My first post, so hello to everyone :-)

I was wondering if anyone has done some kind of 2nd reception, and if so, how you did it.

My fiancee is in the coast guard, and we're planning our wedding next year near where he's stationed.  Unfortunately, my mom's parents are not in great health, and won't be able to travel to the wedding.  I'm very close with them, and I'm really bummed out that they will miss it- my grandfather was a navy chief, so we had thought it would be nice to honor him during the reception dinner or something.  One option that we might have would be to keep the reception after our ceremony very small, and then invite family and friends who live near my grandparents to a second reception a few days later close to them. We'd do something less formal like a buffet, and show a slideshow of pictures from our ceremony or something.

Has anyone done this?  How did it go?  Did you do it before or after leaving on a honeymoon?  My fiancee will really only have a little over a week off, so we're also worried about cramming too much into a short period time. 

Another question with that is- I'm making my own wedding dress (I've sewn since I was a little kid and made formal wear before, so I'm pretty excited about it), which I'd love to wear again to the 2nd reception so that family and people who can't make it to the wedding can see it. However, I'm not sure if that's a good idea.

Any suggestions?

I definitely think you should do a 2nd reception!  And I think you should wear the dress twice!  I wish I had another excuse to wear my dress!  :)

Welcome to PW and esp welcome to our group!!! I think you may be with the only Coastie in the bunch :)

A lot of people have done second receptions (on the main boards you will see it often referred to as AHR or 'at home reception'). I think it is a great idea! I would totally wear my dress again.

Have you considered doing the hm at a later date? Like 6 months after the wedding? You can do something small during the week off after the wedding, but a larger scale hm may be difficult to squeeze in if yu have to travel for the secnd reception.

I was wondering if I was the only Coastie bride here.  ;) Thank you for letting me know what "AHR" is- I'll have to go hunt up some of those threads.  So many new acronyms to learn on the boards!

6 months later might actually be a good option... hmm. We'll have to see how hard it is to guarantee that he can get leave on a 2nd date.  I've learned the hard way a few times that even when his ship isn't supposed to be going anywhere they can have that changed at the last minute!

Ugh, I hate the 'getting changed at the last minute bit'- it is getting really old!

Please let us know if you need any inspiration!