e all want our wedding to be memorable and very few truly want it to fit into a cookie cutter wedding format, but how do you avoid it? Aren't all wedding pretty much the same? Only for the unimaginative and the lazy couple - and even at that by the time you pull everything together a cookie cutter wedding might end up to be an equal amount of work as a unique nuptial celebration designed to fit the individual couple.
Dream - Together: If you don't want a wedding that looks like every other nuptial celebration you have ever seen, then the question becomes what would you like your wedding to look like? At this point you must not let yourself worry about "how weddings are done," - that is the cookie cutter wedding format that you are trying to avoid.
Rather, you must let your imagination run wild - and do it together to build communication and give you the broadest possible range of ideas. You will bring it back to reality in the next step but for now dream and dream bigger than your nature allows. If you do not allow your dreams to break out of the cookie cutter orbit then there is no way your wedding will - with or without cookie cutter wedding favors!
Prioritize: The only essentials in any wedding are the bride, the groom, and the individual who will make your union legal (usually a clergy or a justice of the peace). Clothing is a close second. After that, despite our preconceptions (my own included), everything else in the wedding simply reflects who we are and what we value - or at least it should.
This means, do not be afraid to leave something out of the standard cookie cutter wedding mold. If you do not like or can not afford, the high end wedding dress, flowers, or cake, leave them out or replace them. If you would rather have a barbeque than a catered dinner... go for it. A dance with a DJ is fun at a wedding, but for you and your friends a performance by a chamber orchestra might be more memorable - and you.
Hire a Wedding Planner: This is counterintuitive to most because of the perceived cost. However, the experience and contacts a seasoned wedding planner will have can often save more money for the young couple than they charge and the savings in stress will nearly always be very substantial. Besides, an experienced one will have design ideas from their years in the business that the average young bride just will not have. Just one word of warning, a lazy planner might try to push you into a cookie cutter wedding because it requires little work on their part, so do your homework and ask a lot of questions before you sign anything.
If you do not want to hire a wedding planner, then you need to be more organized than you have ever been in your life. Invest in a book on wedding planning written by someone that knows the business. Someone like a wedding design consultant. The tips and advice on how to manage your time and what questions to ask of your wedding professionals will be invaluable. Just remember, books, by their very nature are of the one size fits all sort so while they can be helpful, they can also push your towards a cookie cutter wedding - just what we are trying to avoid.
Hire Wedding Professionals: Professionals are professionals because they know their business. They know what can and can not be done in their field and an experienced one has been around the industry long enough to have ideas that you probably haven't even thought of.
Moreover, most wedding professionals are anxious to have an opportunity to do something a little bit different than the traditional cookie cutter wedding format. Remember, their reputation is built on word of mouth. If you like the individual professional's style and taste and give them an opportunity to get creative the chances are great they will usually blow you away with what they create.
Breaking the cookie cutter wedding mold is truly not difficult if you have the courage to strike out on your own. It just takes a little dreaming, planning, and bringing the right people around you to assist in building the wedding of your dreams.
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