Engagement Parties

We hosted a backyard BBQ engagement party about a month after we got engaged. It was nice for the families to be able to mingle and get to know each other before all the wedding planning started!

View quoted message I love the idea of a backyard BBQ. I also am 2 years out from my wedding date - and I was worried that doing an engagement party now might be too soon...but sounds like it was a great success for you to help get everyone excited about the upcoming wedding.

We got engaged at the end of August, and decided to do our engagement party right away 1 month later to hopefully get that last bit of summer (we did). He proposed on a sailing yacht, so we had a nautical theme, which everyone seemed to appreciate.
I loved having an engagement party for several reasons:-extended family can meet the other side for the first time-friends that haven’t seen each other in ages get to catch up-I have a large-ish bridal party, so they all got to meet in person-it kept up the excitement for us getting engaged, since the wedding is 2 years away-it got everyone ELSE excited for the wedding and engagement
It doesn’t have to be overboard - we did a nautical backyard BBQ type thing with about 60 people.

View quoted message What you are suggesting sounds awesome too! Love SPA days!

View quoted message I love champagne, and I love brunch. That sounds lovely We talked about doing a combined stag and doe as well (if you can call it that). We want to send the boys out to an awesome local barbershop/pub and for a round of golf, while the girls have a spa day and meet up for a nice dinner later.

View quoted message I'm not sure yet, my mom might want to. That's generally done closer to the date with female friends and family, correct?

View quoted message Thank you! This is perfect, I'll check out the link

Are you going to have a bridal shower?

If your friends and family are looking for another excuse to celebrate you guys, then why not?!

We had a very casual engagement party my best friend threw for us the week after our proposal. It was just for our friends who live in town to get together and celebrate the news. We also had a more formal engagement party that my husband's family friends hosted. They sent invitations and it was more of a fancy meet and greet for my family to meet all of his family friends he grew up with.

Just make sure you have a good idea of your wedding guest list before inviting anyone to the engagement party!! An invite to any pre-wedding event indicates to the guest that they will be invited to the wedding, so if you're envisioning an intimate 30 person wedding then don't let someone's mom get carried away and host a 200 person engagement party

Also - check out How to Plan an Engagement Party and 8 Engagement Party Don'ts for expert tips!

We opted not to have one, we did have a champagne toast with our immediate family but that was it. My friend's engagement party was essentially a wedding reception but smaller guest list and she didn't wear a wedding dress, was very interesting to say the least.

An “I Do BBQ”!!!

Ours was an impromptu family dinner at a restaurant.

We hosted an engagement party in June. We did a Champagne Brunch and it was alot of fun! My fiance and I don't like Stag and Does and he isn't into Stags so we opted to do something together. It was a great time!

My mother and future MIL threw a joint party, they decided to have one because we wanted our families to meet and to get the bridal party together! We did a back yard pool party

Oops replied before message was finished. It was suppose to say anything from a small intimate get together, to a full blown reception. It all depends on what you want it to be. For us It was a small surprise engagement party and it was perfect.

We had a surprise engagement party thrown for us. It was perfect and our closest people were there. I have been to 2 Italian engagement parties, and they were both very close to a full wedding reception with a 6 course meal and dancing. So anything from a small intimate dinner

We just had a dinner out a restaurant with our closest friends and family.