How to Plan a Wedding in LESS than 5 months
In the wedding industry, you hear a lot about couples who have a year long engagement & wedding planning process. While it is true that venues oftentimes book out months & even years out, it IS possible to get married within a shorter time span! Especially right now with how the COVID stuff is affecting the wedding industry, people now more than ever are rearranging or planning weddings in just a few months. One of my January brides planned her beautiful, large wedding in 4 moths and it was amazing, so I just had to pick her brain on HOW she did it! Whether you’re intentionally wanting to have a shorter engagement or COVID has forced you to rearrange plans, hopefully her insight and tips on how to plan a wedding in 5 months or LESS will help if you’re in this situation!
1. Decide on a hard timeline and have a 3rd party reinforce it.
Ben and I vacillated about when we were going to get married for a little bit, but when we decided on January, it was go-time. Ben proposed September 6th and we didn’t decide until the end of September that we would have our wedding in January. The next step we took was working on invitations. We knew that this was going to be a big event and that we were going to have to remember a lot of different people from a lot of areas and time periods in our lives. Because of this, we started our invitation list ASAP, which was a good decision because it was a long and (somewhat) tedious process. Being a perfectionist, I was very particular about how I wanted our wedding theme to come across and I felt that the invitation was a big part of that. After spending about 2 days looking at invitation styles, my mom sat me down and said, “Look, you’re going to decide what invitations to send out tonight or I’m going to decide them for you.” That may seem harsh, but it is what I needed to hear at the time. Having my mom there to reinforce the timeline when I was getting bogged down in details was vital in our wedding planning process.
2. Make your priorities and be less particular about the rest.
This one is HARD. Like I said, I’m a bit of a perfectionist and I wanted so many details to be perfect: the photography, the flowers, the food, the cake, the list goes on. But, since you have a limited time frame, you have to pick your top 1-3 things and be okay with everything else being great but not “perfect.” What are the things that you will look back on and either be thrilled with or regret? Is it the dress? The venue? For me it was the photography and the flowers. After that, I found things for the rest of the categories that I liked but maybe didn’t love.
3. Utilize friends and family for everything that you can.
When you plan a wedding with a short time frame many vendors are already booked for your day, which can make it difficult, especially if you have a certain budget or vision. However, having friends who are willing to help out can negate this problem. Ben and I were tremendously blessed in this way with our wedding. The wedding cake, venue, dress, meal, favors, directing, ceremony, hair, makeup, photography, and decorating were ALL done by friends and family. Considering the fact that most of Ben’s family live in Alaska, it was quite a feat! Additionally, most of the services were provided for only the cost of materials. The people who helped us out were thrilled to be a part of our day and we were thrilled to have them, so it was a win-win situation! If you have church, gym, or school friends who have any talents that they’d be willing to share, consider asking them; you may be surprised at the difference it can make!