Pulling It All Together!

OK, the clock is ticking. The countdown is on. You are now only a month or so from your BIG DAY.

You will not always get your venders and suppliers to answer you as fast as you would like them to. This is the time when you are most likely to find problems. Take a deep breath. You can deal with most of them with no problem.

TRANSPORTATION FOR THE WEDDIND DAY

One are you may not have thought about yet is transportation. There are several things to think about here, actually. First, what type of transportation do you want to have? Look at how you will get from one appointment to the next. You have to move not only yourself, but your entire wedding party.

In this first portion, focus on who will be doing what and where people will meet. Answer these questions.

• How will you get to your initial appointments in the day, such as hair stylist?
• When do you want to meet your bridesmaids?
• Where will you meet your bridesmaids? Where will the groom meet up with his groomsmen?
• Where will the bride and groom meet?
• Where will vehicles park so that everyone can get home after the reception?

The second portion of the transportation process is determining if you want to have limo service. Between getting your hair done and the final reception, you may need to move around quite a bit. Some people want to visit several locations for photos. You may need to travel from your parent's home to the church to the reception. Figure out your travel plans and once you do, determine if you will be hiring a professional driver to move you from place to place.

You do not always have to have a limo driver. You can also invest in a nice vehicle and then have someone from the wedding party or someone who is not in the wedding party, do the chauffeuring. When considering rental transportation, keep the following in mind:

• Determine how many people will be traveling with you and accommodate for this in rental vehicles.
• Price out your options. You may want to ensure that the vehicle is the type, style, or even color that you want.
• Be sure that the person registering a rented vehicle is over the age of 25 for a lower cost.
• When hiring a limo service, research them and know what is included in the contract.
• Know the time limits for limo service as many restrict limo service by hour.

While it is traditionally the groom's job to make transportation arrangements, it is best both parties are involved!

PICK YOUR MUSIC

Earlier, you interviewed several providers of music service and you hopefully have made a decision on the needs you have and who will provide them. In this next step, you want to make some key decisions about the music you will enjoy on your special day.

• Pick out any special music selections for the wedding ceremony
• Choose the first dance song
• Choose any other special music for the wedding reception
• Be sure a wide selection of music is available for everyone at the event
• Make down payment for music service.
• Arrange set up times as needed

Music service should be just about set up at this point. Be sure to know where you stand on ceremony and reception music.

FINALIZE PLANS WITH RECEPTION

Next, give your reception facility a call. Be sure that they are ready to go for your wedding day. Know what they are providing for you. If there are final decisions to make, you will want to do that now. If you have questions, get them answered.

Know the answers to the following questions:

• Will you or they put your décor items in place?
• When do you have access to the hall to drop items off?
• Are food and beverage services ready to go?
• Is the facility ready to go?
• Did you make down payments as necessary?

You may need to provide a final count at this point, depending how many days in advance your wedding is. Focus on getting your RSVP's in at this time too. You need this information to provide to the reception hall and usually to the ceremony site, too.

FINALIZE CEREMONY SITE

Your ceremony site may be a church, a backyard or someplace else. At this point, you know where your ceremony will be held, but are you ready for all there is to do here? Depending on the location, you may need to make plans for the set up of the ceremony site. You may also need to take the time approve the layout design.

While most of the decisions are made now, there are some questions you should have answers to at this point.

• What time can guests start to arrive?
• Can you drop off items before hand, such as bubbles, programs and the aisle runner?
• Is there a place for you to wait prior to the wedding's start?
• Are there any restrictions or limitations in place?
• What is going on before and after your ceremony? If there is another wedding or another event, how long do you have before you have to leave?

With the ceremony site completely ready to go, you can rest assured that your wedding will go well. You should have a contact at this facility for any of your questions.

FLOWER LINE UP

Now that your wedding is fast approaching, you should be making final decisions regarding flowers. Flowers are often used at the ceremony site (though some churches do not allow this), at the reception on tables, bouquets for everyone involved and lapel pieces for special guests at the wedding such as parents and grandparents.

At this point, you should have made the decisions regarding flowers, but there are still some questions to keep in mind.

• When will the flowers be ready to go?
• When can they be picked up or will they deliver them?
• Will they set up the flowers at the facilities?

You should have answers to all of these questions so that you know how the flowers will look, where they will be located and how to get them in place.

PHOTOGRAPHY LINED UP

You have made your decision about whom you will hire to handle your photos for your special day. You may have selected a videographer, too. Now that you have these professionals in place, you need to ensure that all the special memories will be available to you.

One of the most important things to do at this point is to have a meeting with your photographer to point out all of the important people at your wedding. While you likely want everyone to be included in the photos, some individuals may be more important to you. In addition, you may want special poses to be done, such as generation pictures, family pictures and perhaps pictures of the wedding party in fun looks. Get an idea of what the photographer wants to do too. Approve the ideas you like.

Keep the following in mind when it comes to your photography needs:

• Know when the photograph will arrive and where he will arrive for the first pictures of the day.
• Ask questions about the locations you plan to visit for photos and backups if you need them.
• Find out if your photographer needs anything from you, such as names of the wedding party.
• Make the down payment as directed by the contract you have signed with your photographer.

Photographers do a lot of work with weddings so they can help you through this process step by step. What is essential, though, is that you make decisions based on what you hope to see in the finished product.

You should not have to make decisions about which prints to have done, though. This will be done later, after you see the proofs.

On the next page we will focus on Finalizing Your Wedding Plans.