Working with your wedding planner

Congratulations! You're engaged to your soul mate AND you've hired a wedding consultant to help you navigate the wedding-planning maze. You've just taken 2 huge steps toward becoming part of a married couple!

Now what? It's time to create a plan that will include all of the things that have to be accomplished before your big day. Just as with your relationship with your future spouse, working with your wedding planner requires open lines of communication. If you have visions of purple dancing in your head, tell your planner! If you don't want to even get a sniff of a rose on your wedding day, tell your planner! If you want some members of your wedding party to sing a song during your wedding ceremony, tell your planner! If you ran off to Vegas and got married there - but still want to have another ceremony and reception at home to share with your family and friends, tell your planner!

Why am I urging you to tell your planner every minute detail -- even ones that you feel are "small" or "not worthy of telling your consultant"? Because every detail fits into the overall plan of your wedding, and may impact upon other plans without your even considering it. For example, if you want special friends to sing a song during your ceremony, special arrangements may need to be made with the ceremony musicians to set up a run through (which may mean there could be an extra charge for the musicians to do this), the officiant may need to approve the song/singers, not to mention the program should include their names and the song they are singing. Try to tell everything to your planner as the ideas come to you or, at least, are being discussed and look likely -- this way all the corresponding details can be ironed out weeks or months before your wedding.

Wedding consultants are not magicians nor mind readers, no matter how much we covet those titles! Keeping the lines of communication open -- this goes both ways, your planner should be in constant touch with you as well! -- is a key ingredient to having the wedding of your dreams.

Until next time, happy planning ....