Being the first of three sisters to get married, I was a guinea pig. For those of you with same-sex siblings, you know what I’m talking about. Everything is experimental with the eldest. Parents guess at an appropriate amount to spend on new clothes for school, the right amount of allowance, how early a decent curfew is.
The younger siblings ultimately reap the rewards of parental lessons learned – parents’ spending usually growing more lenient with each child.
In my house, for example, my parents spent $100 on my older sister’s homecoming dress. By the time my little sister went shopping for hers five years later, my parents claimed they’d learned just how much “these things cost” and shelled out a shocking $400 (well, at least it was shocking to me and my big sis).
My point is: Getting married first ultimately became – to my sisters – a day to glean planning lessons and start budget negotiations for their own nuptials. They’re certain my parents will up the budget for their weddings. This theory isn’t proved yet, as they are still unwed, but I’d wager they’re right.
Even more than that, I know they will reap monetary rewards of being second or third to wed, because I definitely learned a few things along the way that’ll save them thousands when the time comes.
One example: I was hellbent on micro-managing my florist in the flower selection. I had a list of don’t-use blossoms, printouts for him from Nicole Kidman’s reception and other over-the-top affairs, and a limited budget with extremely high expectations. I should’ve known better, but I was the first to get married in my family and among my friends.
So come wedding day, I was surprised to see anything less than my expectations. My florist used flowers I didn’t want, my bouquet was completely wrong and the arrangements weren’t quite as full as I envisioned — beautiful but different than what I had in my head. It turns out, in post-nuptial e-mails with my florist, my limited flower choice had ultimately thinned my floral budget as my choices were of the more expensive variety.
If only someone had told me. Three years later, in an interview with Chris Norwood of Tipton & Hurst, he unknowingly validated my florist’s defense: “Choosing a color palate instead of dictating flower types gives us more freedom — and money — to create bigger, fuller (and just as pretty) arrangements.”
There are many other things I could bring up from my big day that really impacted my budget more than I knew they would. However, I have to make my way back to the actual reason why I’m writing this to you.
I need your lessons learned the hard way. We’re working on a feature story for an upcoming issue that will offer advice from former brides like me, you and others you know. And, because there are no do-overs, the only way to benefit from our mistakes is to pass along our knowledge and experience to brides-to-be.
So please share your wedding planning mistakes/mishaps. Include what you did wrong, what you didn’t know, why you didn’t know it, what you should’ve done differently and why, and what you learned in the end.
Send your stories to me at LIrvin@ABPG.com. I’ll read them and correspond with you for more information if need be. And if your stories are selected, I’ll work them into the feature story in an future issue. We might even run a photo of your wedding along with the quotes from your story!
