Hello everyone-
I was married September 21st! I got a lot of information and guidance from this forum and particularly the Etiquette section, so I just wanted to take a moment to share my top advice based on how my wedding went. (I'm very pleased to tell you that our wedding was magical and was even better than we had imagined and I hope the same for all of you, but yes, some things went wrong as expected!)
1.) Get a good night's sleep the night before- if you can! I did not. When you wake up before the crack of dawn on the day of your wedding, it is nearly impossible to fall back asleep. Go to bed early knowing it may take hours to fall asleep. Do whatever works best for you to get a good nights sleep. I think my biggest regret is that I was SUPER tired on the wedding day and very sleep deprived. I stayed up late at the bar with family the night before and then talked all night with my sister in the hotel room. Anyway, be sure to sleep well!
2.) Don't leave ANYTHING for the wedding day. I mean anything. Get everything done in advance, or delegate it to someone. Even small things. Assume that your brain will not be working on the wedding day. Even for small, obvious things that you could never in a million years imagine forgetting about or struggling with. I was on an emotional high on our wedding day and I am mystified about how I could forget such basic things that were very important to me leading up to the wedding. The wedding co-ordinator asked me to text her when we leave the hotel. I agreed, of course I would! I want everything to go smoothly. Not only did I not text her, it never even crossed my mind. I didn't even bring my phone! I also told my brother I'd text him when we were on our way. It boggles my mind that I totally forgot about that. Oops. I also asked the bartender what was in the signature cocktail that I DESIGNED and then said "That sounds good!" and ordered it. That makes no sense but it happened lol! My brain was not working. Possibly because I was sleep deprived.
3.) If you have kids at the wedding, spring for stuffed animals and colouring books with crayons where they are sitting. This was a small thing that I'm so happy we did because it got us lots of compliments from everyone- it impressed everyone- and it made the wedding a more exciting and happy place for the kids, too.
4.) If it rains on your wedding day, do not fret. It POURED on ours. I was a little disappointed, until my sister told me that she thought the rain was romantic. What a beautiful thought (what a great maid of honour). We walked into our ceremony with the staff holding large umbrellas over us. It's not what I pictured, but it was EXTREMELY memorable and special and made me kind of feel like royalty. Plus, we ended up getting some amazing sunset/storm cloud photos after dinner. It makes the day unique to you. Definitely have a plan for rain because if you need it, you need it.
5.) If you want to use an iPod for your wedding, go ahead! We used an iPod instead of a band/DJ and I have no regrets. I checked here a lot for advice and opinions on this and they were mixed, but we had a great dance party and didn't miss the DJ. Play popular songs that are easy to dance to that everyone knows the words to. Don't play too many slow songs.
6.) Make the ceremony unique to you. Our ceremony was my favourite part- and I didn't expect that. It was such a beautiful moment, and a beautiful scene with all of those closest to us there. It was amazingly unreal. I'm so happy we wrote our own vows, and put a few other personal touches in. I'm also happy we put some humour in there too. When I first came down the aisle, I said "hi" and smiled and waved- (what a dork! I can't believe I did that!) but everyone smiled and laughed and waved back and said "hi" and it is one of my favourite memories of the wedding. My husband told me that he was really glad I was so 'myself' at the ceremony that made him happy and relaxed. Write your vows down on cue cards and save them so you can frame them after the wedding. Ask anyone who makes a speech or toast for their paper they read from to keep as a keepsake. Also, we sprinkled (fake) white flower petals down the aisle but other than that we didn't do much ceremony decorating. I wasn't too concerned about the flower petals- whether we used them or not- but they added a lot of beauty to the memory so I'd recommend them.
7.) When you get ready, do everything early. I thought I should do the opposite so I wasn't ready too early and sitting waiting around but everything took longer than I expected and time was moving at a very strange pace- I was late for the ceremony- and I'm so not the TYPE of person who I would ever expect to be late for the ceremony but it happened so easily. I would recommend aiming to be totally ready WAAY before you have to be totally ready. It was the most stressful part when I realized how late I was. I almost started crying and everyone had to calm me down.
8.) Write down on the back of all the cards what the gift is- you might not remember by the time you get back from your Honeymoon and you'll have to write them a thank-you card so save yourself the stress and write down all of the gifts you receive.
9.) The biggest thing that went wrong at our wedding was this: we had arranged taxis for all of our guests to take them back to the hotels in the area. We were covering the cost for this. We said in our speech what guests had to do to get a taxi and that we wanted everyone to get home safely. We had arranged everything with the taxi company in advance. THEY DID NOT COME THROUGH! Brutally, at the end of the night, the wedding co-ordinator had to tell us that the taxi company said that there was a 2 hour wait for our guests. We figured it out, we got everyone rides- we were lucky that we had people willing to help us with this. Some of our guests were not able to go back to their hotel and had to double up at a different hotel- I am horrified by this. And my husband and I did not have a romantic car ride back to the hotel. We were crammed in the backseat of a car with my Mom and boxes and bags on our laps. lol. It's okay, it's kind of funny now but I would pass this on to let you know that this happened to us so it could happen to you. So make sure that your transportation is reliable and will not let you down. (We used Central Taxi of Ontario, in the Grimsby, Ontario area)
10.) Every single item that needs to leave the wedding venue- you should arrange who is going to physically carry it from the reception to the car. Figure out which car, and ask your close friends and family to be responsible for certain items. We didn't do this, and we only had a bit of help from a couple of people but even I was carrying out items by myself in my dress at the end of the night and doing most of the take-down. I should have been more organized about this ahead of time. ie: Could you put the cupcake tower in my car at the end of the night? Would you mind being responsible for our cards for us until after the honeymoon? Would you help me take down the photo display at the end of the night? etc.