How to Include Friends + Family on Your Elopement Day?

You’re making the brave and bold (and increasingly popular) decision to host a smaller, more intimate wedding or elopement. Now you’re considering your guest list, and wondering if including guests makes your elopement an intimate wedding instead. Keep reading to learn about elopements versus intimate weddings and how to include guests on your elopement day.

Elopement vs. Intimate Wedding

An intimate affair

Hosting an intimate wedding with a refined, smaller guest list became popular amidst COVID times. These ceremonies often hosted less than 20 guests and still enjoyed a reception of sorts after the ceremony. Hosting a micro-wedding allows the couple to be surrounded only by their closest family and friends on such a momentous occasion.

Eloping

Historically, eloping meant the couple would stow away and marry secretly, returning to their family to announce the marriage after the fact. It evokes a sense of wild romance and adventure. Elopements allow flexibility to get married whenever and wherever the couple chooses. They are usually marked by not having a reception directly following the ceremony. And while typically, an elopement only includes the couple and an officiant – there are a few things that the modern couple cannot overlook like an elopement photographer to capture the moment, perhaps a videographer, and maybe even a few friends.

We want to elope but cannot imagine getting married without my family there to experience it.

Including Some Friends and Family on Your Elopement Day

You want to elope, but you cannot imagine such an important day without some of your closest friends and/or family with you – invite them. It is your day, it can and should be however you envisioned it. Make sure whomever you invite to your elopement is 100% supportive of your plan. Your guests should be honored to be included in such a private and intimate affair and should not be guilting you to change your elopement to accommodate their ideals of weddings.

If you’re struggling to think about the logistics of your private elopement and coordinating your family as guests, I’m here to help! There are many ways to incorporate them, and I’m happy to help you plan this special day!

Splitting the Day

If you are including your closest friends and family on your elopement day, but want to preserve the intimate, private adventure aspect of eloping, you may want to consider splitting the day. Your friends and family can join you in getting ready + for the ceremony. Then you and your new spouse can continue adventuring with your photographer taking portraits while your guests entertain themselves. Or perhaps you and your partner take time to adventure early in the day, and come together with your guests for the ceremony and a celebratory dinner afterward. You can split this however you want to best fit your wants and needs.

Multi-Day Event

Especially if you’re including guests in a destination elopement, you may want to consider making it a multi-day affair. You and your partner can take a personal day to celebrate, adventure + take stunning portraits, then balance it by taking a day with your friends and family. Again, this is completely customizable to you and your partner’s priorities.

Assigning Roles in the Ceremony

You can include your friends and family on your elopement day by assigning them roles in your ceremony. Perhaps a family member or friend can officiant the wedding. Or you can have friends sign the marriage license as witnesses. Just be sure to consider the laws to make sure your wedding is legal! For instance, in Costa Rica, the witnesses signing your license cannot be family (learn about planning a Costa Rican Elopement). Or some places may have specific guidelines an officiant must follow.

Dogs are Family Too

Many people want to incorporate their four-legged family members in their elopement – I’m here for it! If you’re including a pup of honor, you’ll want to enlist a friend or family member to help manage the doggie while we’re taking pictures and during certain parts of the ceremony. When planning to include your dog, consider dog-friendly locations, and if hiking make sure your dog’s hiking/outdoor experience level matches the adventure.

Your pup can be included just for pictures or as a ring bearer, or any other way you want!

How to include friends + family on your elopement day when they aren’t physically present

If you’ve announced your bold and brave decision to elope with your partner, and your guests are not able to join you on your elopement day (whether it’s your choice or theirs), here are some ways to include your loved ones:

Before Your Elopement Day:

• Your closest friends and family can help you in the planning process. This can include shopping for your attire, planning your itinerary, helping you find vendors, and more. You can determine how much or little help you want from your friends and family on your elopement day planning.
• Take part in traditional pre-wedding events including the engagement party, wedding shower, bachelorette/bachelor, and rehearsal dinner. Just because you’re not having a traditional wedding doesn’t mean you cannot celebrate this milestone beforehand with your loved ones! This is a time in your life when they want to spoil you and celebrate you. Perhaps host a dinner party instead of the traditional rehearsal dinner the night before your travels.
• Send out cards instead of invitations announcing your upcoming elopement. Ask recipients to use the return cards (like RSVP cards) to send you little notes of love and encouragement to be read on your elopement day.

Day of Your Elopement:

• Before you and your partner elope, ask some of your friends and family to make a video for you to watch after your ceremony. This could be an old-fashioned family-type video where each person adds their sentiments and advice to a video, or perhaps ask them to toast to you. Conversely, you can video a toast to send back home and share with your friends and family thanking them for their support and guidance.
• Similar to the RSVP return card idea listed above, you can ask for handwritten letters to read from your family on your elopement day. A bonus would be for you to also write a handwritten letter for them to read on your elopement day.
• Take time to FaceTime or Skype with your family on your elopement day – this can be a couple of minutes when you’re getting dressed or for a moment or two after the excitement of the day.
• Take a moment to send pictures to your friends and family – quick snaps of you getting dressed, of the elopement, etc.! Pictures will make them feel like they are with you!
• Including meaningful mementos or jewelry is a sentimental way to include loved ones on your elopement day. Wearing grandma’s necklace, or your mom’s bracelet can make you feel connected with your family on your elopement day. Not into wearing mementos? Perhaps have a picnic on grandma’s blanket!

After your elopement, mail postcards back to yourself, and to your close friends and family with highlights of the day from wherever you eloped! These will be a priceless keepsake for you and a joyful package for your family to receive!

After You Elope:

• Share pictures with your loved ones, by having special prints made or gifting them a photo album. Especially share pictures and memories about how they impacted your elopement day.
• If appropriate, bring home something from your adventure for your family like wine from a local vineyard you visited!
• Host a post-elopement reception to celebrate and share your adventures with your closest friends and family. Much like participating in pre-elopement festivities, this is an opportunity to come together and celebrate your love!
• If you hired a videographer, sharing your wedding video is a wonderful way for friends and family to feel like they were there, and experience the magic of your elopement.

Sharing the Experience After You Elope Sans Guests

So you and your partner eloped in relative secrecy and are now announcing your marriage to your friends and family. How exciting!

You can choose to announce this momentous occasion in a couple of different ways.

• Share your elopement pictures or video with close friends and family or broadly on social media.
• Mail-out announcement cards like these. Elopement announcements are a great way to share the news with your friends and family who aren’t on social media.
• Host a post-elopement reception, a big party, or multiple parties to celebrate the affair with your friends and family. This is a great opportunity to include your nearest and dearest after the event, sharing your photos, video, and stories!

Final Thoughts…

End of the day, elopements aren’t about the number of guests – it’s an experience-driven event that celebrates and intentionally focuses on the couple, their love + their commitment together. It is 100% up to you if and how you include your friends and family on your elopement day.