If you’ve recently gotten engaged, then it stands to reason you’ve spent a good chunk of your time looking over blog pieces and articles about planning a wedding. An overwhelming number of these posts will contain advice on following a very specific checklist to hit each task at the right point in the process. While this is definitely useful for many, it might not be the perfect fit for your style. For some couples, convention is not appealing. If you want to allow your personality to shine through in your wedding, think over these alternative approaches to the usual checklist.
The Budget Should Always Be a First Step
While you can feel free to defy tradition with most planning tasks, the only step that always needs to happen early is determining the budget. Whether you’re hosting a conventional wedding or you’re throwing an event that is unique, you still need to have a general idea of how much money you can spend. Most checklists and planning guides will try to give you advice on how to break the money down in your budget and how much to allocate to each service. If you’re not following a traditional approach, keep the figure general.
Knowing how much money to apply to each service or purchase related to your wedding is a lot easier when you’ve got more of the details ironed out. Come up with a broad budget with your partner and start defining the exact parameters of spending as you go.
The Tasks You Don’t Care About
There are a lot of steps involved in planning a wedding. While you might feel excited about picking an outfit or a DJ, you might not have much of an opinion when it comes to invitations, decor, and floral arrangements. Making a choice when you don’t care one way or the other about the outcome is a unique frustration. Instead of forcing yourself to pick an option because you are required to, consider prioritizing in a different way. Decisions you and your partner have no strong impulses about can be made as early as possible to get them done.
In the case of picking out stationery for invitations, getting this step completed fast means you won’t be bogged down by the decision later. Whether you base the choice around style preference or your budget, getting tasks you don’t feel strongly about out of the way as early as possible means you can put your energy into the aspects of planning that actually excite you.
The Choices That Make You Feel Happy
While browsing wedding blogs, you probably have seen advice on do-it-yourself projects for your event. Whether the suggestions offer insight on creating centerpieces or making your own decor, the idea is to help couples save money and express themselves. However, not all people are going to have the same level of talent. If you have artistic abilities or are excited by the option of expressing yourself through crafting, DIY projects can be perfect for your wedding. However, you should not force yourself to take on more work just because it might save you a few bucks.
This is your big day. If the decisions you make are not giving you a sense of joy or excitement, it means you might want to seek alternatives that actually appeal to you.
The Priorities You Care About
When all is said and done, you have the final say with prioritizing your planning tasks. To truly make the most of your checklist, put the tasks in an order that reflects how much you care about each responsibility. This will make the entire process more fun and engaging.
Though having a guideline for planning a wedding is useful in many ways, it can also hold couples back. As long as you stay true to what matters to you, you can feel free to go about putting together your big day in whatever way you’d like.