As a supplier in the Wedding industry for almost 10 years, I’ve surrounded myself indirectly with the sanctity and celebration of marriage every Saturday night for hundreds of consecutive weeks. I've had chats with countless brides before and after their Weddings. At SNAP/SNAP we work with couples of all different walks of life, but we’ve found that the same universal lessons have consistently popped up from our happiest married couples, and we’re here to share them with you so you can have the best experience possible at your wedding.
Be Prepared
I’d say the largest contributing factor to Wedding day stress is the scary thought of things that have been forgotten, or things that are likely to go wrong. It’s essential to reduce the likelihood of these two things occurring wayyy before the day of the Wedding. The more organised you are prior to the Wedding, the less likely things are going to go wrong. You want to make sure you have detailed checklists of things that need to be done before the Wedding, they should be marked off completely as they are finished, and if they need checking up on the day of the wedding, these should be noted and given to the event co-ordinator or your maid of honour or best-man.
Apart from physical preparation and being organised, you also need to mentally prepare yourself. Promise yourself that you have done the best job possible prior to the date and you will not need to check on things to make sure they’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing. The time for your work in managing this wedding has now come to an end and from here on out, if anything goes wrong, its not your fault, and you can’t feel guilty.
Delegate Tasks
I think most brides and grooms (but mostly brides) feel that the Wedding is this big task that they have to handle by themselves for the enjoyment of everyone else attending. It shouldn’t be viewed this way, I don’t believe you should feel isolated during the planning of the Wedding and especially not during the day of the Wedding. Your friends and family want you to have the best time, they don't want you to be stressed, they’re not here to be impressed if its at the cost of your own enjoyment. This is your wedding, and your friends and family want to do everything in their power so that your day is as enjoyable for you as possible. Which brings me to DELEGATION.
Delegate as much as you can to your best man, the maid of honour, the groomsmen, the bridesmaids, the event co-ordinator, your little cousins, everyone who you can trust with a task, you should delegate to them with clear instructions of how things should be, and when they can’t make an executive decision, have a 2IC like your best friend who would know what you would want done.
I can’t stress enough how important delegation is on the wedding day. As a bride or groom, neither of you should have to sort things out with your suppliers, this should all be sorted by your family or bridal party so you can focus on other things, like enjoying this special day.
Enjoy Your Special Day
We’ve touched on this a little bit before, but it’s important to remember that this is a day that is meant to be for the enjoyment of you and your partner first, and then by everyone else. I see too many couples using their wedding to impress their guests, and this isn’t a bad thing per se, but its not healthy if the impressing of guests is at the cost of the enjoyment of your own day.
For example, if you’re picking flowers for your wedding and your constantly worried about whether or not you’ve chosen the right bloom arrangement to match the colour of what your guests are going to wear, forget about it! You don’t want things like that clogging up space in your mind when you’re trying to enjoy your night. Your friends and family aren’t going to remember what colour the flowers are if what they see is you stressed out and freaking out the entire night. Enjoy your day and don’t feel guilty about it either if things don’t go to plan.
Be Present
Keep your attention on what is in front of you. It sounds cliché but your entire wedding day could be over in the blink of an eye if your head is worrying about different things instead of focusing on what is in front of you. Have beautiful meaningful chats with your family, friends and people you haven’t seen in a while, those are the moments that matter. Take photos with everyone, not just professional ones, candids, selfies, silly ones, these are some things that will melt your heart later down the line.
Learn to Laugh
Things aren’t going to go perfectly in every aspect of your wedding, there is a lot of moving parts and no one can be completely in charge of every minute detail of the wedding. Please be prepared to laugh instead of cry when little things don’t go exactly to plan. E.g. the DJ’s speakers might blow up half way through the first dance - continue dancing with full confidence without music – this will literally be a story talked about for years in the best way. The knife to cut the wedding cake can't be found – you cut the cake with whatever kitchen utensil that was closest too you – might have been a spoon (lol). The point I’m trying to make is, you can either look at these scenarios as hilarious memories that you will pass down to your children or minor insignificant things that completely ruined your night. Enter your Wedding day with the intention of making incredible memories for you and your loved ones, be happy and grateful for the things that went right, and have a laugh at the things that didn't go exactly to plan.
Conclusion
In conclusion, please remember that your wedding day is a day about celebrating the marriage of you and your soul mate in the presence of your favourite people. Plan it out the best you can, envision it to be an incredible and unforgettable night, but please don’t lose sight of most important things whilst getting caught up in the idea of throwing the perfect live-production fairy-tale.