First Things First!

Planning a wedding is no easy task. From the moment you get engaged, you are constantly bombarded with questions: Did you set a date? Where are you having the ceremony? Where's the reception? Is it a big wedding? Is it a small wedding? Can I see the ring? While it is all very exciting, it can also be an extremely stressful process. After going through this process myself, I decided I would share some advice with you all through a series of blog posts, entitled "Angela's Wedding Advice." Each post will have a theme/set topic discussed. Today's topic just deals with the basics and first steps to take.

For one thing, before you go and announce your engagement via Facebook, make sure you tell everyone close to you that you'd want to know about the good news. I made the mistake of not telling everyone I should have, and the drama afterward was simply not worth it and could have been easily avoided with a simple phone call, text message, or e-mail.

It is helpful to your guests to create a wedding website. There are plenty of sites out there you can use. I myself used theknot.com because it was such a helpful resource throughout my planning process. Having a wedding website is the most convenient way to get any news and details out to your guests that you may want to share. It also allows them to read about how the proposal occurred, who is in the wedding party, and where you are registered for gifts. I wish I would have kept our website more up-to-date, but I felt like whenever I remembered to update it, I never had new information to add.

Before really starting any of the planning, the most important step to take is to set a budget. As awkward as it may be, you're going to have to find out from parents, future in-laws, or whoever else may chip in how much they plan to contribute. This was also a step I skipped. I knew how much we'd be getting and what would be covered, but never once did I sit down and calculate all the expenses to make sure we had enough. It resulted in an extremely stressful week leading up to the wedding my then fiance, now husband, and I spent having meltdowns about finances and whether we'd have enough money to pay for the wedding. In the end, it all worked out, but it would have been nice to know that ahead of time.

Finally, the last basic recommendation I have for the very early stages of wedding planning is to find yourself a good checklist to use. I purchased a couple of wedding books myself, since I was fairly uneducated on weddings and all that they entailed, and one of those books actually included a checklist to follow. The Knot also has a great checklist on their website you can use for free, and I am sure there are plenty of others online as well. The best thing about checklists is that they guide you through the entire process and where you should be at what time so you don't fall behind. Sometimes, things didn't apply to me, or they felt like they needed to be done a little too early or late, so I adjusted it to fit my own needs. As long as everything gets done, that's really the most important part.