The Ultimate Guide To a No-Stress Wedding
As a woman, one of the most important/exciting days of your life will be your wedding day. And for most women, it is also the most stressful. And from experience, I can say….. Yes. It is very stressful. You want everything to be perfect and look great and you want everyone involved to be happy.
NEWSFLASH!!!! That most likely will not happen…
Something WILL probably go wrong and/or at least one person is going to be unhappy at one time or another. But guess what, life goes on. All that matters is that you (and your fiancé) are happy.
For my wedding, I pretty much witnessed it all. The good, the bad, and the ugly. From the outside looking in everything looked gorgeous. But I don’t think the word count would allow me to list EVERYTHING that went wrong. But, I can give you some tips to make the wedding planning process a little less stressful for you. No one wants to be or work with a stressed-out bride so here is a short guide to being a stress-free bride.
Wedding Expos
My first tip would be to find wedding expos in your area. Vendors at Bridal expos give out free samples and they also have good deals that they don’t usually offer on a normal basis. We found our food caterer at a bridal expo. He had an awesome special where if you get $X amount of food you get that same amount added for free! So you could get $1000 worth of food for $500. You can’t beat that. A lot of the vendors also had contests offering free honeymoons, wedding cakes, wedding photography sessions, etc. I entered every one of them and actually won something! Even if you go and you don’t see any good deals, at the very least you can get some ideas and inspiration to use for your wedding and maybe tons of free food for you to try or take home.
Wedding planner
Get a GOOD wedding planner. I emphasized “good” because you want a wedding planner that is going to “plan the wedding”. I assumed that I was going to tell the wedding planner my “vision” and she would present me with what she came up with. What I got for my money was a middleman. She just directed me to a person who could do what I wanted and I had to deal with that person myself. I did that for the flowers, cake, etc and she just gathered everything up before the wedding… (not to mention she had on a t-shirt & lounge pants at the actual wedding but that’s another story for another time…) So make sure you and your wedding planner are on the same page as far as what you expect before you sign any contracts.
Infinity dresses
All of my bridesmaids were different in shape and personality, so I thought it would be hard to find a dress that everyone would like and feel comfortable in. But then I found the infinity dress idea on Pinterest and everyone loved it. This is a great picture of my Bridesmaids and My Maid-of-Honor in the Gold. They are all wearing the same dress, just in a style they picked on their own. I found an Etsy shop (thedaintyard) that made the dresses, I just had to tell them the color I needed. Each girl wore the dress in their own cute design and they all loved the fit of the dresses. Another plus is that the dresses are one size fits most and they weren’t nearly as expensive as traditional bridesmaid dresses.
SIDENOTE: Etsy is a great one-stop shop for several customizable items for your wedding. I got a LOT of things for the wedding including our cake topper, a monogram aisle runner, my garter, and a ton of other personalized items like our candy table boxes. If I can find the pictures I will include them in the gallery below.
DIY Photography
So many people are willing to pay top dollar to make sure their pictures are perfect and I was willing to do the same. I know this tip might be a stretch because wedding pictures are a huge deal, but before you book that professional photographer for $100 an hour, try it out yourselves or use some of the people you know like a co-worker who enjoys photography on the side. With the upgraded quality cameras on smartphones and a camera filter app, you may be able to create high-quality pictures.
For our engagement pics, we just found a nice place, a regular camera (this was back when digital cameras were still a thing), and a friend who knew how to point and click and they turned out a lot better than we expected. The picture above is one of my favorites. So we decided to go with those. That’s a good amount of money saved.
For the actual wedding, we decided to get someone a little more professional. Another small tip would be to use your network. We used the videographer from our church. He already had a good camera and since we knew him from our church he did it for a really good price. If you don’t directly know someone, ask your friends and family if they recommend someone. They may be able to give you a “Friends & Family” discount.
K.I.S.S (Keep It Simple Stupid)
I know we all like Pinterest. And I know if you’re like me, as soon as you got engaged you headed to Pinterest to find wedding ideas. However, I have learned that all Pinterest ideas are not good ideas. I found the invitation/RSVP idea to do a big tri-fold invitation with a pocket for the About Us/RSVP website and a pocket for a little map to the Venue. 1st problem: The invitations were too big and over the normal weight which means they needed more postage to send them out. 2nd problem: I don’t know if you will have this problem but most of my older family members are country, small-town people. They don’t like using the internet unless absolutely necessary. So that little RSVP section on the website you created goes unused. I think maybe 5 out of the 150 people who showed up RSVP’ed on the website.
We should have just kept it simple with a regular-size invitation and a postcard-size RSVP stuck in the envelope that was already stamped. All people have to do is mark yes or no and throw it in the mail. They don’t have to do much and you get an accurate guest list. Everybody’s happy.
I got so many cute ideas from Pinterest that did not go as well as I wanted them to. I won’t say just don’t do them because they may work well for you, but all that extra cutesy stuff will probably cost you extra time and money, and will probably go unnoticed and underappreciated.
Girls Night Out/Pamper Party
If you don’t follow any other tip, you should follow this one. After all the planning, organizing, and worrying, it’s good to have some downtime where don’t have to think about any of it. And what better way to do that than with a small pamper party with your closest friends? And I’m not talking about a bachelorette party. I’m talking about something small and relaxing with 2 or 3 of your best friends. Maybe just a vent session or just a time for girl talk and a spa day. Just a couple of hours of not thinking about those invitations you need to order or that phone call you need to make to the wedding planner.
Your wedding day will come a lot faster than you think and the most important thing you need to do is to enjoy it and have fun. It probably won’t go as smoothly as you’d like but don’t let anything ruin your special day. For example, My veil caught on fire at my wedding… I took my $200 veil off so I could dance during the reception and I didn’t realize that I sat it down over one of the small votives on the table. If I can shake that off and enjoy the rest of my wedding day there is no excuse for you not to enjoy yours. It was still a beautiful wedding and everyone enjoyed themselves. I will put I few pictures below.
Things are going to happen but most likely your guests are not going to know. And most importantly you are still going to be officially married the next day. So just breathe and take it all in. Let me know how you plan to stay calm and cool for your wedding in the comments. Or what mishaps have you experienced at other people’s weddings? Let me know in the comments.
