Nalini's Marriage -Initial Process

Dear Friends,
I was off for the last 12 days due to my first younger sister Nalini's marriage on Feb 19th at Palani.
From Feb 18th to Feb 22nd Evening, lot of activities happened, which i couldn't foresee at all.

the list of stuff happens at a typical arranged Kammavar Naidu ( Naicker) marriage around Palani is listed here.

I would like to split this post in to two parts where i want to list out the rituals as well as my personal experiences.

The very first and important step is , If both Boy and Girl's Family agrees, Horoscope matching happens. If both the families are Ok with this then the marriage is almost over. But nobody can predict the surety. the background check also happens here from both the sides.

Then the procedures starts here
1.The Boys Family visits the Girls House ( Here around 100 people visited my house. it costed me Rs13,000 for food and other arrangements)
2. The Girl's Family visits the Boy's House. We were just 30 while visiting their house
3. Engagement(Nichayathartham) or Uppumatruthal ( Exchanging the salt) happens.
Uppumatruthal is the traditional ritual at naidu's marriage. We also did that. Both the families exchange the salt(along with Lemon , vetrilai, paaku) in front of a God like a confirmation that this girl is engaged to this boy. We did this ritual at Patathu vinayakar temple in Palani on January 18th.
4. Next printing the invitation cards happens.this also happened on the same day at a nearby press in palani.
5. The Boy's side buys muhurtham saree and Thaali ( Mangal sutra)
for the girl. these two processes too happened on the same day ( Jan 18th)
6. The invitation card is first kept prayed in front of the Family god and as well as in front of their favorite gods. We went to Kongapatti ( My family god's name is Maaviti Ellammal Temple) and prayed her.
7. The first invitation card is presented to the Maternal Uncle. We went to my maternal uncle's house at periyakottai and presented the card. then we can invite anybody with out any order. Usually this takes about 10 to 15 days of time. a very hectic activity. You need to eat or drink at every place you visit. so stomach and throat upset is a expected result out of this process.

once all this over the marriage process starts