Online Wedding Planning Guide

These paragraphs are where I get to spout off, give advice, and relate some arguing points. I supply grooms with the tips for how they can contribute . . .and how to make it look like they’re paying attention the next time their bride wants to "talk." I wish it were all bubbles, angels, and satin for you and your bride, but somebody has to get down to brass tacks, and I was elected.

The Wedding Notebook is an excellent starter. The two of you should shop for it together. Yeah, I know, but it scores points you’ll need later, especially if you want a bachelor party.

Photo holders make a nice addition to these notebooks after the wedding. That way, she can keep the "after" photos with a sort of "before" journal. She’ll get a kick out of it in later years.

While you’re at it, buy a "Bride’s Bag" for her or suggest that she make one. This would hold her notebook, cell phone, and the like. Notebooks get lost. A lifetime of habit ensures that a woman’s not likely to leave a bag behind. You should also suggest that she make more copies of her handouts than she thinks she’ll ever need, because those get lost, too.

It might be a nice time to invest in a small fire safe, too. You can keep all of the vendor contracts and stuff in there. After the wedding, photos and time capsule kind of stuff could go in there as well.

IMPORTANT: Suggest all these things offhandedly and seemingly unrehearsed or she’ll expect this level of attention throughout.

It’s also vital that you not be the one to close the doors on her dream settings and trappings. If something’s too expensive or impractical, give her time to come to that conclusion on her own.

Okay. Now to "The Talk." Actually there will be many more than one. To fully understand, take as given that there’s the way things ought to be and the way they are. First off, this is not “your wedding, too.”

What does that mean? When your bride asks your opinion, what she actually wants is to tell you why you’re wrong. She’s already made up her mind. If she says she’s flexible on something, she is lying to herself. It’s really not her fault. It’s just that no matter what you say or when you say it, it’s too late for changes. NEWSFLASH: It was too late when you met her. She’s been dreaming this one up since she was old enough to visualize the dream man she gave up on when she settled for you. She really is the one who cares most.

Second, when you have a discussion about the particulars, and you get her to agree that you’ll take time to think about it and settle it later, she means by tomorrow noon. This isn’t her fault, either. The perception of time is gender-specific. This schism in language is a lot like apocalyptic religion; "later" and "soon" mean different things to different people.

Brides decry the male’s "lack of meaningful input." The reality is that men often give up submitting input after a spell because they realize that "meaningful" is synonymous with "agreeable." These consultations are very similar to those all-night discussions where her mind is made up. For some reason she wants you to try to convince her otherwise and fail. To guys, this is pointless and a waste of time.

Maybe you do have ideas and maybe you do care as much about some aspect as she does. You might enjoy debate. It could happen. Tell her now. Don’t wait.

As for the rest of us:

There are things that should not be, like dogs in tutus, cats in sweaters, squirrels on water skis, and grooms picking silver patterns.

You see what I mean. So try explaining it to her.

Tags: 2. Figure Out What Matters by Mike
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“Isn’t this his wedding, too?” you’re asking. Well, yes it is. And it definitely is important to make sure that the wedding you envision isn’t totally out of line with what your beloved has in mind.

The only difficult part of that important task is that, in many cases, your beloved has no idea what he has in mind. I’m sure it comes as no surprise to you that men do not tend to fall into the Pre-planning wedding crowd that has been imagining this event a hundred different ways since they were five years old.

Men more closely resemble those women for whom it takes some time to realize that just saying you’re willing to get married doesn’t actually get the job done. The difference between men and these non-planner women is that when men realize that somebody needs to get on the ball and make this wedding thing happen, men also know that that someone does not have to be them.

Many women find dealing with their beloved’s lack of meaningful input to be one of the most frustrating parts of planning a wedding. If you are one of those rare women whose fiancé loves nothing more than to page endlessly through catalogues of invitation designs and discuss with you the pros and cons of each, then the following advice is not for you.

For the rest of us:

1. Recognize that when you ask your beloved where he wants to have the ceremony, and he says, "You’re the one who cares. Why do I have to decide?" he’s not totally off the mark. In all probability, you do have some set-in-stone rules about where you’d be willing to be wed.

Be sensitive to each other’s wishes and styles. The wedding should be an expression of the coming together of two individuals and a blend of who they are and where they come from. This came into play in such areas as where we got married, the vows, who stood up with us, and the food we served. — Anne



The last thing you want is to ask your beloved where he wants to have the ceremony only to have him enthusiastically exclaim, "How about at the Star Trek: The Experience exhibit in the Las Vegas Hilton?!"



His first attempted contribution to your nuptials would then be met with (I’m guessing here) you crying, "What are you, crazy?!" in a tone of horror and disappointment. Such an encounter is unlikely to leave him excited about participating in the future.




2. Provide your beloved with limited options and real decision-making power. For example, identify a few locations where it would be acceptable to you to hold your ceremony. Present those to your beloved as options and then let him choose.

If you say, "Would you rather get married on the beach at sunset or in my parents’ church in Vermont? " your beloved is likely to have and be able to voice an opinion. If he chooses your parents’ church in Vermont, you can’t then spend the next two hours trying to have a debate about why the beach would be better. When he gives his opinion, let it count.

Also, don’t be too annoyed if you give him this kind of limited choice and he responds by saying, "Why did you narrow it down to just two choices without talking to me about it more?" This will be despite the fact that you tried to talk to him about it more, but he told you he had no opinion.

Take a deep breath. You’ve meditated and mentally prepared yourself ahead of time.

Smile and look deeply interested as you say, "Oh, fabulous! You have a different option you want to talk about?"

Then sit back and listen to him mumble about how he could have come up with one if only you’d talked to him earlier. Tell him you can’t wait to hear his ideas. A couple days later ask him again about where he’d like to have the wedding (or whatever the topic is). I can almost guarantee that he’ll voice an opinion about those limited options that you provided him with in the first place!

3. If you determine an area of the wedding about which your beloved truly cares more than you do, let him have sole control of that. This means that if he chooses to demonstrate his leadership of that part of the wedding planning by completely ignoring it until the last minute and then running around like a stressed-out headless chicken, so be it. He does things his way, and you do things your way. Better get used to it. (This is excellent practice for your marriage, where you’re going to have to hear that he’s "about to" fix the broken hinge on the cabinet for months—possibly years—before he actually does it.)

In this site, you’ll find a special section set aside for the male point of view at the end of each chapter. WORDS FROM THE GROOM will give you a little insight into what men think about each step of the process their women go through. Be warned, what they think is not pretty!

Tags: 2. Figure Out What Matters by Debbie
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There are those who say that I’m obsessive about notebooks. (You may soon be one of them.)

But I want you to hear me now when I say that the presence of a notebook in your wedding plans (I would say in any plans you have for your life—but that might sound obsessive) will be the difference between success and failure. You must have a Wedding Notebook.

In your Wedding Notebook, you’ll either write down (or print out, if you write things down on the computer) the things that you just realized (during the previous exercise) are essential to planning the wedding you really want.

Later, you’ll write down everything from the names on your guest list (that will require several drafts) to exactly what you want your florist to do in the hours prior to your ceremony.

Your Wedding Notebook will contain very personal information, but it will not be private. In fact, for you to plan the wedding that you really want, it’s essential that the notebook not be private. (Use a diary or journal if you need to write down private thoughts. That way you get to have multiple notebooks! )

Example Uses of Wedding Notebook

1. Use the notebook to provide your bridesmaids and other delegates with lists of their responsibilities.
2. Keep lists of important addresses and phone numbers.
3. Use the statements you’ve written in the notebook to communicate your wedding vision to your vendors (in fact, it doesn’t hurt to make copies of your vision description and hand them out to your vendors).
4. Compare different vendors of the same product, to choose the vendor (florist, caterer, etc.) who will be best for you.
5. Clip pictures from magazines that represent the effect that you want to achieve with your flowers or your dress.
6. Depending on the type of notebook you choose, you may file incoming information such as vendor contracts with your notebook.

Type of Wedding Notebook.

Keep a couple options in mind when selecting your Wedding Notebook.

1. When you’re removing pages and passing them out, it’s nice to have a small, wire-bound notebook with smooth perforations. This notebook type is also the easiest to keep on your person at all times. However, if you choose this notebook, you’ll have to supplement it with a folder in which you can insert pictures you tear out of bridal magazines, copies of formal letters you send out, and vendor contracts that come in.

2. A three-ring binder with some blank insert pages takes up more space in your briefcase but allows you to have one location where you write notes and file incoming paperwork. You can supplement it with all kinds of insertable pockets and magazine hangers, etc. You can do just about everything with a notebook these days, but it will be bulky. Decide whether you’d rather organize with one tool (a binder) or two (notebook and folder).

3. A lot of your wedding planning is best done on the computer. A spreadsheet program (like Microsoft Excel) lets you make a list of every person you’re thinking of inviting and then columns in which you can denote whether you’ve invited them, they’ve RSVP-ed, they’ve sent a gift, you’ve sent a "Thank You" note for the gift, etc. Tracking these kinds of things on a computer is great, but it doesn’t negate the need for a Wedding Notebook, in my opinion, because you can’t carry your computer around with you. You’ll need to print out the data that you’ve put in your computer files, and once you do that, you’ll need something to keep it safe and organized in: the Wedding Notebook.

Even if you have a personal organizer, which essentially is a computer you can carry around with you, I believe you still need a Notebook to store in-coming paper (contracts, magazine pages) and to allow you to hand out information to others. When personal organizers come with teeeeny tiny printers, they’ll be awfully close to ideal. Maybe magazines will be all digital by then, and you won’t need a Wedding Notebook at all. I’ll probably cry if that happens.

Tags: 2. Figure Out What Matters by Debbie
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Ask yourself why you are having a wedding at all.

Why not go down to the courthouse and get married in front of a judge tomorrow afternoon (or as soon as you can get a license)?

I’m serious. Think about that question carefully. Your answer to this question reveals a lot about what’s important to you in your wedding planning.

Once you get consumed by the planning process and “I am planning the perfect wedding, and I’ll do whatever it takes” becomes your daily mantra, you lose grips with the real reason why you’re getting married, and forget that you’re about to embark on one of the greatest adventures in life: marriage and starting your own family. – Mika

If the first thing that pops into your head as a response is, “Oh, no, I can’t elope. I’ve always pictured myself in the white dress with the veil and gloves, holding flowers,” then you know that achieving those elements in your wedding is important to you.

If your response is, “I can’t elope. I really want to share this experience with the people I love,” then you’ll know that you should spend money on your guest list (in terms of affording food and space for all your guests) as you plan your wedding.

Prioritize what you think is important so you know where you can compromise (and you will have to). – Angela

On the other hand, if your response is, “I can’t elope. My mother would kill me” then maybe you should let your mother plan your wedding.

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Did that suggestion just give you the chills? Even if it didn’t, you should really try to get an image of what you want from your wedding, or don’t bother having one.

Think about the courthouse thing again. Really get the image in your head. Today you’re engaged. Tomorrow you and your man go to the courthouse and come out married. You’re married forever. That’s the end.

How do you feel about that? What doesn’t feel right to you? What elements of that image make you feel disappointed? Are you saying, “But I won’t have any wedding photos to show my children” or what?

We wanted things and details to be appropriate for us, not everyone else in our families who seemed to have very different needs and expectations of what our wedding should be like. — Coleen

Identify those elements of a wedding that it would really break your heart to live without.

Ask yourself: "Why do I need a wedding in addition to a marriage?"

"If I couldn’t have a wedding, what would I miss most?"

"What does that suggest is most important to me in my wedding?"

"What area of my wedding does that suggest I should spend the most money/effort on?"

Copy that list a few times and post it in strategic places around your home. By your phone and taped to your fiancé’s head are a couple particularly good posting spots because those are likely things for you to be looking at when the wedding frustration rises too high, and you have to remind yourself why you started this extravaganza in the first place.

Just as an aside, if thinking about the courthouse wedding raises no negative feelings in you whatsoever, maybe you should consider it. There’s nothing wrong with getting married the cheap and easy way. You can always throw a party or an anniversary “wedding” celebration some time in the future when your circumstances warrant it and your heart desires it.

This is your wedding. Now that you know what you want, you can go out and get it.

Tags: 2. Figure Out What Matters by Debbie
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The first thing to do when you plan your wedding is to figure out what it is about a wedding that matters to you. What’s really important?

If I thought there was only one right kind of wedding, if I believed that it’s wrong to have a lavish wedding or a Halloween-themed wedding or any other particular kind of wedding, then I’d write a site to help you listen to every word your wedding vendors (and other wedding "controllers") say.

If I believed that there was only one right kind of wedding, then I’d praise wedding vendors when they feel compelled to point out that YOU are not a wedding professional. THEY are wedding professionals. THEY plan weddings all the time. What can YOU possibly know about planning a wedding?

BUT I DON’T BELIEVE THAT. I created this site because I believe that you know something crucial, that no wedding vendor on Earth can know better than you.

You know YOUR dreams.

You know what YOU want, and whether it’s a very typical thing to want from a wedding or a very unusual thing to want doesn’t matter to me at all. What I care about is that you come to the end of your wedding and think, "I made my dreams a reality," not "I sure am glad I didn’t make my vendors do anything unusual!"

I don’t care if what you want is average. Average is fine with me. Not average is fine with me. I care that you want it. No matter what "it" is (as long it’s not harmful to yourself or others, of course).

By “Figure out what matters,” I don’t mean, “Forget about all those fanciful details that you should be mature enough to know aren’t important." Not at all. If what matters to you is having swan-shaped ice sculptures twice the size of the ones your sister-in-law had, more power to you. There’s nothing wrong with what’s important to you about your wedding. It’s just that you need to know what it is. Then you need to convey that to others.

The process to getting the wedding of your dreams is as follows:

1. Know what’s important to you in your wedding.
2. Make it easy for others to know/remember what’s important to you in your wedding.
3. Watch others like a hawk to ensure that they create what’s important to you in your wedding.

For our next topic, we’ll start with step 1, and your first exercise on the road to planning your dream wedding.

Tags: 2. Figure Out What Matters by Debbie
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