Looking for wedding planning hacks to help you have more fun during the planning process and reduce your stress level to zero? We’re giving you 8 of our favorite hacks for planning the stress-free wedding of your dreams, in the blog below!

1) One Venue for Everything

Find a venue that can host your ceremony and your reception! If you’re thinking “but we wanted to get married in our place of worship”. Ask your clergy if they travel! Keeping everything together will reduce stress and coordination, not only on your behalf but also on behalf of your guests! You won’t have to provide directions or field calls about what time the cocktail hour starts after the ceremony and why there’s such a big gap of time between the ceremony and the reception.

Your vendors won’t have to set up at two different venues. Or, tote flowers from the ceremony to the reception space. You won’t have to spend the day shuttling around from your getting ready location to your first look to your ceremony to your wedding portraits to your reception. All while starving because there was absolutely zero time for you to enjoy the delicious snack boards and carving station you arranged for your guests at cocktail hour! Which means, you and your partner can get right to the celebration in a stress-free way!

2) Introduce Your Guests Ahead Of Time

Speaking of getting the celebration started asap, introduce your guests to each other before your wedding day! Who wants to spend their wedding day hopping around from table to table making sure everyone has met and that they are all having a good time? Skip the day of introductions by introducing your guests to each other through your Guestie event! You are the host on your wedding day and your guest’s experience kind of rests on your shoulders. Creating an experience for them that is just as amazing as what you’ll experience as the couple getting married means bringing everyone together through fun introductions and igniting the energy of your wedding day in advance!

3) Set Your Vision & Book Your Vendors, ASAP!

You kind of don’t have that much time to book your wedding vendors. In a land far far away, in the times of a pre-pandemic world, you could book your wedding vendors with not much more than a “Hey I’d love to work with you”! Then the call and deposit would follow and you’d be locked in. Now, not so much. You have to get on it and fast. In fact, each type of wedding vendor has its own specified timeline for when you should reach out to them. We’ll give you a hint; venue, photographer, dress, and catering should be your first line of defense. If you’re curious where all the other vendors fall in your wedding planning timeline, we’ve broken it all down for you in this epic post!

4) Double Up On Vendor Services

Now that you’re ready to take charge when it comes to booking your wedding vendors, double on the services they offer! For example, does your photographer also offer a video or photobooth option? Super, you just booked 3 vendors in one! Does your venue offer in-house catering complete with a wedding cake? That’s 3 more vendors checked off your list! What about your DJ? I bet the person you hired to keep the dance floor lit also has access to some incredible lighting that you didn’t even know existed! DJs also have an array of experienced-based services to offer along with their music, like bubble machines, cold sparklers, and props! If you’ve found a vendor that you absolutely love and they are available on your wedding day, why not make things easier on yourself and reduce stress by taking advantage of their full list of services? You’ll save a lot of time because you won’t be running around trying to find different vendors to fulfill each and every need!

5) Rentals, Rentals, Rentals

Take it from us, renting over buying will save you lots of time and stress! You don’t need to buy a cake stand, you can rent one. You don’t need to buy a wedding day arbor, you can rent one. Not only is it more sustainable, but what on earth would you do with a 2k wedding arbor once your day is over? Rent an arbor, save the dollars, and go bigger on your floral budget to adorn the arbor. Your wedding arbor, chuppah, hoop, or altar arrangements, will be in the backdrop of your ceremony and at the forefront of your wedding photos, so why not focus more on the florals and less on the actual structure?

Those gorgeous candle holders you’ve been eyeing on Pinterest for your reception table setup, you can rent those too! Umbrellas for outdoor seating, linens, stemware, you name it! Rent it, rent it, rent it! If you’ve hired an amazing wedding planner they will be able to give you the best recommendations on the hottest, most reliable wedding rentals in town. 

6) Don’t Micromanage Vendors

Have that gnawing feeling swirling around your gut about timelines, deliveries, setup, and everything going off without a hitch? Yeah, it’s pretty normal tbh. This is a huge day for you, and the biggest life event you will probably ever plan. So feeling that way sort of comes with the territory. It’s what you do with that feeling that will make or break the level of stress you feel.

And here’s the secret, you have to put your trust in the wedding vendors that you’ve hired. That means, handing over the reins and not “double checking” every detail or confirming every last detail, three times! Trust that you’ve done the research to hire wedding vendors who have the experience to bring your vision to life. Trust that they are the ones who will be toiling away behind the scenes day and night in the weeks leading up to your wedding. And, trust that if for any reason there is something that they need to inform you about, they will 100% reach out.

7) Let Your Wedding Party Pick Their Own Attire 

We are totally breaking a cardinal rule about bridal party attire, and we’re going to be unapologetic about it! Let your bridal party pick out their own attire…. GASP!!! Yes, do it, and thank us later. Save yourself the back-and-forth link sharing in the group texts and the countless trips to the bridal salon and tux shop for color swatches and fittings.

Give your wedding party the color palette, set the parameters, and let them pick their own attire. Keep it straight to the point and don’t overload the details of dos and dont’s otherwise you are pretty much adding back the time and stress that you’d get with choosing the attire yourself. A quick “all black with any closed-toe shoe”! Will do the trick. Your wedding photos will be much more aesthetically pleasing with a bridal party that is 100% comfortable in their attire and has a look with a more eclectic vibe versus that “matchy-matchy” feel.

8) Spare Yourself the Frustration of DIY 

This one deserves an article all its own but we’ll spare you the long-winded rant version for now and get down to it! Have you ever seen the meme that says “Why buy it for $7 when you can make it yourself with $92 of craft supplies”? DIY projects, unless you have already a huge closet of crating supplies, the wherewithal, AND the time & patience, do not save money.

In fact, you’ll end up spending more on supplies trying to figure out what works best with what. Because you know the online instructions are never 100% accurate. And there goes your time bouncing around from store to store at the last minute looking for the supplies because of course they are not available on Prime! Don’t bother going down the dark hole that is DIY. Whatever it is, ask yourself if you can feasibly order it, rent it, or work it into your budget. If not, can you picture your dream wedding day without it?

Now that we’ve given you our top 8 wedding planning hacks to help you have more fun & zero stress, which one of those are you going with for your wedding day? Find us on Instagram & share the details!