How Do I Tell My Family We're Eloping?

Making the decision to elope in New Zealand can be a tough one, and it is even harder breaking the news to your family. Here's some advice on how to do your wedding your way without upsetting your family.

Check out my elopement package which includes everything you need, including a contemporary ceremony script with options to personalise.

Transcript:

"Today I just want to take a few minutes to talk about elopements. So, I know a lot of people are doing it quite tough at the moment and trying to make the very difficult decision of whether to postpone the wedding or whether to get married anyway and have a party once the borders open when they can get family over, a lot of kiwis have family overseas and it's such a tough time for everybody. I just thought I'd try and offer a few options and a bit of an insight into how elopements work and how you should be feeling about it.

So the term elopement, a lot of people think "escape off the Gretna green in Scotland" and have this super simple wedding, and it's kind of like a secret thing, but these days it's not really the case. It can be quite a celebration, even if you choose to not have anyone there. A lot of people take the budget that they might have spent on a larger wedding and use it to put it into the areas of the wedding that they really really want. For example, they might hire a photographer to get some really amazing photos that they can share with their family when the time comes. They might want some beautiful flowers. They might want to go out for dinner and have an amazing meal or stay somewhere beautiful. Or even they might want to take a helicopter into the mountains and do it that way. It really is such a personal thing and there are so many different ways of doing it, it really is so individual.

I know a lot of people ask about how they should tell the family and there's a lot of guilt around choosing to elope. My husband and I actually eloped, and we were very fortunate in that our family were super supportive and we had some incredible photos that we could share with our family. However, I know that a lot of families are more traditional and particularly women I think feel a lot of guilt about not having their father give them away. I really think that it's important when you get engaged and you decide that an elopement is what you want to do, I think it's really important to have a conversation with your nearest and dearest and just explain that you're not going to have a wedding and that's your decision and, you know, really try and think about the reasons why you've chosen to go down this path and just so that it makes them feel a little bit more involved in the day still.

There are so many different options you can have for eloping. You can do a very very simple one, you might go to a registry office and just have a very simple wedding and then you might actually have the full reception after when you can get your family over here, or alternatively you might choose to have a beautiful ceremony, have some beautiful photos, get really dressed up and really go for it and then have some incredible images to show your family.

There are lots of different options, get in touch with me if you want to have a chat about any elopement options.

I'm Amanda from The Big Day Company and I'd be thrilled to talk you through it. Thanks!"

With Love,

Amanda xoxo