Three things I said the week after I got engaged:
"We'll have a gift list at John Lewis over my dead body."
"Having a chauffeur to drive you between the church and reception is naff. We're driving ourselves."
"I hate morning suits."
Last weekend I:
Registered for a gift list at John Lewis.
Finally booked a wedding car to take us between the church and reception.
Caved in and allowed husband-to-be to hire all the morning suits.
Why? Why! Because being 'original' when it comes to weddings is harder (or at least more expensive) than you'd (I'd) think.
I have discovered that the reason everyone and their aunt has their gift list at John Lewis is because there are only about three other options, if you can call House of Fraser and Heal's other options (the latter of which doesn't give you a zappy-gun thing to pick the gifts, which made it instantly less attractive). My grand (très chic) plan to choose Liberty's was thwarted when I discovered they'd axed it last year.
Ditto with the car thing. Cost of hiring a semi-vintage old car to drive yourself for the weekend? Around £650. Cost of hiring man with gorgeous old vintage car (one of only four in the entire world)? £300.
And the morning suit thing? Well, my fantasy of marrying a man in a three-piece grey suit (nothing to do with a strange Dermot-O'Leary-on-X Factor-style-obsession last year, honest) dissolved when he tried on the one in the hire shop in Surbiton (not Moss Bros, don't panic, this is an independent-and-family-run-business-only wedding – bar the aforementioned wedding-gift-list conglomerate).
It made him look like he was going to work.
Next job? Persuading my father he has to wear one too. Super-Organised Mother has promised to drug him and take the measurements once he's passed out.