form versus function

i'm all about the cutesy little tokens during weddings. and believe me, i do take them home, so all of the time and effort spent folding, gluing, ribboning is totally not wasted on me as a guest. but as much as i love the cutesiness of things, i really also appreciate the function. and while some items are purely for novelty, i love it when brides find a cute new way to present things that have a specific function.

at first i thought my programs would follow the same intricate, time-consuming japanese binding/sewing that my invitation booklet had. and i definitely wanted the nice "tears of joy" tissues, cuz god knows, i cry at all of the weddings i've been to. but i also knew, first and foremost, that my programs were going to be functional. my primary purpose for them was not just to have something cute, but i wanted it to serve as a very detailed guide to encourage community involvement and response and even singing. being that half of my guests are chinese and non-catholic... heck, more than half of my wedding party are chinese and non-catholic, i felt that this was important and necessary. our family and friends are important to us and we definitely wanted not just witnesses to our ceremony who watched by the sidelines as we said our vows, but actual community involvement with responses to those vows. so i do hope that people use the programs to follow along and respond appropriately. it's not something that you skim really quickly because it's just an outline and then it just sits on the pew to be forgotten. and i hope it provides some comfort or direction for those who don't know when to sit, stand or kneel.

because the content of my programs are quite detailed and quite abundant, i wanted to make them extra large, so i chose legal sized paper folded in half. henry even liked the idea of making them exactly square, but then, we'd lose an inch, plus it would require more cutting. i really liked the fact that i didn't have to cut any further and we could use the standard legal size and i was really against losing another inch of space. so, function definitely trumped form on that idea.

like i said, i thought i was going to do the japanese binding/sewing thing... but we actually ran out of ribbon and i wasn't about to lose more time and money on this project, so we're stapling it. yes, oh yes, i know you can't believe it, but yes, we're stapling it. but not to fret, i didn't get the ugly standard aluminum staples. for the cute, yet still functional factor, my staples are red! so that was a compromise. and honestly, i love the clean look of the whole program. it's a neat booklet, no fru fru ribbon or bow. and it lays nice and flat.

as for the tissue pockets, i've decided to keep them separate from the program piece. i had planned on the martha stewart little pockets glued to one of the inner covers. but it was so bulky and interruptive and i just wasn't satisfied with any idea of it attached inside the program. thinking about it was honestly stressing me out, so we're keeping it simple (stupid) and just keeping them separate from the program. if people wish to take one, they're free to do so.

sometimes, being in the wedding business totally makes you nuts with all of the ideas for projects and DIY (Do-It-Yourself) items. what have you chosen to do or not do? or what areas of your wedding did you choose the more functional route rather than the cutesy form?