Five Ways to Ensure Your Wedding Doesn’t Suck
You’re getting married in three weeks! Or three months! Or you’ve been roped into helping your best friend plan her wedding! Or someday you just know that you will meet Mr./Ms./Dr. Right and you want to be prepared. Whatever your current situation, Congratulations. How wonderful. Wedding planning can get crazy, but really it’s not that complicated. It doesn’t matter how low-key or over-the-top your wedding is, if you do a few basic things, you’ll be golden.
Play your cards right and on your wedding day there will be a moment when time kind of stops and you look around and see all of your friends and family (and maybe a few of your parent’s business associates) enjoying the hell out of themselves. I can almost guarantee that when you think back on it later, it will be this memory — you and your partner surrounded by all these lovely people having a blast — that will mean the most. In an ideal world, this kind of joy could happen spontaneously, but the truth is that you have to work to create an environment in which people can relax and enjoy themselves. So let’s spend a little time talking about the ways you can make your wedding the best it can be, shall we? Then you can go off and knock your nuptials out of the park!
1. It’s not all about you.
If you’ve ever watched any kind of reality show about weddings, you know that the biggest mistake one can make is to start saying, “It’s all about me.” In fact, you don’t even need to be a crazy diva who says it out loud, all you need to do is be thinking it secretly, and the damage will be done. Here’s the thing: It is most decidedly not all about you! The temptation for many is to think of this as their one chance to be the center of attention and to do whatever they want. Well, that might mean YOU have fun at your wedding, but it won’t mean anyone else does. If you want your wedding to be one that people love, then it needs to be just as much about your guests as it is about you. And the truth is that no matter what you will be the center of attention because, duh, you’re the one getting married. Plus, if you go out of your way to be gracious and make sure everyone has a good time, then people will constantly be coming up and telling you about how much fun they are having, thereby ensuring that you get even more attention. So, Golden Rule, Karma, Pay It Forward, etc.
Also remember that at its heart, a wedding is about two people promising to love each other in front of the people who care about them. Not to get all cheesy on you, but this shit is for real: your guests aren’t just there to fill seats, they actually play an important role in your marriage. Because they have attended your wedding, they are invested in the future of your relationship. Down the line when marriage isn’t a fun party but is hard work, these are the people who will help you stay married. They will be there to support you when things get tough, and they will be there to celebrate with you when things are good. These people are not extras in your Perfect Wedding Movie, they are a living, breathing part of your marriage — and they deserve your love and attention!
The best way to give it to them is to consider their comfort and entertainment as you make all the decisions, big and small, about the wedding. You need to strike a balance between throwing a party that is reflective of your tastes while still ensuring that your guests, whose tastes and needs may differ slightly from yours, are able to enjoy themselves. This doesn’t mean you should have a wedding that doesn’t convey who you are, but just as you would when you’re throwing a dinner party, you should think about what will make things easiest on your guests and whether they’ll be able to eat the food you decide to serve.
2. Focus on the personal, not the impressive.
A wedding doesn’t have to be elegant or expensive to be great. It can be in a huge ballroom or in your backyard; you can have 300 people or 30 people; it can be at the top of a mountain or in a church. It doesn’t really matter, as long as you’re excited about it. The bottom line is that your guests are there because they want to celebrate with you, not because they want free shrimp or want to spend a few hours in the city’s chicest event space. Yes, if a wedding is beautifully decorated and the food is the finest money can buy, people will ooh and ahh, but really what they will remember most is if they had fun. And you don’t need $300 centerpieces, filet mignon, or monogrammed napkins to have a good time. You can have just as much fun — sometimes even more fun! — eating tacos, drinking Budweisers, and dancing like crazy with the people you like most in the world. So don’t be fancy for fancy’s sake. Do what reflects who you are as a couple and people will eat it up.
Here’s how you do that: Set out your vision for the kind of wedding you and your partner want, then stick to it. It’s very easy — once the Wedding Industrial Complex grabs ahold of your mind — to get swept up in things, to convince yourself that you should spend more than you can afford to get those amazing invitations or the extra dramatic cake or that historic venue. (Those wedding magazines are so pretty, but also sooo very dangerous!) It might be worth it in some cases, but be sure you’re doing it because it is your fondest wish to get married inside of a space shuttle or serve cocktails garnished with gold leaf. Do not do it because you feel like you should or because other people will be impressed by the grandeur. Nobody but you will even notice half of these things anyway because they’ll be busy dancing, and really all they want is a yummy dessert — not to eat a to-scale cake replica of the lost city of Atlantis.
In the end, nothing will make your wedding suck more for you than if you feel like the event got away from you. As you navigate the often treacherous waters of wedding planning, remind yourself that you don’t want to wake up the morning after feeling like you threw your mother’s (or your partner’s pushy grandmother’s or Martha Stewart’s) dream wedding. Same goes for spending your honeymoon in a panic about how much debt you racked up. (Truly not worth it; weddings are important, sure, but so is being able to pay your rent!) So you need to be solid in your vision and budget and stick to your guns, even if that means standing up for yourself occasionally (in the most graceful and non-bridezilla way possible, of course).
3. Respect people’s time and money.
When you’re looking at how much money you’re shelling out for everything from food to favors, it can be easy to slip into the mindset that you’re doing people a favor by inviting them and that therefore they should be happy to go along with whatever you want them to do and buy you a nice gift and the rest. But, as we discussed earlier, this is never never never the case. As much as your guests may love you, they have inconvenienced themselves — taking time off of work, paying for airfare, hiring a babysitter, buying a new dress, etc. — to attend your big day, and so every decision should be made with that in mind. (Of course, if friends or family have offered to go above and beyond, don’t be afraid to lean on them for help with logistics, or catering, or whatever you need. A lot of people like to feel involved and love weddings and get really excited about all the details, so harness that enthusiasm!)
One of the nicest things you can do is to give your invitees as much information as possible well before the wedding is upon them. Let people know ahead of time what they can expect in terms of traveling to the event and the nature of it. (How much do the hotels run? Will there be a shuttle to take them to the wedding location or will they need to rent a car? Are kids invited? What exactly do you mean when you say the wedding has a “skydiving theme”?) That way they can figure out if they’re up for it and how much everything is going to cost.
Also, be careful about piling wedding events on too high. If your wedding is on Saturday night, don’t expect that everyone will arrive by Friday at 5pm in time for your rehearsal dinner and then stay through Sunday afternoon for the post-wedding brunch. This is not only a huge time commitment, it can also result in wedding fatigue for all your guests. So my humble advice is to make the wedding the main event, and be very flexible with all ancillary gatherings. One last little thing, if you’ve got people coming into town for your wedding, make sure to give them a map and some information about what there is to do nearby and where some good places to eat are. That way they can be more self-sufficient, and when they have free time they can easily go out and explore.
4. Plan, plan, and then plan some more.
Whether it’s fancy or super chill, expensive or on shoestring, you will need to invest some serious thought in planning any good wedding. You’re welcome to obsess about tablecloth colors and flower girl dresses, but be sure to pour just as much time into thinking about the less glamorous logistical side of things. There are one zillion online and printed resources to help you plan the specifics of any kind of wedding, so do a bit of homework and make sure you’ve got everything covered. Because no matter how personal and welcoming you mean it to be, if you don’t think through the basics, a wedding can go off the rails really fast. Regardless of the setting, there are a few things your guests will need no matter what: food, drinks, bathrooms, and someplace to sit. If you’re getting married in a traditional location like a church or a hotel, much of this will already be taken care of. But if you’re opting for some scenic overlook or your house or a hot air balloon, the onus is on you to figure out all of these details.
Food and Drinks
Obviously what you serve will depend on the type of wedding you’re having, but you should always endeavor to have food available for people pretty soon after the event gets underway because there is nothing worse than hungry guests — they get crabby fast! Same thing with drinks. People usually like to get started sipping on something ASAP, and unless there is some good reason (religion, it’s 8am, one of you is a recovering addict, etc.) people will expect that you’ll provide some alcohol — and, like it or not, they’ll be annoyed if they have to pay for it. Consider the non-alcoholic beverages too. For instance, if you’re getting married on a hot beach, make sure there is water that people can drink while they wait for the ceremony to start. Basically people who are hungry or thirsty get unhappy REALLY fast. They may not whine to you about it, but they will gripe amongst themselves, and it will cut down on their enjoyment of the whole experience.
Bathrooms
This may sound obvious, but you need to have plenty of bathrooms for your guests! If there isn’t great/easy bathroom access, invest some money to rent porta-potties. (They make really nice ones now!) This might even be necessary if you host the wedding in your own home. If you’ve got one bathroom and 100 guests, that’s going to be rough. And what if the one toilet backs up?! Secure enough toilets and your guests will thank you. (Actually they won’t thank you because things will seem so effortless that they won’t even realize there’s anything to thank you for, but you get the idea.)
Seats
It’s tempting to say “Oh, people can just stand,” especially if your wedding is in a more casual setting, like a beach or park. Sure, some people will be fine with that, but other people will not, especially if you’ve got elderly or infirm people coming, or if you’re getting married outside in the summer. You really don’t want people passing out during your ceremony. (I’ve seen this happen before, and it’s very distracting!) You want people to be able to pay attention to the proceedings, not to be thinking about how tired they are of standing there. So if the place you’re getting married doesn’t have pews, then rent some chairs or put down some picnic blankets — just don’t expect people to stand around for long stretches. Same thing goes for the reception. People want to be able to sit down while they eat, so make sure there are plenty of places to park oneself.
5. Engage your guests.
Get it? You want everyone to be super engaged with the whole wedding experience. (Sorry, mega-groan!) Anyway, the point is you should not bore or ignore your guests!
When you get deep into wedding planning, it’s easy to start thinking of the guests as a big block of nameless, faceless heads that will eat X amount of food and cost you X amount of dollars. But of course they are not! When you really stop to think about it they’re your college roommate and her nice husband with the weirdly wispy facial hair and your partner’s hilarious coworker who busts out those strange dance moves when he gets drunk. They are all the people who you like (or at least tolerate because they are related to you)! It may sound stupid, but as you go through the planning, try to envision your actual family and friends navigating the wedding you’re laying out. How will your ancient great aunt deal with the non-traditional table set-up you have in mind? How will your partner’s seven young nieces be able to tolerate the length of your ceremony? Will your rowdy high school friends be able to figure out how to get to the reception location on their own? (Nope!) Of course a lot of the specifics of what you’ll need to do depend on your particular wedding, but here are a few broad suggestions to guide you:
Don’t let people get confused
A key element of making people feel at home at any party is the flow of the event. You don’t want there to be stretches of time where people are wondering what’s going on or what they should be doing. Do not expect people to figure things out for themselves. If this were a regular party, you’d welcome someone into your home, offer to take their coat, direct them to the drinks, and help them insinuate themselves into the group. The same principle applies at weddings: The burden is on you, as host, to make sure your guests know what to do. If after the ceremony, you want everyone to walk two blocks to the reception hall, then figure out a way to make it clear that they should do that — print it on the programs, have the minister announce it, put signs outside pointing them to where people should go. If your partner’s family has a traditional dance they want to do, have one of them teach the whole group how to do it so that everyone can be part of the fun.
The shorter, the better
This applies to ceremonies, downtimes between different portions of the event, toasts, waits for the shuttle to arrive, etc. People get bored and restless a lot faster than you think they will, so why not err on the side of short and sweet. This isn’t to say you should just whip through every aspect of the wedding and get on to the next thing. Of course when something is deeply meaningful, give it its due. Don’t cut your dad off if he starts to ramble tearfully during his toast, and don’t delete the vows from the ceremony because they’re too wordy. But do keep timing in mind as you manage the flow of the entire day. If you keep things moving, your friends and family will stay excited and energized.
Give your guests things to do
People like to be entertained, so give them activities to do at the reception other than sit in their assigned seats talking to the same eight people at their table all night. Of course eating, drinking, and dancing are good starts but have some alternatives too. These will help mix the crowd up and give people who are dateless or don’t know their tablemates a chance to mingle. What activities you choose will depend on the tone of your day, but it could be anything from having people write messages to you on little cards (that you can later scrapbook, if that’s your thing) to playing carnival games (wedding dunk tank, anyone?) — whatever fits in with your theme and seems like it’d be fun for the people you’ve invited.
Take pictures of your guests
This sounds obvious, but it’s often overlooked: make sure you or your photographer get plenty of shots of your guests enjoying themselves. After all, this might be one of the few times this year where they’re dressed up and looking their best, and they’ll appreciate having some shots of them looking so hot. It’s also nice for you to be able to see what other people were up to at the wedding. One classic way to do this is to set up a photobooth-type situation where groups of friends can get their photos taken. (It doesn’t have to be an actual rented photobooth, just station a friend who’s willing to take some shots or set up a camera on a tripod for people to use themselves, and then email people the photos later.)
Provide a babysitter
If there are a lot of people bringing young kids to your reception, I guarantee that your parent-friends will love you eternally if you provide a babysitter to supervise and entertain the mass of children in the room. The simplest way to do this is to set up a kids’ table in a corner with some coloring and other fun gizmos and hire an experienced teenage babysitter or two to wrangle the young ones for the evening. This will minimize chaos, keep the kids from being bored, and allow the parents time to kick back and have some adult conversation.
Thank everyone for coming
Make a real point of mixing with the guests and thanking as many people as you can possibly stand. And if you want to give a toast and thank everyone en masse, that’s nice too. If ever there was a time to turn on your happy, outgoing, host/hostess personality, this is it. So even if you’re shy, try to push yourself to be as lively and chatty as you can be. You don’t need to be fake — theoretically, you ARE happy to see everyone — but on this day you are both yourself and a person playing the part of a bride/groom. Every guest wants to get a little facetime in with the happy couple, so you just have to grin and bear it. Yes, your cheeks will hurt the next day from smiling and talking so much, but it will be worth it.
Phew. Sounds easy, right?? Seriously, though, assuming you’ve followed your gut and put in the work and covered your bases, the wedding should unfold as planned. Basically, once you hit the rehearsal dinner, the train has pulled out of the station, and you’re just along for the ride. So your best bet is to let go and enjoy the party you worked so hard to put together. Your guests will be thrilled to be having such a great time, and you’ll be able to spend your time soaking it all in. Of course not everything will go perfectly, but it doesn’t matter. You will be so overwhelmed with talking to people and looking pretty to notice. So live it up and make the most of your fabulous wedding! Then enjoy your glorious wedding night and relaxing honeymoon, because when it’s all over you’ll have to buckle down and get on with the business of actually being married, which…Well, nevermind, you’re going to need a whole separate guide for making sure that doesn’t suck!