A wedding day will be the highlight in any calendar and there’s the obvious expectation that the bride and groom will be looking forward to their day with a heightened sense of anticipation. For some, however, the planning process can be somewhat dispiriting.

Indeed, many weddings are associated with disagreements, spiraling costs and a considerable degree of stress. Fortunately, things don’t have to be that difficult. It is actually possible for you to get great results and to ensure that you end up with a wedding day that meets your expectations. In this post, I’d like to take the time to explore a number of the options that are open to you.

Hiring a wedding planner

One choice that’s clearly available is to actually ask someone else to handle all of the planning process. There are plenty of wedding planners who can help, using their own experience to ensure that your big day avoids the sort of hitches that can be the stuff of nightmares.

Using a wedding planner is not, however, without its issues. For starters, you’ll need to accept that you will pay this professional a fee, which is likely to add to the cost of the event. It is fair to say that some wedding planners do negotiate better deals with venues, florists, musicians and cake makers. This can help to offset some of the cost.

To a certain extent, you will also have to accept that you are giving up some of the ability to make decisions. Although it’s likely that you’ll work extremely closely with your chosen planner, you will be allowing them to make some decisions on your behalf. That’s something that is almost inevitable and simply doesn’t concern some couples.

The good news, of course, is that hiring a planner meets that you can largely sit back and relax. You won’t be required to get your hands too dirty, which should make things easier.

Get help from family and friends

You’ll soon discover that many people would be glad to help with the planning process. I remember finding the whole idea of creating a budget and dealing with the financial side of things as being incredibly dull. It wasn’t something that I was used to doing and I felt a certain sense of discomfort.

In my case, I found that one of my relatives loved working with spreadsheets. He had a clear understanding of what was involved and volunteered to help. You may find that this is an area where you can get help. Similarly, you may know people who are creative and would be able to produce invites, or help with coming up with a theme for the day.

By sharing the workload, you’ll soon discover that wedding plan can actually be a lot of fun. We had little knowledge of what was involved with choosing flowers for the day, but we found that our florist was able to offer some excellent, objective advice. When it was appropriate, we were happy to take that advice from the professionals, knowing that they deal with these occasions on a more regular basis.

Relying on those who have skills in particular areas makes a lot of sense. Ultimately, you can think of planning your wedding as being a large and important project. Once you appreciate the need to get the right people involved at the right stages in the process, you can soon get things on track. If you’re feeling stressed, then that’s simply an indication that now is the right time to ask for help.

Finally, don’t feel that you are passing your own troubles on to others. We discovered that our loved ones were only too keen to step in and ease the pressure.

Author – Keith Barrett likes to draw on his own experiences and to offer advice to others. He remembers his wedding day as being vibrant and uplifting, but also recalls a few issues at the planning stage.