In going through this wedding planning process thus far I’ve learned something about my sister that I never knew before: She is really bad at making decisions. And, I actually witness this a lot with many of my brides. You have so many options to sift through, what do you do? It’s hard to visualize some things (even if you have real wedding photos from someone else’s wedding right in front of you) with regard to your own wedding.  Case in Point #1: The Dress — Alyssa tried on about 20 dresses and really liked 2 of them. She had no idea which one to pick. She looked gorgeous in BOTH of them (I know, such a problem to have). She and my mom thought that maybe we should go somewhere else and look at more dresses. But why go and add 15 more dresses to the mix and then you have to pick between 3 or even 4 dresses? I know some people relish going and trying on dresses and maybe it’s just that I don’t care for shopping very much, but the answer was clear to me – to pick the (albeit more expensive) dress with the Wow Factor. I mean, it was fabulous. She looked amazing. And there was no way she would even remember the other (still gorgeous) dress in question 11 months from now.Case in Point #2: The Shoes (for the Engagement Party) — So, Alyssa and I found this cute dress at Anthropologie and then of course we had to find shoes to go with it. One morning we went back and forth with links via AIM but it’s really hard to tell how something is going to look from a product shot on a website. I happened to be shopping after Christmas and saw these really cute soft gold Stuart Weitzmans that in my humble opinion would be perfect. I know if Alyssa were looking she probably would have passed them over because A. Way too expensive and B. Heels too high (3″ on a 5’8″ girl). Luckily, I don’t think like a 5’8″ girl since I’m only 5’5″ and Ryan happens to be 6’1″ so who cares if you end up being 5’11” in the heels anyway?   So, I bought the shoes! (And I really hoped she would like them, because they were just so cute – strappy sandals with little rhinestones going across the two straps on the front, and they were on sale for what came out to being about 70% off the original cost.) I just really could not go through any more links and “what if scenarios” with regard to the shoes! And, we still have to find her shoes for the wedding so I felt the need to check something off the list for her. I think we both feel a sense of gratification when we get to cross things off the list, which is a good thing in avoiding stress.

Case in Point #3: Ryan’s “outfit” for the Engagement Party — Same problem — so instead of dragging this out, after purchasing the shoes, I went over to Macy’s and bought 2 ties that I thought would work. They were conveniently “Buy 1 Get 1 Free” so I bought two nice ones in the closest colors of her dress and told her to let Ryan choose. Again, this goes back to the whole idea of letting your groom choose something once in a while so you can get your way on everything else! Problem solved.

 
We are having similar problems with the flowers, the ceremony musicians, and the DJ. Unfortunately our DJ (who is wonderful) accidently double booked himself for the date and has to send another of his people for the wedding now. So, in order to avoid another decision, Alyssa wants me to just meet the new guy and make sure he’s “okay” (which means clean-cut, so our conservative dad won’t think he’s “weird”). I am finding that these small decisions (that Alyssa mostly doesn’t even really care about) can be quickly nipped in the bud to avoid any stress. No matter much you think one wrong decision could create a disaster, I promise Alyssa, and all other brides reading this, that it won’t be! When you have your flowers on your tables at the wedding you are not even going to remember what all the other options looked like. What are you having a hard time making a decision about? And who, or what, helped you come to a decision about it?