Wedding Traditions - UK v. USA

I know I’ve been beating this topic to death recently, but I promise this will be the last mention of weddings… no, really, it will.

I recently came across an infographic showing the differences between American and English weddings.  I hadn’t really thought too much about it while planning my own, I just knew what I wanted and, well, went for it.

Starting at the beginning:

The Engagement:

In the United Kingdom, apparently the average length of an engagement is between 16 months and 2 years.  In America, it’s only 13 to 18 months.  Personally, mine was about 6 or 7 years!  We Brits like to make sure we’ve got it right, I think.  

Just after I was engaged, I was constantly asked “So, when’s the big day?” and I didn’t have an answer.  Just because you’re engaged, in my opinion, doesn’t mean you have to rush off down the aisle.  I’ve worked with people who have been engaged and married within a year.  As soon as that ring passed the knuckle, the cash register started ringing and there was no holding back.  

The Cost:

According to a survey by The Wedding Secret, the average cost of a wedding in England is £21,000 [$27,300].  Quite pricey.  In the USA the average is $32,641.

Note:  This is the average price - I've seen quite a few that have cost a whole lot more!

[I would like take this moment to point out to my hubby that he got a bargain and I am rather thrifty, contrary to what he may believe.]

PRE-PRE-WEDDING

Ahh, the fancy named “Bridal Shower” where basically you invite as many people as you can to your house (or some other lush location) and ask them to bring presents.  Usually, its just women who go to these things.  I’ve never been to one myself, but apparently weird games are played which may involve wrapping the bride-to-be in toilet roll to make a wedding dress.  A bit odd really.  I think it’s just an excuse to get early wedding presents if you ask me.  Hopefully, alcohol is provided, because I couldn’t imagine going to one if there wasn’t.  

I’ve been away from England for too long to know if there is such a thing there, but I’m sure it’s gradually sneaking over.

No, just no!

PRE-WEDDING

UK – The Hen Night

Basically a big 'girl’s night out' which may, or may not, involve loads of alcohol and scantily clad men (aka male strippers).  Also, there may be a pub crawl.  On second thoughts, there will definitely be alcohol.  There will probably be some crying, throwing up and declarations of love to the bride-to-be (and quite possibly to the aforementioned strippers)

Classy English!

USA – The Bachelorette Party

While I’ve never actually been to one, I’ve heard they are quite similar, although pubs aren't really involved.  They get a bit more expensive too as they tend to be at fancy places like wineries (possibly in a limo) and there may also be a whole weekend away.  There also always seems to be a 'theme' and everyone has to dress the same.  The Maid of Honour and bridesmaids have to pay.

Always a bit matchy-matchy

I didn’t have either – although I’m thinking a pub crawl would have been nice, but living in the USA pubs are few and far between and definitely there are not enough to crawl to.

THE CEREMONY

UK

• The groom has his back to the congregation and does not get to watch the bride walk down the aisle, so it's a bit of a surprise when she gets there.
• The bride walks down the aisle before her bridesmaids (otherwise how will someone hold her train?)
• The wedding party (i.e. bridesmaids, etc) sit down with the congregation during the ceremony.

Bridesmaids definitely behind the bride

USA

• The groom faces the congregation so he can watch the bride walk down the aisle and presumably notice if she falls on her face.
• The bride walks down the aisle after the bridesmaids.  (Then who holds the aforementioned train?)
• The wedding party stands for the entire ceremony.

THE RECEPTION

UK

The sit down meal is the main point of the day.  Getting a fancy meal you don’t have to pay for, makes it all worth while.  Not until later, after the speeches are complete and the cake is cut does anyone get up and dance.  I’m wondering if this is, in fact, because nobody wants to make a fool of themselves until they’ve had a couple of glasses of wine?  You know, British reserve and all that.

USA

As soon as the bride and groom enter the dining room, they have to dance.  They don’t even get a chance for a quick swig of champagne.  Everyone has to wait until they’re finished until the meal is served, which tends to be a lot shorter than those in the UK.  Many people actually get up and dance between courses (the cheek of it!).  

THE CAKE

UK

British wedding cakes are traditionally made of fruit cake and are tiered with anything from one tier to pretty much as many as your baker can get to balance.  Three seems to be the magic number though.  Each tier has little pillars holding each layer.  Obviously, butter icing is not a thing.  Nice hard Royal icing holds the shape.  

Very 1970's style

USA

Most American cakes are made of sponge with butter icing (or frosting) and are ‘stacked’ which pretty much means they are just put on top of each other.  Then there’s the awful tradition of feeding each other a piece of cake, which invariably ends up being smooshed into someone’s face.  [see this post here for my views on that malarkey]

Clearly, I am generalizing here and not everyone has a massive wedding, but if you want to go traditional and all out, then you might want to get saving your pennies because wherever you live, it’s going to cost a bob or two.

My wedding was in no way what you would call “traditional” being in Las Vegas, but I did sneak in a little bit of jolly old England.  I changed the wording to the old fashioned Church of England vows which include “love, honour and obey” and you can imagine what reaction I got to that little word. [*smile*].  

I’m just an old fashioned romantic at heart.  

What a Scorcher!

We’ve been told in California that there is a drought this year and we need to conserve water.    There will be fines, they say, if people are seen wasting water and apparently if their neighbours dob them into the authorities (lovely).  

The thing is, we’re told that every bloody year in California.  Ever since I’ve been here, going on 21 years now, there’s been a drought warning.  And every year, the state goes up in flames.  Just last week, there was a fire close to us and this is what we could see from the house:

A bit scary, no?

The next morning, everything was covered in ash, big huge chunks of the stuff.  This is what happened to our swimming pool.  I didn’t really fancy swimming that day.  

That's not fish

It’s one of the hazards of summer in California and you tend to get used to it.   100+ degree weather will do that.

Which reminded me of the famous (infamous) British Drought of 1976.  Anyone remember it??  Of course you do.  It was the most exciting time of my childhood, I think - water pipes and all.

Although we all remember it as the hottest year ever, in fact the 'heatwave' only lasted for three months, June, July and August.  Temperatures averaged 95 degrees to 96.1 degrees with the absolutely hottest day being July 3, 1976 when it reached a staggering 96.6 degrees.   It was deemed the hottest year in 350 years (although who was keeping those records, may I ask?)

Britain went without rain for 45 days in a row, which is a flippin’ miracle.  Forest and heath fires broke out and crops were destroyed.  I don’t actually remember the fires, but I vividly remember how new and exciting it was to queue up for water in buckets, bottles, cups or pretty much anything you could carry.  Water rationing was a big thing.  So were instructions to “Put a brick in your toilet tank” to save water and to “Share your bath.” (Eww)

Water standpipes were a thing

That summer was one of the best ever if you were a child.  I remember the adults were moaning and feeling hot and sticky, while we were pretty much left to our own devices, playing in the garden until all hours of the day.  The longer we were out of the house, the less water we used, I think.  There was no worry of skin cancer back then and we all ran around “as brown as berries.”   

Of course, it all came to a grinding halt and back to reality in the last week of August, ironically, just after a “Minister for Drought” had been appointed.  According to Wikipedia, thunderstorms continued throughout September and October, although, for the life of me, I don’t remember that.  

There have been heatwaves since, but I don’t think anyone remembers those as much as that glorious summer of 1976.  [And now I've made myself seem very, very old]

Back here in California I will continue to live through the yearly droughts, I will not water my grass and I will not wash my car.  I will watch the firestorms and hope they don’t get too close to my house, but in the back of my mind I will always be saying “This drought is not as bad as the one in 1976” 

Halloween USA Style

Halloween - Its a BIG deal

In October of 1994, we moved into our first house is the USA and our furniture had just arrived from England. We hadn’t brought our worn out three piece suite or our UK television, so we didn’t have any living room furniture at all.  So, by Halloween, the front door still opened into an empty room.  It looked like we were going for the empty, haunted house look - perfect!

Not my house

Having grown up in England where the only notable thing that happened on October 31st was my friend’s birthday, I’m not sure we were entirely ready for Halloween.  We’d seen the films, of course, and hoped that Michael Myers didn’t live in our neighbourhood.   I knew the children (and apparently teenagers after 9:00 p.m.) dressed up and went door to door “Trick or Treating” with a bucket or in some cases a pillowcase (greedy) collecting sweets, or “candy.”

My son was around 8 at that time and wanted to trick or treat with his new friends, so it was just my daughter and I at home that night.  We were ready, we were prepared, we had a couple of bags of sweets to give out, we had the lights on inside and out, I got a dining room chair and put it by the front door and we waited for the first children to arrive.   And did they arrive!!!

One after the other, in droves, with parents, without parents, babies in pushchairs (why would babies need candy?) and the costumes - from Disney characters and superheroes, to vampires and zombies we saw them all.  One notable costume and one which was my daughters favourite was a tiny little baby in a Tweety Pie costume.  That baby’s probably around 22 now and might really want to forget it, bless.  Some parents are very inventive with their costumes and I'm sure some of those babies might grow up to hate their parents for the indignities handed out.  For example - this one ..

Bless!

So anyway, there we were, giving out handfuls of sweets to every child and about an hour in I realized that we weren’t going to have enough. We had been willynilly throwing handfuls into each bucket and I thought the children were really nice when they were saying “Wow, thank you”  Look at me, I thought, I must have the best sweets on the street.  Nope, it was that they couldn’t believe I was so generous and I have since learned that they get ONE each…. Yes only one!!

Only ONE each!

So Plan B went into action – one sweet each and if possible, only pretend to put a sweet in their bucket.  Yes, this sounds like a terrible plan and it actually was…. I still remember the angry look I got from one little boy who knew I hadn’t put anything into his pillowcase and I stood there looking at him, daring him to tell me he knew – bad karma, I know (*cringe*)  I only tried it that once though – I couldn’t handle the guilt.

And throughout all this, every time I opened the front door, the first thing those little kids saw was an empty room.  I did get quite a few questioning looks that night and think I might have scared some of them actually.

And what do you do when you run out of candy?  Well, you close the door, turn out the lights and pretend you’re not home.  But that doesn’t actually work.  It seems those flippin’ kids will knock on every door in their hunt for sugar!  And then, as it got later, the children got bigger.  I was opening the door to teenagers, some of whom even had mustaches – and not the stick on kind.  Surely there should be an age limit to trick or treating?  My daughter and I eventually had to go and sit in a back bedroom because, quite frankly, she was getting scared (she was only 2.5) of all the big monsters knocking on the door.

Nowadays, I end up having way too much candy and I tend to buy what I like and fortunately, I now live in a neighbourhood where there aren’t so many children.  But then, I end up eating ALL of the sweets myself.  Not such a good idea after all!

Undertaking, Overtaking - The Freeway Free-For-All

I’ve been reading with interest posts by my blog mate ukdesperatehousewifeusa about undertaking. Now, until she had mentioned it a couple of months ago in this post, I had never heard of it.  Reading her heading, I thought someone had died!  But no, that’s not the case.  Undertaking is basically the act of overtaking in the slow lane.  

She lives in the east coast and I’m thinking the roads are a tad smaller there than here in California, where freeways have five, six or sometimes seven lanes – each one of them choc-a-block full of cars. And there’s usually that idiot (or old fart) who wants to drive at 50 mph in the “fast’ lane.  Those people drive me nuts!  The only thing to do is go around on the right….

And here’s my secret – I love it!  

Yes, I love the fact that you can go around all those people driving too slowly (or what I presume to be too slowly). I have been told I've got a lead foot, which in English means I am a bit of a girl racer. I must admit though, it’s a bit like Wacky Races sometimes what with everyone having a free-for-all on the freeway.  I don't break laws, it's just so much more convenient to be able to go around on either side.

The freeway free-for-all

Look at me getting all sciency... yes, I know it's DNA, not the freeway, but it looks just the same sometimes.

I’m sure if I lived in a different state it wouldn’t be the same.  I wouldn’t undertake in London, so I’m not sure I would do it in New York either.  It's just how the roads are here and I was told, long ago when I started driving here, to never drive in the slow, or far right, lane because you will have more chance of getting hit by cars entering and exiting the freeway.  

Oh, and if there happen to be any California Highway Patrol reading this, um… I don’t speed, per se, I just like to get through traffic.  No need to hunt me down and give me a ticket  *sheepish grin*

Hope he's not pointing at me!

Thanks for Staying Scotland!

IT'S A NO!!  

In my last post, I said I didn't think men in kilts were at all sexy and they should wear trousers in Scotland from now on.  However, doing a bit of a Google search, my attitude may have changed just a tad when I found these pictures.  (Men, you might want to look away now)

Phwaaar!

So, I would emphatically like to say THANKS FOR STAYING SCOTLAND  *swoon*

Unfortunately, in my experience, when you actually meet a man in a kilt, he tends to look like this:

Oh, and I'm also glad we don't have to change the flag.

Scotland, Are You Really Leaving?

What with all the talk of Scotland's independence going around at the moment, I thought I would put in my tuppence…. I am not at all politically interested in anything (true story) so I’ve really only been reading the headlines.  But as with anything there are pro’s and con’s and I thought I would make my list.  So here goes

PRO'S

Bagpipes

I know there are a lot of people out there who absolutely love them, but to me, the bagpipes sound like someone trying to strangle a cat.  It’s like nails on a blackboard to me – makes me cringe.  So maybe England can ban them?  Please.....?

Oh look - bagpipes!

Trafalgar Square

When England play Scotland at Wembley, the English would be able to sing and dance in the fountains at Trafalgar Square.  Up until now, the Scottish take over and you can’t get anywhere near the bloody things.  Mind you, it’s not that England supporters ever have anything to sing and dance about.

Can we have a go please?

Men in Skirts

I don’t know about you, but to me a man in a skirt is just not sexy and it seems that those bloomin’ Scots always want to show you what’s underneath and it’s usually nothing!! Please, please don’t do that….. Good old English trousers please!

I don't really need to see this, thank you.

CON'S

Passports

You might have to show a passport to get into Scotland from England.  I’m not sure this is actually a con for me, seeing as I’ve never actually been to Scotland – the furthest north I’ve been is Newcastle and although they talk incredibly funny there, I don’t think it’s actually Scotland.

Biscuits

Walker’s Shortbread, who doesn't love it?  I love the stuff dipped in a nice cuppa.  Every Christmas I buy a big tin of Walkers. I won't be able to live without it.  (Well, I probably could, but I don't want to).  Will Scotland stop us being able to buy some?

I'm going to miss this

The Union Jack

This has got to be the biggest 'con' of the lot.. what will happen to our wonderful flag?  Am I going to have to throw away all my union jack emblazoned items.  Do I need to take my flag off my car?  It will look really odd (and a bit anaemic) without the blue.  And yes, I have just managed to make the Scottish independence debate all about myself.

Stay with us Scotland... we need your blue bit!

But I suppose we will all have to wait until tomorrow to find out what happens.  I'm a bit of a traditionalist and although Scotland already have their own Parliament, their own money and their own flippin' language, I just don't want them to go.  It will be like having your upstairs neighbours move out and although you've never actually talked to them, you're used to them because they were always there.  It's all a bit sad really.