With ABBA's greatest hits on repeat, the wedding planning has been cruising right along. Depending who you ask, we're drastically behind or doing just fine. According to my meticulous spreadsheets, we're rockstars and the naysayers are officially off the guest list. Since most else in life has been taking a back seat during all this, figured some update to prove I'm alive and that we're making progress wouldn't go amiss. So, here's some stuff that's gone down on the planning front since the engagement, and a bit of a follow up to some of those fabulously half-assed answers from November.
- We have a date! And it's less than a year out from the day we got engaged - no pressure! By the end of September 2019, we'll be oh so officially husband and wife. We're pumped to have locked in a fall slot. Our logic: summer would be way to sweaty for me, winter could cause travel issues, and spring was too risky for the dreaded "rain on your wedding day" that Alanis Morissette ironically warned against (plus I didn't want to wait til 2020, to be honest). Added bonus: our date comes with a built in theme song, so we'll never forget our anniversary!
- We have a venue! We basically picked a mansion by the lake. Because, why not? Added bonus: we get it for the entire day, which means I will be lounging about the place in my PJs and pretending it's my house all morning.
- We have a photographer and a DJ! After buckets of research, we signed some legit looking documents and parted ways with a few more deposits. We've got a wizard set to go behind the lens, a nerdy crew for the jams, and all the uplighting you can handle (because I insisted). Added bonus: we also managed to finagle some discounts! Holla!
- I have the dress! Speaking of discounts, holy shit did I get a deal on the dress. I had been researching and pinning, and just went to go check out a shop with my mom, very casually, with no intent of even trying a dress on, but the woman at the shop was so chill and before I knew it, I I was buying my dress! Added bonus: originally, the dress was almost two grand, and I got it for $400! (As a midwest gal, the glamour of the deal is almost as important as the glamour of the dress!!) It just will need a little bit of alteration (adding a bustle, tightening up the bust - but else it's almost my size as is!) and wham, bam, thank you ma'am!
- We have a color scheme! And yes, I caved and made an effin' Pinterest board of it (DM for link - because I know everyone has just been holding their breath! lol).
- Some things are still in the works:
- We have a tentative plan for officiant, guest list, and wedding party, just need to do some communicating on all that.
- Hotels, the website, and all date saving / invitation type things are still being tinkered with.
- I have about fifty different game plans for the DIY chuppah I'm going to build. Chuppah begets centerpieces, so once I nail that down, I can properly plot tables out.
- I've got a shady scheme going currently for florals and cake - should it all go to plan, will post about that some day.
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| Wisconsin: it's where our love story started, so it's where we're getting married! |
Important things I've learned:
- Haggle. It's expected. Worst case scenario? You don't get a discount and pay what you planned to pay anyways. Else, many aspects can be customized to save cash moneys.
- Meltdowns. They happen. Don't try to be tough, just let that shit out and move along. That's how you keep them as mini, bite-sized anxiety attacks ... instead of family-sized.
- Wedding Expos are a circus, in hell. If you attend, have a game plan. Be aggressive and hit up the bar immediately. Bring address labels with your name, email and wedding date/venue on them so you don't have to fill out a million little slips to enter into drawings - because that's why you're there. Drawings. And cake samples. The rest is just fluff. (I could do an entire post on the nightmare that was the one expo I attended - if anyone wants to hear that saga, let me know!)
- Kindred. There's a lot of other brides-to-be out there. Band together, ladies! Because the war stories are great, and it's nice to compare notes. (There's also a lot of ladies who are wived up already, who have the value of hindsight to help calm any worries.)
- Make it rain. Money means nothing anymore. The wonderfully foolish amount of cash thrown at weddings is a fun little game of trying to spend less. All you can do is just remember your budget, and make a plan for bringing in extra dough if you find yourself wanting to go over. (In the beau's case, he works overtime to make more - in my case, I spend less the save more.)
- No monsters here. Putting your foot down does not make you a bridezilla. (She who is in charge of planning, gets to have final say on plans.) Feeling stressed does not make you a terror. This is a major life change, and that sort of metamorphosis isn't always pretty, but in the end you come out a butterfly - so it's all good.
The best thing about all this? The beau hasn't been scared away by all the planning. Now that the big boxes are checked, we're just getting excited about all the little details we'll get to have for what's going to be a wonderful day. One wonderful day, one perfect point in time, to kick off what will be a wonderful lifetime. Sure, we'll kick it off with a little less cash in our pockets, but with just as much love in our hearts. (Cheesy enough for y'all?)
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