[List of 30] Wedding Planning

Random Observation/Comment #509: If life flashes before my eyes, her smile seen through my tears of joy will be one of those memories forever in my heart.

see lemons engaged

 

That book I’ve been writing for the past few months was finally finished and a shortened version was printed for her to read at a small get-together in LIC. With the help of some very awesome friends, we had an incredible home-cooked meal and a very elaborate proposal. I’ll write the details in another post, but first and foremost – Thank you all for making it so special!

I gave it about 16 hours of not thinking about planning and simply enjoying the feeling of calling her my fiance, but once I stepped on that subway on a commute, the ideas started flowing. Without reading any posts about weddings, here’s what I think I’ll need to do before getting married:

  1. Pick a time frame for when we want to have the wedding (consider seasons and ask our “MUST” guests what dates absolutely don’t work)
  2. Determine our budget and how many people we can invite
  3. Pick a type of wedding (e.g. destination, trendy, traditional, chic, low key, eloping in city hall, etc) and shop around venues for availability in time frame (e.g. brewery, distillery, backyard with food trucks, etc) – Yay Pinterest
  4. Form a guest list and add spreadsheet columns for whether or not they’re invited and probability of accepting invitation (Thanks, April and Jason!)
  5. Look at our resources and see who can help (Mandy for wedding cake design? B.A. for photographer recommendations? B.A. for negotiations?)
  6. Type of ceremony – We need to decide if we’ll do the marriage license stuff earlier and then have a much shorter ceremony for the day-of. We’d also respect the Chinese traditions.
  7. Bachelor and Bachelorette party locations and invites – provide a guest list for your maid of honor and best man; Set rules for strippers.
  8. All groomsmen are wearing suits – I have already decided this. We may all get custom made ones. Maybe we’ll wear superhero t-shirts underneath.
  9. Bride may have two dresses – one for a Chinese ceremony session
  10. Flowers and theme – I personally don’t mind for any of these and I think it’ll also be determined by the venue look
  11. Website – I’ll probably be making something to keep people informed of the dates and such – maybe a separate tab here to make it easier on the hosting
  12. Host an engagement party – maybe at SPIN?
  13. Invitations and Thank you cards – I’ll probably make a cool web one, but also do physical ones just because I think it’s the thing you’re supposed to do
  14. Registry of things – We need to decide on what we would want to buy for things: a Japanese knife is definitely in there. I think there are a lot of options in this space: http://www.womangettingmarried.com/best-online-wedding-registry/
  15. Catering/Food choices – The best part is trying out all the food. I personally would love food trucks of different types. I’d be great if we had mashed potatoes in there.
  16. Cake – A Lady-M Crepe cake would be awesome, but we’ll probably make a thing out of trying all types of great stuff
  17. Photographer and Photography style – luckily my best man is a photographer
  18. Gifts for groomsmen and bridesmaids – I didn’t even know this was a thing, but maybe I’ll give everyone a new custom made suit from Hong Kong
  19. DJ or Band? – We could just have a spotify playlist, but it would be really nice to have someone play separate for the ceremony
  20. Grooms and bride wedding bands – The material is important. Maybe someone from machine shop can make a design for us. Yay Cooper connections!
  21. Honeymoon locations – this is super fun to plan. I already have tons of ideas of where we can go to have a good time and relax. I’d normally rough it, but honeymoons seem like we should be relaxed
  22. Go on a diet and lose 10 lbs – We both decided to do this, but I think it’ll be much easier for me
  23. Publish the book – We’ll probably include this in the gift bag? Are we having a gift bag?
  24. Find an officiant – someone’s going to get us married
  25. Put together a full schedule – Maybe I’ll use an app for wedding connecting and a way to publish the schedule for everyone like in TED. Sounds like a great app idea.
  26. Check up with all vendors and make sure our ducks in a row before the final days
  27. Write marriage vows – I wrote a book, so this shouldn’t be too hard. I’m more conscious about staying not having the audience fall asleep or not crying through the whole thing.
  28. Write Thank you speech – I think before the dancing happens with traditions, I say some words to those who came to the event
  29. Take dance classes – V will be very happy about this
  30. Do a 30 day challenge with personally meeting all the people we’re inviting – this is more of a personal touch for me

There are probably a lot more things that will come up, but for some reason I’m not at all stressed. We like organizing events and this one will be pretty awesome.

~See Lemons Happily Engaged