I have been thinking long and hard about how to help brides who are planning a wedding. This is one of the most stressful times in a girl's life. Every little thing seems like a life and death decision. You can't imagine how many tear filled nights were spent because I couldn't find the perfect font for my Save the Dates (not even kidding).
As I was pondering this, I kept thinking about all of the silly mistakes I made during the wedding planning process. I figured that if I could help someone avoid any of these wedding pitfalls, then it was worth writing this blog post.
Too Much Pinterest
I may or may not have started planning my imaginary wedding when I first got introduced to Pinterest…By the time I actually got engaged, I had accumulated hundreds of pins that were all over the place. I quickly realized that a mountain elopement with a $3000 ball gown and a mash potato bar was not going to happen haha! It was so hard to narrow down colors, style, etc. I would suggest that you start a whole new board for your actual wedding and only put relevant pins on there. It will save you a lot of endless scrolling.
Not Accepting Help
Let's take a little detour to talk about little Stacy. I have always been the "bossy" one. By the time I was in middle school I had embraced it and always wanted to work alone. I prefer to do everything myself so that it is to my standards. When it was time to plan the wedding, it was no different. I felt like I needed to hand pick every single detail. I spent hours researching and planning. Honestly, it was a burden. I had 11 months to plan my wedding and I ended up getting burnt out after a few months. Everyone always told me, "let me know if you need any help," and unfortunately I just blew them off. Although, I think somewhere down the line I let go of some of the decisions and it felt great!
Assigned Seating
This is a HUGE one. I was determined to have a formal ballroom wedding, and every wedding needs place cards and assigned seating, right? WRONG. This was the biggest headache. Franky and I spent a whole day trying to create a seating chart on a huge poster board with sticky notes. Once it was all settled, all that needed to be done was the place cards. Since I am a chronic procrastinator, I was making table numbers and writing place cards the last two days before the wedding. I actually had to run to Michaels the night before my wedding to finish up those stinkin' cards. That's not even the worst part. The day of the wedding, while I was trying to relax before the big entrance to the reception, I had ushers keep asking me where to sit people who did not RSVP. UGHHH, trust me on this one, no one will care (and some may even prefer) if they need to pick their own seat.
Thank You Notes
This is one this I feel really bad about. I carry the weight around to this day hahaha. There are so many parties (and gifts) when you are getting married. I had one 'despedida', one bridal shower, a shower at work, and of course a wedding. As hard as I tried to keep a list of all of the people that I received gifts from, I just could not keep up. Plus, when we came back from our honeymoon, our house was full of gifts. Many of which had no card, so we had no idea who bought them. In retrospect, I would make sure I recruited someone who is very organized to help me with this task. There are also a lot of high tech options for thank you cards out there. So let me take this time to give a quick shout out to all the people who got the hubs and I some awesome gifts, THANKS!
Wedding Album
This brings me great shame as a wedding photographer. When we were paying for everything associated with the wedding, an album got pushed to the back burner. I thought, “I’ll just design and print my own book later.” It’s been three and a half years and I still haven’t done it. It is one of my goals for this year though! Moral of the story, order one from your photographer! Save yourself some work and many years of procrastination hahaha. An album is an essential keepsake. Keep me accountable you guys, ask me about how my wedding album is coming along throughout the year until I post some pictures!