Bridesmaiding: The Bachelorette Party

By now you’ve bought your bridesmaid dress. You’ve planned a bridal shower. You’ve avoided all those terrible games. There’s one big thing left for you to do before the wedding: the bachelorette party.

This was the part that worried me the most, because I know nothing about partying. I’m an early-to-bed, freakishly-early-to-rise person, so I “go out” almost never. To say I don’t know much about “nightlife” is the understatement of the year. My idea of a fun night out is getting dinner with friends, enjoying a fancy cocktail or two, and finishing the night off with coffee and a book at home. What can I say, I’m a party animal!!!

My biggest tip for this is the same advice I had for the bridal shower…get help! Luckily, Cat has other friends who are much more normal and exciting than me, and they gave me lots of suggestions for where to go and what to do.

My other biggest piece of advice? Listen to the bride. I’ll admit, I worried myself a bit about the bachelorette party. Even though Cat’s been my BFF for 12 years, I still thought she would want to get buckwild for this. But, of course, she wanted something relatively low key. Her rules for me: No strippers, no carrying around inflatable penises (lest you think this is some oddly specific random fear of hers, you should know we saw pictures of a girl on facebook who had to do this at her bachelorette). This was all fine by me, because I have a feeling me trying to get a stripper would be a lot like that scene in New Girl when Jess tries to hire one for Schmidt’s party bus, and it ends up being Matt Besser. I would not turn Matt Besser away from our bachelorette party, but, you know. It isn’t really the place for improv.

My main concerns, then, became planning something that wouldn’t totally break the bank and making sure most people could come to all or part of the day. We stayed in Columbus, because some of the ladies had these things called “jobs” and “children” that meant they couldn’t take a whole weekend away.

During the day, we made candles. We went to The Candle Lab in Columbus, where for a set price you can have what they call a “Wine and Wicks” party where you make a candle, then have a glass of wine while it sets up.

Here’s a picture of Cat and her ladies (including me) enjoying some candlemaking:

Then we went to a wine bar. I don’t know what your lifestyle is, but the most important single element in your bachelorette party is probably going to be alcohol. Get it in everybody’s systems somehow, and then everything will be fun. The wine bar ended up being super great; our bartender was hilarious and I think he fell in love with each and every one of us. Specifically Cat. This was as close as we got to a stripper, and I’m okay with that.*

We had dinner at Surly Girl, one of my favorite restaurants in Columbus (it should be one of everyone’s favorites! They have the best cocktails and FRITO PIE. What sort of fool are you if you don’t like frito pie?).

And then there was dancing. This is the part I had someone else handle, because I don’t know where the kids go to dance. I only dance at my apartment, when no one is watching.

So, in summary, here are my tips for planning a bachelorette party:

1. Get help.
2. Ask the bride what she wants.
3. Make sure everyone drinks a lot.

Oh, and don’t forget you should buy the bride a few choice gifts. This is something I might not have known if I hadn’t been told (I’d been to exactly one bachelorette party before this one). The bachelorette needs, at minimum, a sash! Since my bachelorette gave us explicit instructions not to be…um, explicit…I knew I shouldn’t buy a tiara made of penises or anything. But maybe your bachelorette would like something like that. You’ll have to use your own judgement, but WHATEVER YOU DO, don’t get one of those “suck a buck” tshirts where you glue lifesavers all over it and then expect strangers to put their mouths on it. This is yet another bridal tradition that seems like something the mentally ill would engage in. “Oh, I just glued some candy to my shirt so strangers will pay me to eat it.” That’s weird. Don’t do that.

That’s basically all you have to do. Do you have any stories about particularly good or bad bachelorette parties you’ve attended or planned? Let me know in the comments!

*I did end up kind of regretting not going to a male strip club, because when I mentioned I’d never been, one of other bridesmaids said, “You’ve never been to a male revue??” and described it to me by saying, “They’re up on stage dressed like firefighters or policemen or whatever, and then after while they rip off their clothes and dance around in their disgusting banana hammocks. Then they grab you and pin you to a wall and thrust all over you, and the middle aged women go crazy.” It just…it just sounds like an experience.