Since my own wedding, several family members and friends of mine have gotten engaged (Yay, Lori!)…one of them got married last Saturday (Congrats, Lindsey!).  OTR friend, Naomi Seldin, will also be taking a  trip down the aisle (Woo Hoo!).  Here’s how she’s dealing with all that planning…

Planning a wedding? Congratulations! So am I. Five months ago, after I got engaged, I was overjoyed — and a bit overwhelmed.

I write about ways to simplify life and get organized, but when it came to wedding planning, I had a lot to learn.  Here is some of my advice about the initial stages that could help you save time, money and headaches.

1. Take time to prioritize. My fiancé and I have a small budget for the wedding, so we’ve had to make decisions about what we value most and can afford.  Having our loved ones and closest friends there was our priority.  We also wanted to give them a good meal at the reception and an open bar.  Most of our friends live in the same area we do, so we wanted to make it as easy and inexpensive as possible for them to attend.  That (and our budget) narrowed our search a lot.

2. Get organized. Mark and I have three main places we keep our wedding-related documents and research:

• A “wedding” file in my portable filing cabinet.  This is where I’m putting things like site contracts and receipts – any important document we might need later on.

• A wedding planner (a gift from one of my bridesmaids). Most of them have basic resources like to-do lists, countdown calendars, pockets for vendor brochures, and pages you tear out of bridal magazines.  If you don’t want to buy one, you could easily create your own binder and fill it with information available for free on Web sites like TheKnot.com.

• Online: Mark used Google documents to create spreadsheets for things like our guest list and possible venues. They’re shared documents, so we both have the ability to update them as needed.

To cut down on clutter, go through all three periodically and get rid of the things you decided not to use.

3. Pick the right venue. If you’re on a tight budget, find a venue that’s already attractive and has as much of what you’ll need on your wedding day.  Mark found a great restaurant for our reception that holds up to 80 people, the size of our guest list.  We looked at other beautiful sites, but realized pretty quickly that we would have to hire a caterer, rent chairs and tables and linens and a sound system, rent a tent in case it rained … you get the idea.  Renting out a restaurant ending up being the simplest option because it had everything we needed to wine and dine our guests, plus cool décor and an iPod-ready sound system.  It ended up being the least expensive venue we looked at, too.

4. Don’t go it alone. If you’re planning a big wedding and can afford to hire help, find an experienced professional to answer questions, negotiate with vendors, put out fires and shepherd you and your guests from chapel to dance floor.  If you can’t, accept help from your family and friends.

Being flexible and giving up some control can help reduce stress.  Mark has done a lot of the research, worked on invitations and designed our website; my future in-laws and my mother have offered to help with decorations and more. My sister, who got married two summers ago and is my matron of honor, has answered a lot of my silly questions and found dresses for the bridesmaids that all of them like.

5. “Your wedding day will not be the best day of your life.” That’s one of the first things my sister told me after I got engaged. And even though it sounds negative, it’s actually a comforting thought.  Danby had a small and relatively simple wedding, too, and it was a beautiful one. But, she says she had more fun on her honeymoon.

If you feel pressure to plan the “perfect day” or the “wedding of the century,” try to remember what the day is really about.  It’s the beginning of a marriage, not the end-all, be-all of your life.  You really need only four things to get married: a partner, a marriage license, someone to marry you and someone to witness the event.  If you’re lucky, the people you love the most will be there to help you celebrate, and you’ll all have a good time. The rest is frosting.

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About the Author

Naomi Seldin is a features content editor at the Times Union of Albany, N.Y.  She writes about how to live well with less at Simpler Living.

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