Registering for the {Deep Blue Sea}

Playing house is nearly as great as a honeymoon.  Nearly.  But when we're talking about Greece as your destination, I don't think anything compares.

Yesterday, I was on my google reader getting my fill of Design*Sponge (one of my favorite design blogs) and Grace posted about a book titled Greece on My Wheels by Edward Enfield.  

Edward narrates his travels by bicycle throughout Greece and the Greek Islands.  Well, with the blazing heat here in central Texas my plants are even wilting INDOORS, so a vacation to the clear blue Mediterranean is sounding pretty schweeeet right about now.  I jumped on Amazon and ordered that sucker, because it's about time Timothy and I start planning our Honeymoon.

We used this nifty little website called Honeymoon Wishes to register for a honeymoon rather than wedding presents.  I know, awesome, huh?  Actually registries (like weddings themselves) are no longer stuck to traditional restrictions.  So many couples are now getting married at the average age of 27-28, and many of them have lived together previously and some of them already have children.  That means they already have all the toasters and blenders and dishes they need, so why ask for more?  Instead, with all these new online registries they now can register for everything from a down payment on a house to donations towards a new family vehicle.  Tim and I jumped on that bandwagon with zero second thoughts.  [ note: we did also register for traditional home goods and gift items for people who did not feel comfortable giving money or who preferred to bring a gift.  Most people choose to do the easy thing and pull out their plastic, but many people gave us gifts as well and they were all appreciated!  It was nice for a bit of variety, too.  ]

So for our registry we created little activities for our honeymoon in Greece, like scooter rentals (whoopee!) and snorkeling, and items like a hotel suite upgrade or breakfast in bed.  Every gift item was allotted a certain amount of money and then guests could select what gift they wanted to give based on how much money they wanted to spend.  Most people had a lot of fun with it.  All the money goes into your account with the registry and then on a selected date they issue you a check for the amount that's been donated.

We did really well with our registry and our loved ones were so kind and generous towards us.  And while we are appreciating all the home goods gifts that we got right NOW (like our fabulous toaster oven, Kitchen Aid mixer, Pyrex glassware & Acai salad bowl sets, etc), we have that reserved fund in our bank account to spend on our honeymoon one day in the future!

Many people wondered why we didn't go to Greece immediately after our wedding, like "normal people do."  Well, I've wanted to go to Greece for a very, very long time.  My standards for what I NEED to accomplish while we are there are extremely high.  I am not much of a "mosey-er."  I walk a lot and I see a lot and I am pretty darn annoying with a camera.  Plus, when it comes to Greece, I love the history, the culture, the food, and of course, the birthplace of theatre!  I knew how exhausted I would be after three months straight of designing and planning our wedding, and the thought of climbing on a plane and trekking all over a country for two weeks after that just wasn't thrilling to me.  Especially when I knew all I would want to do was sleep and eat.  I didn't want to waste our trip to Greece sleeping in our hotel room!  And Tim?  Well, he agreed with me.  Plus I think he thought that if I tried to plan an extended overseas trip at the SAME TIME as the wedding that things might just end up badly.  So we opted to save the money and use it at a later date.

But I digress . . .  

I should mention that we did take a Mini-Moon to Marfa, TX, following the wedding (and you can see pictures here), and it was a lot of fun.  This is a great idea of couples in our situation or one similar.  Resorts will book you a honeymoon whenever you tell them you are on your honeymoon - they don't care if that's two days after your wedding or two years!  A mini-moon at least gives a couple some time to recoup after the wedding and enjoy a few days just being newlyweds.

What we ended up concluding was that since the best time of year to go to Greece is really May, before it gets too hot (but still warm enough to enjoy the sea) and before all the summer tourists arrive, we'd make that trip our oneyearhoneyanniversarymooning in 2012!

 

And this . . .

And this . . .

Can't wait.

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Registries to check out if you're looking for something different on your Wedding Day:

Honeymoon Wishes - this is the site we registered on, there are hundreds out there, but I though this one was simple and easy to use.

Down Payment Dreams & Hatch My House - both provide a place to register for a downpayment, mortgage, or renovation fund.

GreenWish - contributions to any large scale gift or project in your community, primarily focusing on local & green organizations.

The Big Day - here you not only can register for a honeymoon fund, but also to have people pay for certain aspects of your wedding day itself (the limo ride, your first glass of champagne, fireworks, etc).

Don't forget you can always have people donate to any charity or your alma mater online, if that's more up your alley.