Tips and Tricks

Highly recommend a day of coordinator if you don’t have a wedding planner and have the budget for one.
My DOC handled the ceremony rehearsal, setting up the entire ceremony and reception space, let me know when it was ready for dances/cake cutting etc, and cleaned up all decorations and put them in our hotel room.
I was very good at planning buy and was so happy I could relax day of and just enjoy my day.

I highly recommend not going into debt for a wedding and keeping it as small as possible with COVID

Wish i kept it more simple. in the moment i thought that things like thank you stickers on goodie bags would be a nice detail but in reality it wasn't necessary. i spent hours putting stickers on goodie bags for instance haha when really, i didn't need them, people didn't really notice. and i could have spent less time and energy and $$ on something like that. i think what that made me realize was that we as brides/hosts want a nice experience and think that those kind of details matter or would be nice. and although they are, guests aren't always paying attention to things like that. they're there to support you, and so even if all i had was a plain dinner and nothing else, that would have been fine.

View Quoted Comment I reflect on the weddings I have attended as a guest and tbh for not one of them could I tell you what colour scheme they had, what I ate, what the centrepieces were etc. So I’m trying to incorporate that in my planning- no colour scheme at all ( I literally just want a colourful bouquet) and a few different flower stems on the tables as ‘centrepiece’ and a nice meal. We are throwing the money into providing craft beer and nice wine for guests and I’m making custom favours (photo coasters for the guests - a different photo for everyone) to make it a little more special and memorable. Keep it simple, less is more <insert other cliches here 😆>

Wish I got a massage the week of (so stressed), wish we knew nobody would notice any of the decor details only the bigger items of decor (and the venue).


Glad we had two photographers, chose a spectacular venue, and had a smaller wedding and local reception so we could splurge more on the events.

Don't stress the little things, especially little decor details

Great question!! I wish I had planned the processional better and distributed the lyrics each girl or guy would walk down at. Thank goodness we had a rehearsal where that issue came to light and I completed the timing at 2am night before my wedding 🥺 it worked out in the end! I’m really glad I ate my entire dinner, my Man of Honor ensured I ate all meals that day and drank water. Kept me sharp and feeling good!! Good luck with your wedding!!! ❤️

Here are some things I wish I didn't do and that I'm glad I did:

Glad I did:

1. Started Early!: Our wedding was in February of this year and got engaged in April of 2019, so we had about 10 months to plan the wedding. Less than a month after we got engaged we had our venue picked, booked and deposit paid, and we started looking at our Save the Dates, Invitations, Caterers and other details of the wedding. Starting early saved me when it came to stress b/c even if we did not buy everything when we first decided on it, we at least had all of our decisions made and were able to just go back to the website and purchase it when we were ready to buy things.

2. DOC: My husband and I's DOC was amazing! She works at the venue and I'm so glad we added a DOC into our venue cost. She took care of EVERYTHING!! If there were any issues or hiccups at our wedding, my husband and I knew nothing about it (and still don't) b/c she had everyone (including our vendors) go to her with any questions/issues they had.

3. Got organized with my planning: I planned my husband and I's wedding without a wedding planner so making sure I was organized was key! I bought a planner and made a list of everything that needed to be done for the wedding (at some point). I didn't make sure it was in order of how I wanted to do it, I just jotted down everything I could thing of that needed to be done. From there, I went to the "month at a glance" section ad wrote in what dates I wanted certain aspects of the wedding done/purchased by. I also wrote down what days we had meeting with our caterer, baker and our DOC at the venue.

4. Didn't go into debt for our wedding: My husband and I paid for our wedding 100% on our own without touching our savings account. We used the extra money that we had after our bills were paid and put half of that into an envelope. When it came time to pay for something for our wedding, we took it out of the envelope, put it in our checking account and then paid for whatever we had to. It made it super easy b/c we could always refer to the envelope to see what we had. We ended up putting so much in our envelope that we had close to $2000 left over after everything for our wedding was paid for.

Wish I didn't do:

1. Go with my sister's choice photographer: Don't get me wrong, I love some of our wedding photos, but we went with one of my sister's best friends and she, at the time, wasn't that experienced in photographing weddings. Our wedding was one of the first ones she did and our photos show that. I wish I would've put my foot down and would've gotten a better photographer (or possibly 2 photographers) to take photos of our day.

2. Booked our resort suite far away from our venue: Our wedding was on a Saturday and my husband and I booked a resort suite at the resort I work in the contract's department of for the Friday - Monday of our wedding week. The only issue was - our venue was 30-45 minutes away from our room. It was okay because I didn't drink at our wedding, but the ride back to our room was crazy long, lol.

3. Made my own dessert table: The idea was great and it did turn out great, but the process of making everything after underestimating how busy I'd be the week of the wedding was stressful. I love the dessert table idea, but if I did it all over again, I'd pay someone to create a it for me.