Happy New Year! Here at Believe Bride we are ALWAYS ready to help our brides find their perfect dress. A new year means new brides for us and so much to look forward to! If you are recently engaged or awaiting your bridal appointment, here are a few tips as you enter a new year and continue preparing for your big day! Whether you’re big on resolutions or you are always looking to better yourself, use these tips to make your wedding day go smoothly and beautifully!
5 Tips to Prepare for the Big Day!
Prepare your guest list
Solidifying the guest list can be a daunting task. Some prefer a small wedding while others want the whole shebang! Either way, be sure to get your guest list rounded up and documented! Hand written invitations can be the personal touch many dream of while others may prefer to type and print out those addresses and save some time! Whichever you decide, make sure to get started on this task ASAP! The sooner you can notify your guests about the day the sooner you can nail down your attendees. Most people recommend sending out a save the date 6-8 months ahead of time. For mostly local guests, 6 months is plenty of time and you may be able to send them a little later as well. But if you’ve got lots of guests needing to nail down travel accommodations, the sooner the better! Save the dates are great to notify your guests and put your date on their radar. While save the dates are fun and easy, if you plan to send a formal invitation as well you can plan to get that out about 8 weeks before your wedding date.
2. Create a checklist
Let’s be real — not all of us are planners! Planning a wedding can be overwhelming and difficult! Make life easier by creating a checklist! Talk with your partner and decide on what is most important to have on your big day. Once you do that, create a checklist to ensure that each item on your list can be made a reality. If you’re not good at creating lists or you’re feeling overwhelmed, there are tons of wedding planning apps and websites that can help you do this! Find your favorite one and then get planning!
3. Set up your bridal appointments
If you’re newly engaged, we recommend getting your appointments set up to find your dress! While some can be purchased off the rack with small alterations needed, if you find a dress that needs to be ordered, it can often take up to 6 months to make the dress and then need additional time to complete alterations. Don’t let this task become a stressful nightmare! Find the dress early to ensure you have enough time to get the dress in and get those alterations done. Lucky for you, here at Believe Bride we make the whole experience so easy for you! Get your bridal appointments scheduled today and let us help turn this task into a fun event!
4. Pick your venue
Unless you have personal connections, this can often be one of the more difficult tasks to complete for our newly engaged couples. Whether restricted by budget or trying to find a place with availability on your date, it can be overwhelming to find the perfect venue. Make a list of the things you want in a venue — ie. outdoors, a room to get ready in, accommodations for the ceremony and reception. Once you decide which are non-negotiable, it will make it easier to search for venues that fit the bill. Call ahead once you pick your date to ensure you have a space locked down and ready to go. Once you have a venue, it makes it even easier to get those initiations ready to send out!
5. Ask for help
Sometimes we get wrapped up in the whirlwind of excitement when we get engaged and forget that we don’t have to do everything ourselves! When things feel like they are impossible, make sure you have your bride tribe to lean on. Delegating tasks and asking for help will not only make your planning experience less stressful, it will also create wonderful memories to last a lifetime! Being able to share not only your big day but the days leading up to it with those closest to you will make your wedding day even more special. Cherish the memories big and small and don’t be afraid to admit if you can’t do it all.
You may be new to the wedding arena but we are pros here at Believe Bride! Let us help you as you prepare for this wonderful day so that you can embrace and enjoy every moment. The wedding day goes by so quickly and you don’t want to be stuck dealing with small problems all day long. Starting your planning with these 5 simple steps will help set you up for success and ensure that your big day goes off without a hitch! And if there’s a hitch or two… remember not to sweat the small stuff. This day is about love and your partnership and you deserve to enjoy every second of it.
