S/O Deciding on a wedding date

amother

Fri, Jan 10 2020, 12:54 pm

I think that aufruf/sheva brachos arragement should be decided before the date of the wedding!
When my son got married the kalla's mother wanted to do it on Thursday night. As most of my guests came from oot with not enough time to travel back home for shabbos, I told her that my guests would have to be invited for shabbos.
She didn't want that, I totally understood as it was a lot of people!!!
We made it at the beginning of the week and I was very happy to have a nice shabbos aufruf with all my oot guests.
She was very happy to have a small shabbos sheva brachos!
Next wedding, it was oot, we made it in the middle of the week so the guests could travel before and after without us hosting them for shabbos!!
Yes, we had to explain a few times to the other side as they didn't understand at first but communication is the key!!!
What are you thoughts?

ra_mom

Fri, Jan 10 2020, 2:38 pm

amother [ OP ] wrote:

OPs brother's wedding is on Monday, very close after the aufruf. Works out well to head to the wedding after the aufruf. I can't even imagine traveling in for a Monday wedding and then hanging out from Monday to Friday so I can attend the Shabbos Sheva Brachos.

Although OP mentioned that the aufruf is 11 hours away from her home and the wedding and shabbos sheva brachos is 4 hours away, so it seems she wanted to skip the aufruf, go back home after the wedding, and then travel back for SS.

Fox

Fri, Jan 10 2020, 4:51 pm

It's an excellent idea to keep in mind the logistics of travel as well as the problem of taking off work and the expense of making a long weekend out of the simcha.

One of the problems, of course, is that wedding halls or other venues are often so heavily booked that baalei simcha have to take what they can get.

Sheva brochos is one of the easiest places to cut expenses. Thirty years ago, virtually all sheva brochos were held in private homes with very limited guest lists. Then they crept into shul social halls to accommodate more guests, and now there are people who think sheva brochos are "supposed" to be at a restaurant.

My friend's experience shows how it gets out of hand: she planned to make her DD's Shabbos sheva brochos in her home, cooking some of the food herself and purchasing some from a deli-type establishment.

The mechutanim, though, wanted to invite 50 people from their side! Their rationale: the siblings of the chosson's father, several of whom lived in Israel, would all be reunited for the first time in 20 years, thus giving so much nachas to the chosson's grandmother.

Not wanting to be churlish to an elderly woman, my friend and her husband gave in. So now they had to rent a shul social hall for two meals. The rental alone was $1200, since it required non-Jewish employees to stay for cleanup, cleaning linens, etc. Of course, having it in the shul meant that the kallah's mother could no longer do any cooking -- everything had to come from a caterer with an accepted hechsher. This added thousands to the cost.

In the end, my friend was unable to invite anyone from her side other than her nuclear family. The kallah was allowed to invite one friend. My friend estimates that when the dust settled, she had to spent close to $7K making the Shabbos sheva brochos. The mechutanim, who are far from affluent, made no offer to help defray even minor costs.

So while I'm 100 percent in favor of making chassunahs less stressful for attendees and family members by using seichel in scheduling, I'm also in favor of firmly saying "no" -- even at the risk of dashing elderly ladies' dreams -- when it comes to staging weeklong festivals.

GetReal

Sat, Jan 11 2020, 6:10 pm

Fox wrote:

My friend's experience shows how it gets out of hand: she planned to make her DD's Shabbos sheva brochos in her home, cooking some of the food herself and purchasing some from a deli-type establishment.

The mechutanim, though, wanted to invite 50 people from their side! Their rationale: the siblings of the chosson's father, several of whom lived in Israel, would all be reunited for the first time in 20 years, thus giving so much nachas to the chosson's grandmother.

Not wanting to be churlish to an elderly woman, my friend and her husband gave in. So now they had to rent a shul social hall for two meals. The rental alone was $1200, since it required non-Jewish employees to stay for cleanup, cleaning linens, etc. Of course, having it in the shul meant that the kallah's mother could no longer do any cooking -- everything had to come from a caterer with an accepted hechsher. This added thousands to the cost.

In the end, my friend was unable to invite anyone from her side other than her nuclear family. The kallah was allowed to invite one friend. My friend estimates that when the dust settled, she had to spent close to $7K making the Shabbos sheva brochos. The mechutanim, who are far from affluent, made no offer to help defray even minor costs.

So while I'm 100 percent in favor of making chassunahs less stressful for attendees and family members by using seichel in scheduling, I'm also in favor of firmly saying "no" -- even at the risk of dashing elderly ladies' dreams -- when it comes to staging weeklong festivals.

Someone I know married off a daughter and wanted to have shabbos sheva brochos in her house. The mechutanim wanted all their married children and BH many grandchildren to enjoy shabbos together. The kallahs mother said she couldn’t do it. They ended up having it in one of those huge mansions that are rented out for simchos. Each side helped pay for the accommodation and everyone chipped in to bring food. It’s ridiculous for the Kallahs family to pay a fortune for the chassans family reunion.

amother

Sat, Jan 11 2020, 11:36 pm

Fox wrote:

That's not right!
It doesn't make any sense to make it one big family reunion and not participate in the costs!

amother

Cerulean

Sat, Jan 11 2020, 11:58 pm

ra_mom wrote:

I am the op of the other thread. Just to clarify, my mother wanted the wedding on a Thursday so we can al stay. The other side didn’t want to host a big shabbos Sheva brachos but they agreed to change the wedding to a Monday so my mom can make her big ufruf. I can only travel to one city and will be flying into kallah city tmrw and out on tueday