The Wedding Planning Book to End All Wedding Planning Books

Early into the planning process I stumbled upon A Practical Wedding, a wedding blog that differed from any other. And I'm so glad I did. You will be too once you read it. It offered a refreshing, down-to-earth perspective on wedding planning and marriage in general. Not surprisingly, the blog evolved and its creator Meg Keene recently published a book, A Practical Wedding: Creative Solutions for Planning a Beautiful, Affordable, and Meaningful Celebration.

I wasn't planning on reading any wedding planning books nor am I planning on reading any more but thank goodness I read this one! You know the feeling when you're reading a book and you can't help but talk during the process? Well that's what reading this book was like for me. Kind of like this:

"Oh my god yes! I totally agree!"
"I thought I was the only one that thought that! It's so nice to hear I'm not crazy!"
"Seriously, who the hell cares about the effin' chairs?!"

Basically, Meg took a very unique approach when it came to writing a book about wedding planning: She was actually NORMAL about it. As in, she reminds us all that the whole point of planning a wedding is the getting married part, not the part about how great your reception is or what your centerpieces look like. So if you are a clueless yet sane bride wanting to plan a meaningful celebration, read this book ASAP. She gets down to the nitty gritty and helps you figure out where to start in an easy-to-understand step-by-step process.

Thanks to movies and media, the prelude to the wedding planning process — the proposal itself — has been exaggerated to such great lengths that it has made most of us forget the point of it all. Meg's insightful and empowering words shatter the typical stereotype.  I absolutely LOVED the quote from the book discussing this topic:

"It's exciting to decide to get married. And scary. But the moment of the proposal is just that: a moment. It moves you to the next step of the process; it's not the be-all, end-all. So maybe you have a fancy candlelight dinner followed by parachutists delivering you a pear-shaped, seven-carat diamond. Or maybe you decide to get married one Sunday morning over the newspaper and a cup of coffee. Either way is fine. The point is that you decided to spend your life with someone you love."

And that ladies and gentlemen is just a small piece of the wisdom you'll find in this book. Another favorite tidbit of mine featured in the book: the genius and oh-so-true tips from Kayce Hazelgrove of shinyprettybits.com and foodiewashere.com titled "The Six Stages of Wedding Planning." Kayce takes you through the various stages of emotional highs and lows of planning a wedding. 

My favorite was #4: OUTRAGE/DEPRESSION: "WHAT THE EFF" "EFF ME"

"This stage is marked by feelings of bitterness and frustration. You may feel as though you are failing in some way. This can cause you to swing between feeling angry over all the expectations being placed on you and despondent over your inability to live up. You may find yourself resenting others with friends and family who own a barn, can DJ, or have the enviable ability to craft masterpieces out of bits of random fabric and paper." 

Now I'm not sure if any of you guys planning a wedding out there have felt this way, but I certainly have and reading this book was a nice affirmation of 1) I'm not a crazy person and 2) knowing that it can be done in a sane and gasp! maybe even fun way. As Megan of notmartha.org puts it:

"It’s like having a very cool older sister who went through all this already to help guide you on what is and what isn’t important."

I couldn't have said it better myself. Buy this book and read it now. You'll be thankful you did.



P.S. Listen to Meg's interview discussing the book on NPR's Talk of the Nation here.

decisions, decisions

So you're engaged, you're excited, you're happy! And then reality sets in when you realize you now have to plan a WEDDING. Deciding to spend the rest of my life with my man was the easy part (love you babe!). Choosing a place where we'd get married on the other hand was an incredibly daunting prospect! 

Let me back up a bit, you see my fiancé and I are from different states. He is a California native while I've bounced around between Poland, NY, NJ, AZ and finally joined him in the Golden State. Per Polish tradition, the marriage usually takes place in the bride's hometown. But where was my hometown? I felt a connection to all the states I lived in for different reasons but didn't feel especially compelled to get married in any of them. And who says you have to follow these traditions anyway? (Your mom does, that's who.) Of course, I forgot to mention the option of getting married in the Motherland itself. No shortage of decisions, that's for sure! 

Bottom line, for couples who are from different cities, states and especially different countries, this can be a tricky decision. For some, it's a no-brainer, for others (like myself) it's a decision you agonize over, rationalizing and comparing one over the other again and again. In the end, I hope wherever we do decide to have our wedding, our family & friends will be there to support and celebrate with us. After all, it's not about where the wedding is taking place but the fact that we're getting married, right?! :)

P.S. Not to worry, we promise an awesome party no matter the destination. I mean, at least that was an easy decision, eesh.