5 Essential Steps to Take When Planning a Wedding

If you’re planning on tying the knot in the near future, congratulations! But now that you and your significant other have made it past the proposal stage, you may find yourself asking, “Now what?”

Wedding planning can seem like a daunting task. Most brides and grooms-to-be aren’t professional event planners, after all. You may have suddenly found yourself in the position of having to do everything yourself, without the slightest clue of where to start. What do you choose first? The date? The catering? The dress? Wedding hashtags?

To avoid feeling overwhelmed by the amount of tasks ahead of you, experts recommend breaking your wedding planning into smaller, easy-to-digest steps to help you stay on track. Tackling these tasks one at a time helps to avoid the stress of thinking about everything all at once. Check out Nashville wedding dresses that make you shine.

Let’s get started! Here are the 5 essential steps to take when you set out to plan your big day.

  • Set Your Budget

Some people might argue that setting a date should be the first step when planning a wedding. While this is a very important step, setting your budget is what will set the rest of your plans into motion. The venue you are able to choose, the amount of guests you will be able to accommodate, and the date and time you are able to set aside will all be connected to the budget that you set for yourself ahead of time.

While the average wedding cost was around $28,000 in 2021, there’s no need to feel the pressure to budget a certain amount based on these expectations. How much you decide to spend on your wedding is completely up to you and your significant other. 

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  • Choose Your Theme

Do you want an English-style garden wedding, a breezy and casual beach wedding, or an elegant formal ballroom wedding, complete with a violinist and a five-tier wedding cake? There are nearly endless options for choosing the look and feel of your special day, but you will have to narrow it down before you can go on to the next steps.

The theme of your wedding affects more than just the colors of your linens. You will need to choose the appropriate venue for the kind of wedding that you want to have. The invitations, attire, decorations, music and more should all be a reflection of the theme and the level of formality you want for the big day.

After your budget is set, and you and your significant other have agreed on a theme that best suits your tastes, it’s time to move on to the next step.

  • Assemble the Guest List

It’s important to come up with a rough estimation of the number of guests you want to have early. This number will determine the size of the venue that you need, as well as the amounts of food, drink and seating that you will need to provide.

This step also includes choosing who will be in your wedding party – the best man, the maid of honor, the groomsmen, and the bridesmaids. Each of these people will require more consideration later, as they will each need special attire and accessories for the wedding, as well as helping the happy couple prepare for the big day.

  • Choose Your Venue

Choosing a wedding venue is an important step in planning for your wedding. You will need to find a venue that not only fits your theme, but that can accommodate the number of guests that you want to have, and that can provide all the necessary amenities for a ceremony or reception.

Many venues are booked over a year in advance, so you will want to get this step out of the way soon. 

  • Book Your Wedding Services

This step is actually a lot of smaller steps all rolled into one, but each one is as important as the last. Weddings can often require a lot of professional help in the form of caterers, florists, wedding photographers, decorators, bands and DJ’s, bartenders, and more. 

However, not all of these things are essential, and not every couple will need to book someone to provide these services. It is up to you which services you want for your wedding, and which tasks you would rather take care of yourself.

Conclusion

Once these five steps are out of the way, the rest of your wedding planning will feel like a breeze. Getting these steps done at least twelve months ahead of your wedding date will leave you plenty of time to focus on the smaller details, such as finding the perfect dress and planning for your honeymoon, without having to worry about the big-picture stuff.