Wedding Wednesday: Five Details You Need

Guys, I may be helping a coworker plan her wedding. Nothing crazy, just throw some ideas out and help her put together some stuff. I'm super psyched. It's all part of my evil master plan to bail on reality and live in a wedding dream world! Mhuahahaha!

Seriously though. I slug my way through a lot, A LOT of wedding stuff each week. I also read A LOT of personal blogs belonging to women who have had such gorgeous weddings. I love weddings because they are a day of joy and happiness and love. I love seeing how gosh darn HAPPY everyone is. I love seeing the emotion between the couple as they take their vows and take such a big leap. But what thrills me about wedding is all the expression and love you can put into such small details. I loved personalizing all of our details. It made our wedding feel so intimate and well, Lovely. It's so exciting and fun to see how people personalize their weddings and make them pretty (which reminds me...have you considered sharing your wedding with me?). Don't get me wrong, weddings aren't about details and fluff, they're about commitment and love. But the fluff sure classes up the joint, no? So here is my list of five details you need to include in your wedding. Enjoy!

1. Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue - It's so cheesy. I know. But it's kind of, dare I say, fun! This is also the sort of detail in a wedding that need not cost a ton of money! For instance, my something old and blue was my grandmother's handkerchief which I wrapped around the bottom of my bouquet. I never did have something borrowed, but my godmother gave me a rosary and my sister gave me a pearl bracelet, which were both my somethings new. See? Cost to me was nothing! And if I had had something borrowed, that would have been zero dollars too! It's a sweet, easily personalized, little detail that can also be great for photographs and is totally painless on the budget. You're welcome.

2. Flowers - And I'm not talking about your bouquet, because that's one thing most women get anyway. Listen, flowers are so expensive. I know. And they die. And it seems like such a waste to have flowers adorn each table. I get it. But they are so worth it. I love flowers. I love the love that goes into them to make them grow and bloom. And I love the warmth they bring to an event. If I wasn't such a lazy bastard, I'd have flowers in my house all the time. Even if all you have are some Queen Anne's Lace from the roadside in clean pickle jars, I guarantee you it will pretty the place up (and truth be told, done right, that would be QUITE pretty). And I also highly urge you to DIY them if you're brave enough because, really, people just like pretty flowers...arrangements are nice, but they just want to see colorful, bits of live pretty. But even if you don't DIY your flowers, even if you spend thousands of dollars on your flowers, make sure you love them. And don't get suckered into the same arrangements at each table. Mix it up! Use the same colors, but different types of flowers. Use different vases or vessels. Be creative! Weddings shouldn't feel cookie cutter, in my opinion, because PEOPLE aren't cookie cutter. When did weddings become about uniformity??

3. Some form of escort/place cards, but awesomized. Yes. That's a word. - First of all, people need to know where to sit. They just do. Second of all, this is an easy way to pretty up your wedding. And it need not be expensive. Do you know how many compliments I got on our bird's nest place cards? It cost me something like $30 to do. Yes, it took some time, but really, it was like a weekend's worth of work. Not that bad at all. And if you're not the crazy, bird's nest-making, DIY type, find some pretty paper, download a pretty font, and find a label template. Hell, my 73 year old mother could handle that. The point is weddings can come down to necessities and this is probably one thing you'll for sure have. It's an easy thing to make pretty and personalized. Many of our guests kept their place cards as souvenirs. And Lovely saved ours for us (how thoughtful, right?) which, when I get my way one day, I'll have put into a shadowbox with a few other things.

4. Personalized Vows - Don't skip the real ones if you don't want to. We didn't. And maybe your priest/reverend/rabbi/shaman/Tibetan monk/holy person doesn't call them vows, maybe they call them statements of love or "a few words." Whatever. Say something! Don't just say your vows. Please. For me. It's your opportunity to say how you feel about your partner. It's your opportunity to tell them you love them. I'm sometimes kind of a stoic person and that shyness can sometimes translate over to me not telling A.P. how much I love and appreciate him. It was easy when I was trying to win him, but now that I have him, I sometimes forget. I try to get better about this all the time, but I think we can all agree it's hard to be mindful of this each and every day without fail. That being said, I don't think I'd ever said ANYTHING to A.P. like I did on our wedding day. It was a moment for us to be completely honest about our love for one another and in front of those we loved the most. It felt special. I want that for you, too. Do it.

5. Favors - I have very, very specific rules about parties. Seriously. Remember C. Blonde? Well, when I was a kid, she used to throw fabulous parties. Everything I learned about parties I learned from her and from forming my own opinions after having attended (and, early on in my career, throwing) bad parties. One of my many, many rules for parties is that guests bring something. Even a nice note is good thing! And the opposite of that is that the host has to provide a TOTALLY, KICK ASS PARTY. That of course includes really good food, free booze (that's really key people. I hate cash bars. And I hate BYOB. Lame, lame, lame.), great music, and fabulous company. But for a wedding, it also includes favors. I know this sounds really stupid. I know a lot of people are going to fight me on this one. But people sometimes pay THOUSANDS of dollars to come to your wedding. And I know it's their choice and they should if they loved you, blah, blah, blah. I don't give a hoot. Giving a favor is, in my oh so very humble opinion, good manners. And favors do NOT need to be elaborate or expensive. But they should be personal. My friend gave little booklets she made of favorite love quotes she and her husband picked out. And she's NOT a super crafty person, she just printed them and bound them with a little ribbon. Another friend gave a mix CD of all their favorite songs (what a fun way to get to know the bride and groom in a different light, btw). You could even write sweet, handwritten notes with a favorite family recipe. There are a million ways to do this and do it cheaply. But the gesture of having that something extra for your guests, no matter how small, is, in my book, good etiquette.

(Simple Flower Arrangement via Pinterest; Inexpensive Favor Idea via Pinterest)