5 Wedding Mistakes I Made When Planning My Wedding

Wedding mistakes are hard to miss completely, even if you're in love with the memories of your special day, there's always a few things you wish you did differently --- and these few things aren't always super dramatic, but could have saved you a lot of time (and stress) if you'd been all the more wiser.

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When I look back on my wedding day, I immediately picture my husband crying and grinning all at once as he watched me walk down the aisle. I remember the rush and thrill of holding hands after the ceremony, and I remember running nearly full-speed to our getaway car (even though our photographers told us to walk, stop, and kiss for a great photo op surrounded by sparklers) so we could dash off on our honeymoon.

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I loved my wedding day because it was the start of an amazing marriage, but there were some little hiccups along the way that could have easily been avoided if I had the foresight then to avoid.

My 5 wedding mistakes

1. Not making a new email account for wedding related emails

I'm sure this is the first thing brides do now, but in case you've missed the memo, this is crucial. Not only do you need to inquire about wedding services with wedding vendors, make orders for wedding details, favors, and every little thing in between, but you may get sucked into signing up for things - which has a tendency to spread your email from wedding mailing list to mailing list like a virus.

When your wedding day has passed, and your days calm down a bit, go back to that account and delete it. If there's mailing lists you still want to be on because the companies offer things that go beyond weddings, keep it. It'll help keep your personal email account clutter free and meaningful, while still giving you opportunity for exclusive deals or updates from your favorite brands.

2.  Feeling pressured to uphold wedding traditions that make you uncomfortable

I got a lot of flack for not wanting to do a garter toss. The idea of my husband crawling up my dress in front of our entire family and friendbase just didn't scream intimate and meaningful to me. I was told that I was being silly, that it's tradition, and to pick my battles, a phrase that just needs to get nixed from  the wedding dictionary all together because a lot of the time (but not all the time...) it's just an excuse for other people to have things their way.

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I don't even remember who made us feel we needed to do it, but it was a very awkward experience for us which wasn't helped by having over a 100 people laughing while you look totally embarrassed. If you don't want to do something, don't do it. We could have used that time to hang out with loved ones and catch up -- something we also wish we could have had more time to do.

3. Not getting your parents (or main wedding helpers) a thank you gift after the wedding.

We thought we would get gifts for both sets of parents on our honeymoon, but with a tight budget, and inability to find the perfect thing, we never got anything for them. Our parents helped us out in so many ways during the wedding planning and I really wish I took the time BEFORE the wedding to plan out a great gift for them. When my cousin got married, the whole family was staying at the hotel in which she had her ceremony and reception. She booked all the parents their own massage session at the hotel's spa for the day after the wedding. It was very much appreciated!

4. Not verifying how involved the venue's staff will be during the wedding day.

The venue's coordinator was barely able to show up to unlock the doors, and they were definitely unavailable when the air conditioning failed on that hot, sunny, Florida day in July. Thankfully, my uncles had experience with this kind of thing, and fixed it, but I would have preferred not to have my own relatives/wedding guests working like that at my wedding.

Make sure there's at least one person on hand to deal with these types of issues. My poor mother was running around with my uncles, trying to solve this problem, and they missed out on some of the wedding reception activities.

5. Not having a guest book

I know, I know, we sell wedding guest books here at Blue Sky Papers, but I seriously regret not having one at my own wedding. We opted for the photo booth with chalkboard speech bubbles (that my awesome husband made!) and vowed to print the photos after the wedding, frame them, and display them as a gallery wall in our new apartment.

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It took us a year to get them up on the wall, and we didn't even get to all of them because buying frames for all your favorite photo booth photos starts to get crazy expensive. Instead, I would have loved to have had a photo guest book for us to put all the photos in so we could pull it out and flip through it on our anniversary or whenever we start to miss home and all the loved ones we left behind.

What about you? Any wedding planning mistakes occur during your engagement? We'd love to hear about them, or better - how you managed to avoid them!