BRILLIANT TIPS FOR MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR WEDDING DAY
Talk to any bride, or any groom, and you’ll hear the same thing over and over. “The day went by SO fast!” With all that you have going on during your wedding day, it’s hard to avoid the feeling of regret and sadness at how quickly it was over. Is there anything you can do to change this, to slow the day down?
Follow these brilliant tips from newlyweds to make the most of your wedding day.
ELOPE VS TRADITIONAL WEDDING
The type of wedding you are planning will come into play. An small elopement will be much different than a large traditional wedding. When Jade and David decided to elope to Italy, it was “just us and just love. It started early and ended late, so we took all the time we possibly could.”
For some, eloping is the easiest solution. For others, who dream of a more traditional wedding, you’ll need to take a different approach.
TAKE TIME FOR YOU
It’s wonderful to be surrounded by all the people you love most. But it’s really common to feel yourself pulled in a hundred different directions. One bride offered this sage advice, “Make the day about you!” And many, many others agreed.
Take time for yourself, as a couple. Walk away together, away from everything for a few minutes. Have a moment to let it all sink in. Another bride shared her thoughts:
“I think couples need to take more time out of their day for moments to breathe. Immediately after our wedding ceremony, my husband and I walked away from everyone, as we felt that we needed that time away to just breathe and reflect and enjoy our happiness. It was the one moment I recall where time actually seemed to have stopped. I wish I would have done this more throughout the day.”
BEING ORGANIZED
It’s a lot of work, planning a wedding. Truly! But here are a few suggestions that can help ease the load on your wedding day.
Prepare an master itinerary that everyone works off. “I had prepared an event itinerary and everyone had a copy – it sort of became the bible for the day.”
Also, delegating tasks to your spouse, family and friends is a great way to ease the stress. Choose your team well, and don’t wait – delegate early in the process.
Make sure everything is done the day before, or even a few days before, so you can sit back and relax! If it’s not done by the morning of, it’s not likely to get done at all – and if it’s not done, it probably wasn’t that important anyway.
Try not to schedule too many things in the day. Spread the day out, it’ll be a long day but it’ll give you time to actually breath and appreciate the meaning of what’s going on around you.
“And don’t worry about the little things. If the decor is not exactly what you had imagined, or dinner is served 15 mins later than planned, in the end it doesn’t matter. That’s not what you or your guests are going to remember.”
Not the planning type? If you have the budget, hiring a good wedding planner will make your life so much easier. But if you don’t have room in the budget for full planning, consider having a day-of wedding coordinator – it will save you a boat load of stress when the wedding day arrives.
Another option – assign a family member / close friend to be the day-of contact for all things. Any problems come up? Questions of where to place the decor? Have everyone call them instead of you! That way, you are able to sit back stress free and enjoy the moment as fully as possible!
(click here for more advice on planning your wedding)
TIME FOR FAMILY AND FRIENDS
Having your friends and family around to support you is one of the best things about having a large wedding. The problem is finding the time to actually talk to them all! You’ll hear a lot of people share these thoughts:
“We went out of our way to greet every guest there…it takes a long time, and we really only talked to each of them for a couple minutes. Wish we would have been able to talk to our guests more!”
Best advice? Create additional events before or after the wedding. Consider having a get together before the wedding, or one the day after to ensure you spend time with each of them.
“We had all our family come to a BBQ the night before, and we did brunch/dinner with them the day after to ensure we spent enough time with everyone. Our family members are still talking about how much they appreciated that.”
SEPARATE PHOTO SESSION
One more suggestion to give you more time on your wedding day is to shorten up the photo session, and plan to go out again a day or two after the wedding. This gives you another chance to wear your wedding dress, and the photos will be much more relaxed since there is no timeline to follow. Another bonus? You can shoot when the lighting is best, which is usually just before sunset.
(read more about why you should include an after session with your wedding photography here)
AND DON’T FORGET ABOUT THESE
Finally, here are some random suggestions to help you out with your wedding day.
