Since both our ceremony and our reception were taking place outdoors, our eyes were glued to the weather forecasts all week leading up to both events. Even though it was super hot in AC, I was just glad that it was sunny with not a cloud in sight. It looked less promising for Saturday - hot, with a 50% chance of thunderstorms.
We had no back up plan. Our row home would not accommodate 70 people. There was no budget for a last minute venue change. I started calling tent companies to see if we could rent one at the last minute. Tents & Events was extremely rude to me, making me feel like an idiot for waiting until the last minute (even though they totally had tents available, as I knew they would), and then even laughing at me when they asked how the tent would get to the yard and I said "through the house." Look lady, I've never rented a tent before, I don't know what the right answer is! She then said she would get back to me later that day, and never did. They were extremely unprofessional and I would not recommend doing business with them.
After searching for a bit online, we once again found that like the dance floor, it was actually cheaper to buy a tent than to rent one. We had only a few days before the reception, so the biggest issue was shipping. We purchased a 10'x30' white tent on amazon, with two day shipping, and it came to about $250 - still over $100 cheaper than renting it, plus we got to have the tent then, or sell it, or whatever. I think this is the exact one. We got some mixed messages about shipping and thought we weren't going to see the thing until the Monday after our reception, so that caused some anxiety and elevated blood pressure, but all we could do was wait. And then on Friday morning, we saw a gigantic box on our stoop and let out a huge sigh of relief. Oh, and PS, we got it into our yard by carrying it THROUGH THE HOUSE. In your face, Tents & Events.
Assembling it was actually very easy. The tent looked really pretty, and even though it wasn't really heavy duty, I was confident that it would do the job. We tied the poles to the fence to give it some extra support and that seemed to do the trick.
While we were putting the tent up, our neighbor yelled from his yard that he had another smaller tent that we could borrow to cover the dance floor if we wanted (this one went the entire length of our lawn until the dance floor, and we hadn't come up with a solution for that yet). We of course said YES and ran over. While there he also gave us a large fan, and offered up a bunch of tools if we needed them. We didn't know him very well and I thought it was so sweet of him to do all of this for us.
The whole experience really made me appreciate my block. The week before we had gone around to each house and hung a lollipop with a note on it on their doorknobs, explaining that we would be having the reception in our yard and there would be music until about 10pm, and I put my email address so they could contact me if they had any questions or concerns. From then on, anytime we left the house, random neighbors were shouting congratulations or offering help or advice. It was the first time I really felt this connection to my street, and it made me want to get to know them all better.
Our neighbors tent was perfect - it picked up right where ours left off and covered the dance floor, all except for about two feet on the side. And that night, it didn't rain until the very last song, and everyone started cheering. It was a relief actually - it made the night cool down, and people were even standing on the uncovered section of the yard to dance in it. As you can tell, the people I surround myself with embrace the saying on our napkins, and always have a glass that's half full.
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