. Technically, every film released in Los Angeles for a week is a potential nominee. To make it work, there would have to be some kind of extra step to become an "eligible" entry, akin to how networks are required to submittheir TV programs for Emmy voting in order to make it on the ballot.

While this is a hassle, it's also maybe the most effective plan on this list. Movies like Creed, which was totally ignored this year except for supporting actor Sylvester Stallone, would benefit from voters being required to see it. What seemed like a strangely timed Rocky reboot could actually be seen for what it is: an artful, sports-themed, sharply directed drama. This would've given star Michael B. Jordan and director Ryan Coogler a fighting chance.

Would it require a year or two to work out the kinks? Sure. Would it leave the academy in a better place than it is right now? Almost certainly, yes.

This is probably the most controversial option, because it violates one of the central tenets of Oscar season: The academy should remain unbiased. To have them offer up any kind of campaign, even if just an email message, on a film or performer's behalf violates a sacred covenant. The solution to that problem would be to offer all eligible films some kind of promotion from the academy itself. Yet that's basically awards season socialism, a contradiction in itself since not everything eligible can win.

So the films featured by the academy would have to be select. Yes, it would compromise the fairness of the awards for a few years. Here's the counterargument: Oscar voters have proven two years in a row that they are incapable of putting together an inclusive nominee pool. They actually need to have their hands held.

This wouldn't be a permanent solution, nor should it be used to benefit any particular film or actor too heavily. Here's an example from this year: Had the academy featured Tangerine, a small movie starring trans performers of color, it would have opened voters' eyes to future films like it. They'd see films like The Danish Girl, starring Eddie Redmayne in an Oscar-nominated turn as a trans woman, along with other films actually featuring trans performers. Voters could then judge the performances on the merits — not on which film is more available to them.

After a few years, voters would be trained to seek out the diverse and inclusive, and then the academy could return to its previous impartiality. This would be a dramatic move, but considering the situation as it stands now, drastic action may be what the academy needs.

On the weekends, Lisa Sobieniak and David Ongley often ski over the flat, dim snow at the edge of town to a bend in the natural gas pipeline beyond the airport and stop there for a romantic kiss.

It’s the spot where they were married last April.

Not many outdoor weddings happen in Barrow, on the shore of the Arctic Ocean, and even fewer happen when the temperature is below zero with a 16-mile-per-hour wind. But then, the popularity of skiing is relatively new in Barrow, and Sobieniak and Ongley’s wedding needed to be about skiing.

More Alaskans are learning to stay active so we can have fun and stay healthy during winter. Rural Alaska is evolving too, opening to good ideas from Outside. Sobieniak’s story is about that, and about her own renewal.

She moved to Barrow by herself five years ago, her three kids fully grown, to be a librarian for the North Slope Borough School District. She had grown up skiing in upstate New York and had lived many years in Colorado, where she telemarked the vast peaks of Rocky Mountain National Park right outside her door.

“I had been to Alaska a couple of times on big adventures,” she said. “A motorcycle trip and heliskiing, and always loved Alaska and wanted to see what the 24-hour dark was all about. I was recently divorced and had reached a point where I could retire, and wanted to branch out, start a new life. So I took this job.”

The district has only one librarian for its eight communities. Sobieniak works in the elementary, middle and high schools in Barrow and flies out to the villages for a week at a time. That was part of the adventure, but also part of the challenge, especially after incidents like the plane crash in Anaktuvuk Pass earlier this month, which injured traveling teachers and left the school desperate for staff.

Each village school library becomes a public library in the evening, and that put Sobieniak regularly in touch with Ongley, director of theTuzzy Consortium Library in Barrow, which serves the entire borough. Ongley moved to Barrow from Copper Center in 1995.

Ongley is smart and dignified and wears his graying hair in a trim little ponytail. The first thing Sobieniak noticed about him when they met was the mountain bike in his office. Skiing was one of the first things they did together.

I joined them on an outing to the bend in the gas pipe on an early January day. Sunrise was weeks away. The midday twilight in thick clouds was too weak to pick out bumps and dips in the snow. Even in bright sunshine, winter snows hide the difference between flat tundra, lake or ocean. On gloomy days like this one, skiing feels like floating through a spacy gray-white limbo.

But Sobieniak loves skiing here. Where the landscape denies variety, she sees it in the sky. And it’s true, for all but a couple of weeks of total darkness around the winter solstice, Barrow’s sky usually puts up some kind show, often with a spectacular failed sunrise that lasts through the day.

“We have to go from 24 hours of dark to 24 hours of light in six months, so it’s always changing,” she said. “It’s just a peaceful beauty when you’re skiing out on the tundra. It just seems like everything is calm and beautiful. Even when it’s cold and blowing, it seems like everything is doing what it’s supposed to do, without human impact.”

When they decided to get married on skis, there were plenty of friends to come along. Skiing isn’t taking Barrow by storm, but plenty of people are doing it. Skis rent for $5 a day at the town recreation center.

The biggest push to bring skiing to Arctic communities has come from the NANA nordic program founded by former Olympian Lars Flora, who takes elite skiers fromAlaska Pacific University and other teams to teach village children. Started with funding from the NANA regional Native corporation, the program spread with other sponsors to serve 40 villages in 2015.

Costs are for flights and for skis left behind in each village. The athletes volunteer their time, using up vacation days to attend.

Calisa Kastning, a team administrator at APU, took one of these trips to Kiana with her 1-year-old, Sylvie, who was already skiing and charmed the kids.

“It’s really a great experience to bring something and see such joy on their faces, something we may take for granted,” she said. “There’s usually a line out the door waiting for skis.”

Last year, international competitor Rosie Brennan taught skiing in Barrow.

On the Friday before their Saturday wedding, Lisa and David considered going to the courthouse for an indoor wedding, but the forecast didn’t look bad. Overnight the temperature dropped and the wind kicked up, but they decided to go ahead.

Skiing in this climate involves a lot of preparation. I met someone skiing whom I didn’t recognize hours later because no part of her had been visible.

Guests on skis and two snowmachines made it to the point in the gas line where it arches upward to allow people and animals to pass underneath, like an extraordinarily sturdy arbor. As a surprise, a friend had decorated the pipe with streamers and paper flowers the day before. They whipped in the wind. Fortunately, they had been attached with wire.

The group formed a circle around the bride and groom to protect them from the wind. The ceremony was brief.

On departure, one of the snowmachines wouldn’t start. Everyone waited. Sobieniak worried about the guests’ safety in the cold. Finally, they had to start back, and a little later the snowmachine started. Friends gathered for a reception indoors.

Sobieniak expects she and Ongley will move back to her rural home in Colorado in a year or so. She’s just become a grandmother. Her skiing-crazy son already took the baby out in the snow.

But the couple will keep Ongley’s cabin in Copper Center and maintain their Alaska connections.

Sobieniak will leave Alaska with more than she came with.

“Coming someplace that is so different makes every day a fresh experience,” Sobieniak said. “It really helps you live in the moment. That is something I’ve learned up here. It is to take each day for its own lesson and its own beauty.”

Farmers who host weddings in their backyard cannot refuse ceremonies where two people of the same sex are trying to get married, a New York court has ruled.

The court's decision affirmed the state's Division of Human Rights (DHR) ruling against Robert and Cynthia Gifford, owners of Liberty Ridge Farms, after they declined to host a "wedding" for a same-sex couple. The Giffords said they would host the reception for a lesbian couple, but the ceremony itself would have to be hosted elsewhere because of their religious beliefs about marriage.

DHR found that the couple violated New York's "places of public accommodation" anti-discrimination law. If the court's decision stands, the Giffords must pay $10,000 in state fines and an additional $3,000 in damages to the lesbian couple, Jennie McCarthy and Melissa Erwin, for "mental pain and suffering."

Additionally, the Giffords – who say they have hosted a birthday party for a lesbian couple's adopted child, and employed people with same-sex attractions – will have to provide sensitivity training to their staff and prominently display a posterhighlighting state anti-discrimination laws.

The suit goes back to a 2012 phone call that Cynthia answered. Erwin and McCarthy wanted to have their wedding on site, something Cynthia said couldn't happen.

In a statement issued by the New York arm of the ACLU, which took on their case, the lesbian women said, "Having your relationship judged as somehow unworthy is incredibly hurtful and disheartening and we want to ensure that other couples do not have to undergo the same treatment."

Erwin and McCarthy say it took them months to find another site to host their "wedding."

"All Americans should be free to live and work according to their beliefs, especially in our own backyards," said Alliance Defending Freedom legal counsel Caleb Dalton in a statement after Thursday's decision. Dalton, who defended the couple, added, "The government went after both this couple's freedom and their ability to make a living simply for adhering to their faith on their own property. The court should have rejected this unwarranted and unconstitutional government intrusion, so we will consult with our client regarding appeal."

In 2014, another attorney for the Giffords told LifeSiteNews, "The entire interaction between the complainants and the Giffords transpired during a two- to three-minute telephone conversation, which, unknown to Mrs. Gifford, was being tape-recorded," Trainor said.

"After communicating the fact that they chose not to hold same-sex marriage ceremonies at the farm because to do so would violate the Giffords' sincerely held beliefs (that God intended marriage to be between a man a woman only), Mrs. Gifford invited the couple to visit the farm to discuss handling their wedding reception, which the couple refused."

Trainor also says the state's law doesn't apply to the Giffords because their wedding and reception business is on their home property. However, Slate's Mark Stern noted in 2014 that DHR found that "[Liberty Ridge Farms] is a for profit business and directs its publicity to the general public. … LRF engages in widespread marketing to the general public through advertising at a bridal show and on the internet[.] … LRF is encouraging members of the public to lease the use of its facilities and purchase its services. Thus, there is no exclusivity and LRF is not 'distinctly private.'"

Michael Lascuola and his wife did it in their living room. Robin Tapp and her husband did it at the top of Wilkerson Pass and Jennifer Schafer and her husband did it in the forest outside Winter Park.

What did they do?

Got married all by themselves. No priests, pastors or judges. No guest list drama, no "Chicken Dance," no venue rental and no worrying about party favors. All gone in the blink of a nonexistent bouquet toss.

It's called self solemnization and in short it means you and your beloved can simply marry yourselves whenever, wherever and however you'd like, as long as you're in the state when you do.

Colorado is one of just a few states, including Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, that has legalized the act of self-uniting a marriage without the presence of a third-party officiant. And don't worry if you leave the state - the marriage is still legal, wrote Stephen Clark Harkess, a family law attorney in Wheat Ridge, on AVVO.com, a website that offers legal advice.

"You will still get a marriage license recorded in Colorado and every other state will recognize that marriage," said Harkess. "You don't become unmarried when you move to another state."

Tapp and her boyfriend dated for 16 years before their self solemnized wedding.

"We thought why make it a big deal?" she said. "We've been together so long why not make it just for us?"

The process took about three weeks, from the time they picked up a marriage license at the El Paso County Clerk and Recorder's Office, drove to Wilkerson Pass, took a hike into the woods to face the Continental Divide and returned the signed license to the Clerk and Recorder's Office.

"It was wonderful," said Tapp. "We held hands and looked in each other's eyes and said what we needed to say from our hearts."

There are two other ways to tie the knot in Colorado - a religious ceremony or civil ceremony with a judge or magistrate. Religious ceremonies were the most popular in 2013, coming in at 46 percent of all marriages that year, said Jimmie Van Buskirk, recording manager at the Clerk and Recorder's Office. But self solemnization wasn't far behind in second place at 34 percent. And the numbers haven't gone down in the past two years, he said.

"It's quick and affordable because you're not hiring anybody to perform your ceremony," Van Buskirk said. "The majority of folks who do it are military and getting ready to ship out."

While that may be the case, getting hitched without an over-the-top to-do also appeals to those outside the military. When Lascuola's wife suggested the two of them get hitched in a similar fashion, his response was simple.

"Let's do it," he said. "We'd both been married before in big ceremonies and realized having all the people in from out of town and deciding who should be on the guest list didn't have anything to do with whether the marriage would work or not."

It was a simple affair with only their dog as a witness.

"It was the right choice for us at this point in our lives," Lascuola said. "We're well into our 40s, both married before, both raised kids and this was just right for us."

Schafer heard rumors that you could marry without an officiant and snooped it out online. It was the second marriage for both her and her husband and they wanted something low-key and more about the partnership than the party.

"I would say if you feel like the big day can get distracting and you don't want a lot of people's input and opinions it does work well," Schafer said. "It just helps keep you centered on each other which is what's important."

Like her marriage proposal, Katie McCarthy’s wedding will be steeped in meaning. The 25-year-old from South Boston accepted Chris Gorczyca’s proposal hand-painted inside a mug of tea, and the pair will celebrate in June at the Taj, where McCarthy marked many other special occasions, including her ninth birthday (it was then the Ritz-Carlton), with afternoon tea parties. “My grandmother would take me,” she recalls. “I remember being awestruck that there were chandeliers in the bathroom.”

Weaving sentimental moments and other details from her past into her modern-day wedding is a must for McCarthy and for many other millennial brides looking to add personal significance to their big day. “Just a few years ago, it was dream weddings and all about the bride,” says Amy Kimball, owner of the Boston-based event planning company that bears her name. Millennials care less about opulence and more about incorporating elements of nostalgia and emotion, she says.

“Clients are now saying to me: ‘I want our guests to walk in and feel that is really [us],’ not ‘Wow, did you see that floral arrangement?’ . . . Of course, the details are still very important, as that is how you are telling the story, but the desire is for the wedding itself to be an extension of the couple, their history, what is important to them, and who they truly are to the people that really know them, not their 900 friends on Facebook.”

For McCarthy, the connection to tea and her grandmother became a natural wedding theme when Gorczyca proposed during breakfast last May. As she sipped from her mug, the words “Good Morning, Beautiful. Will you marry me?” appeared inside. “He knows I don’t finish my tea, so he didn’t put the words at the bottom of the mug,” says McCarthy, who plans to give her 200 guests mugs as a wedding favor.

Lauren Kay, senior style editor at The Knot website, says personalizing weddings in the age of Instagram is about “theming a moment” for a unique experience. And with couples taking on more of the financial load of their weddings, they feel more empowered to customize the events, she says. “Maybe there’s a themed party at the Friday night rehearsal dinner or a Star Wars-inspired after-party, a favorite dish or a family dish as part of the wedding menu. Even the music — now it’s very reflective, incorporating favorite songs into the wedding processional, or unique performances, a choir, marching band, things that are a little nontraditional or surprising.”

To welcome family, Jean Wang and Nick Nelson arranged for a version of the traditional Chinese wedding tea ceremony as part of their celebration at the Lenox Hotel last June.

It was the traditional Chinese wedding tea ceremony that Jean Wang and Nick Nelson wanted to include in their nuptials, but the Boston couple arranged for a modified version for their celebration last June at the Lenox Hotel. “We made it a little bit shorter, and we didn’t wear red brocade silk [the color representing luck and prosperity]. We just took our own spin on that,” says Wang, who wrote about the event on her fashion blog, Extra Petite.

Wang, now 28, wore a customized convertible dress with removable mandarin collar while Nelson, 30, sported a suit. The couple served tea to both sets of parents as well as Wang’s grandparents and aunts and uncles who had traveled from China.

Kimball says that keeping the larger celebration in mind and not getting lost in the details is important. She remembers Boston clients who had fallen in love in Vermont and wanted to hold their October wedding there. “It meant so much, but honestly the logistics — guests flying in from California and New York — it ended up being such a nightmare,” she says. “We spent a long time trying to make it work, but we changed it and went urban, having it at Mooo [in Boston]. It ended up working out, and it did still have meaning.”

Annie Schneidman and Matt Coleman of South Boston eventually gave up on the idea of including Lucky, their chocolate Lab/basset hound mix, in their September 2014 wedding. “We love her so much, but she’s pretty naughty,” the now Annie Coleman says. “We couldn’t figure out a way to have her at the Chatham Bars Inn. She’s honestly such a handful.”

The investment management analyst, now 29, eventually settled on the next best thing. “We had this genius idea to have her picture as the table numbers, so we went to Carson Beach and took photos,” Annie says. “She was on our save-the-date as well. Everyone knows how crazy and particular I am about the dog. They thought it was so funny and so sentimental.”

The Knot’s Kay says the Colemans’ creative but practical solution illustrates perfectly how couples can balance nostalgic moments with being guest-friendly. She advises a less-is-more approach. “If you walk up or down the aisle to a rock song, guests will remember that. Do not go overboard,” she says. “If you have too many details, they will go unnoticed. Realize you don’t have to have everything. It’s a flaw of Pinterest.”Annie Schneidman and Matt Coleman took photos of their dog, Lucky, for the table numbers at their Chatham Bars Inn reception.

Jennifer Pabian and Jonathan Wirt will be following Kay’s advice at their July wedding at the Fairmont Copley Plaza in Boston. Pabian, who grew up in Sharon and now lives in Brooklyn with her fiance, plans to celebrate her close family ties with small details built into the ceremony and reception. She asked her 83-year-old grandmother, Marcia Bigney — who had cancer when Pabian was born and vowed to survive it so she could dance at her granddaughter’s wedding — to tell her story at the pre-ceremony signing of the ketubah (the Jewish marriage contract). A jazz group will play during cocktails in honor of Pabian’s grandfather, a saxophonist who died in 2000. Wirt will wear Pabian’s grandfather’s wedding ring during the ceremony, and Pabian will wear her great-grandmother’s gold ring.

“I like the traditions,” she says. “The people who should appreciate them will notice them.”

Some details will be barely visible. Most of the 175 guests, for example, won’t see that the bustle on Pabian’s wedding dress includes a piece of her mom’s wedding veil. But they will notice a wall of photographs featuring wedding pictures from the bride and groom’s parents and grandparents.

“My parents are middle school sweethearts, married 37 years. That’s rare, and I met somebody whose parents are married 35 years. We have a charmed family background,” Pabian says. “It’s not something I’ll be broadcasting. It’s not a spectacle. It’s just little things that mean a lot. Even though it’s a big wedding, it’s family.”