I’m thrilled to introduce Sarah Jane and her Madison Wisconsin wedding. Her advice is wise, and in-line with a theme we seem to be hitting on over and over lately: 1) You can probably let go of what you are obsessing over, because it’s not going to be a huge deal in the end, and 2) Bllllllooooggggggsssss. Wedding blogging is an *industry* now and we need to face that (a baby industry, but a industry none the less. I can say that because you know, I am *part* of that industry, even if only a small part.) but it’s a sneaky all-girl-talk industry that sucks you in. So if you’re freaking out about how you need to have a wedding that looks just like a wedding on the blogs, let me tell you: very few weddings look like tha,t and NO weddings feel like that. So let go of your balloons, your hair flowers, your mustaches on sticks, your beautiful calligraphy, your bicycles built for two, and think about how you want your wedding to FEEL. And yeah, in the end, that might include a hair flower or two (mine did), but it won’t be what matters. So with that, I’m going to let Sarah Jane preach her truth. Take it lady:
Well, I’ll just start out by saying I’m addicted to the internet. I was way before we got engaged, but post-wedding it’s even worse because I discovered blogs in the planning process. The only resource for wedding planning I knew when I got engaged was Martha Stewart Weddings, via my mother. Well, I turned to my lovely internet and slowly but surely I found wedding blogs (and The Knot, but I ignored that one early on). And then I was hooked. I have to say I was quite giddy when Meg emailed me back and I explained to my husband that Meg is a wedding celebrity (in my mind). I explained to him that the times when I felt compelled to share my blog love with him were Meg’s posts, which made it easier for me to explain to him why I was acting so crazy. So thank you, Meg, for this wonderful forum and community of support.
The way I see it now, with my 20/20 hindsight and 4 months post-wedding, is there are 2 major categories of weddings: traditional (where it is pretty much cookie cutter and there are certain elements and events that you “must” do and have in order for your wedding to be a wedding) and hipster/blog industrial complex wedding (where it is not a cool wedding unless you had bunting, photobooth complete with costumes and mustaches, rode off on a bicycle, etc.). Now, I do love these ideas. They are creative and fun, however they are everywhere in the blogworld and I got to a point where I was so sucked in that I felt we had to have them because everyone had them. This is not something that is true to us and frankly, I felt at some point that we were feeding into the short attention span of today of constantly trying to entertain people with new things and activities. People are at weddings to have fun, but also to talk. Friends and family are there to support the couple getting married and to catch up with each other while eating and drinking, and maybe dancing or some other activity if the couple decides they like lawn games,etc. more than dancing. It is important to take time to breathe and step away from the blogs and other planning materials in order for you to see what makes sense for you and not feel like you have a new pressure for those that have veered down the untraditional path. The wonderful thing about untraditional is that you can do whatever you want (provided whoever is paying for the wedding is okay with this).
Be creative. Keep it SIMPLE. We focused on doing the big things really well, and the small things, well some happened, some didn’t, and some worked halfway. But the big things people notice because, well, they are big (food, music, ceremony, location).
Perhaps the biggest thing of all was that the guests saw how happy and carefree I was, and I feel that it helped set the tone for the guests. I was able to let go and enjoy it. Let me just say, I am a control freak and perfectionist so this seemed like a tall order for me to try and fill. Everyone in my family and his family knows me quite well, so I wasn’t the only one wishing for this. Once I sat down in the chair for hair and makeup, I just said to myself, this is it. If something doesn’t work out, it will not matter. There were fires that needed to be put out, but my MOH and husband took care of them while we were relaxing pre-ceremony with a pitcher of WI beer.
That’s not to say that I did not have my moments of insanity pre-wedding. Case in point, bathroom baskets, out of town bags, and window decorations.
First, the bathroom baskets I believe were barely used (safety pins, bobby pins, hairspray), yet by the end of the night, the nicer items were completely gone (Tide to go pen, oil absorbing sheets). Not worth it.
The out of town bags were a struggle for me, but I nixed them. 80% of our guests were out of town. I felt like I owed it to them for making the trip to give them a map and something local in food and drink, but there was no inexpensive way about it and frankly the logistics of it were overwhelming to me. So, we focused on giving them a really great wedding (and rehearsal dinner).
Window decorations were unnecessary. If you can see in any of the pictures, the windows were 5’x5′ open air windows and I felt there just had to be something decorative. Half of them were taken down before the end of the night because they got in the way. And some of the others look kind of weird in the background of pictures. Keep the décor simple.
Thankfully, the things I look back on with the greatest amount of pride are: Our extended families came almost 100%! Those that didn’t come were because of serious last minute health issues that could not be ignored.
(This is Logan’s family welcoming me in!)
Our ceremony was completely written by us, and conducted by friends and family.
We said our vows and kissed and danced, a lot.
Keep It Simple – and apply this to everything. Just because you have extra time (or want to procrastinate), you do not have to spend it wedding planning. You can make decisions and move on with your life, despite what everyone else tells you. For example: in planning, do not overdo the research, and do not draw up 4 different contracts with 4 different caterers (I told you I was a control freak and perfectionist). Most decisions were made within 3 months of the wedding – and it was an 18 month engagement. The BIC kept overwhelming me with ideas and making me question the things I had settled on already. That’s a lot of ideas that I kept entertaining for a long period of time. It’s tiring. Just a quick (or not so quick) sidenote here: I handmade the invitations based on an awesome textured paper I found online. I slaved over these for at least 3 months, off and on. When they were finally finished and ready to send out, I almost caved and went with some other invitations because I wasn’t sure that my invitations would be as well received since I hadn’t really seen anything like them before. Logan kindly snapped me back to reality. 
And then the compliments on the invitations started rolling in and I realized that the invitation was completely mine and no one else’s. It was scary at first, but worth the effort to do something of my own inspiration and not somewhere online.
I realize this is easier said than done, I was told that it’s not that hard to plan a wedding many times during the engagement, but I didn’t really get it because I was planning 30 extra things that weren’t really necessary. Here’s hoping that some of you aren’t so sucked into the wedding planning world that you can actually process this information for what it is.
Finally, bring extra extension cords.
