In the Beginning...
After the engagement, decide on a range of dates/times when you hope to have the wedding. Negotiate at least 2 or 3 possibilities between the two of you.
Have a preliminary discussion about the size and composition of the bridal party. Identify the people who must attend the wedding.
Announce your engagement to family, friends and others, in roughly the order of their significance in your lives. Explore availability for your possible dates with those individuals whose attendance at the wedding is critical to the ceremony. Adjust your dates if necessary. Traditionally, people (parents) would publish a notice of the engagement in the local newspaper. Depending on the time to your wedding, some people choose to have an engagement party.
The Hard Work Begins......
Set the wedding budget. Be realistic. Identify who will be responsible for which bills. Create a spreadsheet or chart or other tracking mechanism, and use it, and be brutal. The wedding should be the start of a wonderful life together, not an insurmountable accumulation of debt. Remember the Honeymoon when you discuss budget issues.
Research and discuss the type of ceremony you want, the number of guests, the size and composition of the bridal party, etc.
Research and discuss the Guest List. Be sure to send draft lists to each set of parents, but discuss with them first your budget and the limitations that places on the Guest List. Be firm with them, but listen too.
10% of Your Time Has Passed... Already!
10% of your Available Time has Gone. If you had 10 weeks until your wedding, now you only have 9 weeks. If you have 2 years, then now you have a little less than 22 months.
Confirm availability for the dates. Start researching Wedding Sites, based on the approximate number of Guests you might have. Depending on how much time there is, the time of year, or your preferred locations, booking as much in advance is probably a good idea, but don’t book until the Guest List is close to being finalized.
Once you book the Wedding Site, consider sending “Save the Date” cards (depending on how long there is to your wedding). These are not invitations to the wedding, but merely advance notice of the wedding.
Start researching Reception Sites at the same time, as the availability of one might restrict the booking of the other. If you know you will have out-of-town guests, also research accommodations, to be sure there are places close by.
Start thinking about color schemes and themes for the wedding. Brides often will buy a library’s worth of bridal magazines at this point. At the same time, Grooms will discover what a billion-dollar business the wedding industry is and want to invest in said bridal magazines… At the same time, research your stationery – this is your invitations, RSVP cards, Thank you cards, etc.
Finalize the Bridal Party, the Guest List, the Wedding Site, and the Reception Site. Send out your invitations. Ensure that options for accommodations are included for out of town guests. Increasingly, maps to the Wedding Sites and Receptions are a good idea for everyone.
Start researching and book your Officiant. Often, Officiants book up as quickly as Wedding Sites, particularly for “in-demand” times of year, such as the summer. Deposits usually are necessary. Once you book your Officiant, starting working with him or her on the ceremony. Again, research is nice, if you want something unusual – a more personal statement of yourselves.
Choose your dress/ headpiece. Check the delivery period and order as necessary. Also choose the clothing and accessories for your Bridal Party.
Research and select other vendors, as desired: Photographers, caterers, florists, musicians or DJs, transportation to and from the Wedding, etc. Your Wedding Site likely will have recommendations, and these are a very good start since they will see hundred of such professionals and their work-product coming past them on a regular basis. Recommendations of friends and family are good too. It is always a good idea to actually meet the vendor in person before contracting with them, and if possible, to see their product – sample cakes, sample photos, etc. Look critically at such samples. My wife complains about our wedding photos because in all the group shots, everyone’s feet are cut off, and there is (as she says) a “half a mile of space” over their heads. The photographer was honestly surprised that she expected to see feet. His habit was to ensure that faces were the center of the photographs. If we had really looked at the samples of photographs he had shown us, she would have seen that.
Research and purchase your rings or other mementos of your union.
If you are having a rehearsal, consider a rehearsal dinner party. If you have out of town guests coming, consider organizing an event for them the evening before the day of your wedding (such as dinner) or for after your wedding (the afternoon, if you are having a morning wedding, or the day after, depending on when most of them are leaving). My wife had friends and family visiting from Canada and UK, and so we had a dinner for them before the Wedding Day, she had breakfast with them on the day of the wedding, and there was a planned activity the day after the wedding. We also provided them with lists of other activities and sites in the area that they could go see in their free time (but instead everyone came down with the flu).
If appropriate, sign up for Wedding Gift Registries and/or ensure that a family member is organizing a Bridal Shower.
Plan for the honeymoon, but first make sure that you share the same vision of what the honeymoon should be. For example, my wife and I were married in December, and I was responsible for booking the honeymoon. I envisioned a quiet, secluded, romantic honeymoon at a Wisconsin Resort. My wife's view was that it was a frigid, snow-bound golf Resort in a town that had shut down for the winter. (I still say it could have been a lot of fun, but then we both got the flu...)
Book your wedding night accommodations. If any Grooms are responsible for this, I recommend explaining your plans in detail to the Bride first. Also book any other accommodations that need booking (such as for visiting friends or family, or other members of the Bridal Party).
Start planning decorations for the Wedding Site, Rehearsal Dinner, Reception. Crafty brides will look around and quickly decide that they can make better decorations than anything affordably priced and on the market. Probably so, but when you have to do this 25 or 50 or 200 times while simultaneously working your “real” job, researching and finalizing the rest of the wedding, and ensuring that you both are well-rested and looking fabulous on the day of the wedding, it becomes less feasible. My wife is crafty and made all the decorations for the Wedding Chapel, the Wedding Reception, a Ring Pillow, and basket for the Flower Girl, and topped it off with a complete Santa Clause costume in real red velvet. She was up past midnight sewing the day before we left for the wedding, and could well have been described to have been grumpy by people braver than I.
Purchase Gifts for the members of the Bridal Party. Finalize your menu and music for the Reception, if you have not done this yet.
Contact guests who have not responded to confirm their attendance. Finalize the guest count and the layout at the Reception. Send this to each set of parents to ensure that you are not giving new life to old feuds.
Check your County to see the specific Marriage License requirements, and make sure you comply with them. Talk as many times with your wedding officiant as you need. Finalize your ceremony at least 2 weeks before the wedding day.
Make sure that any friends or family who are participating in the ceremony with music or readings know exactly what they are to do and when they are to show up. Have plain copies of the readings ready for the rehearsal, but for the wedding ceremony, print the readings on good quality heavy bond or cardstock paper and hand these out immediately prior to the ceremony.
Ensure that all members of the bridal party have their clothes in order and know when and where they are to report.
For the bride and bridesmaid (and mothers of the bride and groom), time at a beauty salon or spa together, well before the ceremony, to have hair and nails done while relaxing and bonding, is sometimes a really good idea to take the stress out of the day. If this is wanted, it is time to book this now, but make sure there is time for everyone to be done in plenty of time. At the same time, make sure the groom, groomsmen and fathers of the bride and groom go for haircuts and basic manicures too.
Talk to family and friends to see if someone will act as a Coordinator or Host for the day – telling when the other guests need to move on to the reception, sit down, stand up, etc. Usually this is a godparent, or close aunt or uncle. Pick someone who is good at telling people what to do (not shy).
On the day of the wedding, get dressed and try to relax. Grooms should have a lot of cash, credit cards or 1 or 2 checks with them, for tips and final payments, but do not stuff your wallet in the pocket of your tuxedo. Grooms should not be lumpy. The best man can hold the wallet for you or otherwise be responsible for it (Best Men also should not be lumpy). The groom or best man also should bring the Marriage License. Remember – no license, no Wedding. If there are rings, the Best man should carry these too, and distribute the Groom’s ring to the Maid of Honor at the appropriate time. The Maid (or Matron) of Honor, in turn, should hold a small, discreet purse (in her hands, not over her shoulder) behind her bouquet that holds a stain stick, chapstick, comb, small bottle of hairspray, the bride’s lipstick, and a couple of tissue paper. During the ceremony, stick the tissue in the bouquets, where it is handy but invisible.
The wedding should be enjoyable – meaningful and intense perhaps, but enjoyable. Do not panic about little details. At this point, just go with the flow and focus on the bigger issue that you are marrying your soulmate, your own true love, your best friends. Orange carpet and wilting flowers pale in comparison.
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