Engagement party help

lenga01

Hello,

Fisrt of all I want to say hi, I'm not new to the site but am new to the wedding part! I got engaged last saturday and we have decided to throw an engagement party. It will be on the 7th of march 09. We have managed to get a really good hall and dj but we are very confused with all the rest! Sorry for having loads of questions but neither my oh or I have been to an engagement party before lol.

Do we have food, like a full buffet or is finger food better?

The hall has a projector screen which we can use but we have no idea what we would put up there, is pictures of us ok or a bit cheesy?

Do you make speeches or just generally thank everyone for coming?

Thanks for reading!

Sammy_Girl

Hi Lenga and welcome to the Wedding Board

Unfortunately, we never had an engagement party, or have been to one lol. But I would suggest having a finger buffet. It would be kind of like a birthday party I guess, so no need to go too wild on the food.

You could use the projector screen to have a slideshow of pics of the two of you when you were younger and pics of you together. It would be nice - not too cheesy.

And then you could have yourself and OH make a speech. Maybe even your parents too.

Sorry, I'm prob not too much help having never been to an engagement party lol

Good luck and congratulations! Have you set a date yet?

lenga01

Thanks for the ideas. We haven't set a date yet, I can't decide if I want a winter or summer wedding, lol

gill_81uk

I wouldn't expect a speech at an engagement party, so i would say that is definitely up to you whether or not you want to do one.

I would guess you'll be greeting people as they come in so they will all congratulate you and you can thank them then.

I think finger food buffet is definitely the way to go.

talkhard

My friend most recently had a lovely engagement party. They had a full buffet, centre pieces on the table and an engagement cake that they cut like you would the wedding cake.

They also had a "first dance" type thing with pictures.

They didn't have any speeches and instead, went around the guests thanking everyone for coming.

Enjoy it! It's your opportunity to be centre of attention and my friend said it was like a dummy run for the wedding reception

xx

panpipe

Our engagement do was quite an informal affair (and organised in 3 weeks!). We hired the local rugby club and a dj, and had a small buffet with things like pizza, garlic bread, and cut up lots of baguettes to have ham and cheese with. Nothing too fancy - good job really, as we'd been told we'd have access to the kitchen but when we got there it was being refurbished so I had to go home again to cook the pizzas and garlic bread!

We didn't do speeches or anything too formal like that, just put up a few balloons and banners.

Your friends will just be happy to be with you celebrating the big occasion, so I don't think anybody will be disappointed with whatever you decide to do. Have fun :beer: