Wedding planning is a lot like going to the grocery store. You start putting all this stuff in your cart and your husband sneaks some stuff in that when you get to the register, you're in shock of how everything added up to [insert absurdly outrageous price here]. Once you start looking at vendors, décor, and food, you soon see that wedding planning isn't exactly everything you had dreamed. This could lead you down the road of DIY.
Or maybe you're super handy and creative and budget isn't the primary motivator to craft some things for your wedding. Maybe you just enjoy that kind of thing. Regardless of the motivation, it's important to take a hard look at whether you should DIY or hire a professional.
At our wedding, I created all the florals, the stationery, reception signage, Philip made our branch arbor for the ceremony, and we collectively wrote the scripts for the ceremony, toasts, and game we had at the reception. It honestly was a lot especially while juggling our fall wedding season for our photography business. I knew that I didn't want to screw up my hair and makeup [from a professional photographer's perspective, unless you've had professional experience doing hair and makeup, this isn't an area I'd recommend DIYing, which is another topic I'll touch on in an upcoming post] so I left that to the amazing Amber, and we knew we needed an awesome DJ/emcee to keep the reception going with the dance floor and instructions for our game. We also leaned heavily on Odd Crew Events at New Holland Parlor for the flow of the game and food. Although it's a “duh” statement coming from us, photography and videography was the top priority for us and spent a very long time researching before choosing Linden Bloom Photography and Native Tree Films. These are other areas I obviously wouldn't recommend DIYing [which you technically can't do yourself, but believe me, we did try to analyze how we could get away with photographing our own event].
The same advice that I gave in regards to timeline construction is applicable to this: give priority to what's important to you. This is especially true if budget is a concern. Prioritize what is most important to you on your wedding day. Is it photography? Videography? Attire? Food? Dedicate larger portions of your budget to those items and take a look at other aspects of your day to see where you can get crafty. We've had some couples opt for digital invites to save on stationery.
If budget isn't the motivator, consider your time constraints. If you already have the skill set to do particular things, like planning and creating your timeline, making a dessert bar, or designing and printing your stationery, would you rather have someone at your wedding that you can delegate those tasks to? In other words, is it worth hiring someone to alleviate your potential stress so that you're able to fully be physically and mentally present at your wedding? The last thing you want to have happen is for you to be running around on your wedding day doing things you could have paid someone to do who specializes in those very things.
I don't regret DIYing any of the elements I did for our wedding. I used dried florals that I sourced from Amazon, etsy, and Hobby Lobby, and it looks the same today as it did on our wedding day. I have it in that form forever and have it displayed in our bedroom. I knew that the vision I had for our floral arrangements was so specific and I love the way they turned out. Our stationery and signage is very us and very personal, and I wouldn't change any of it. If you believe you will have the same feelings after your wedding, go for it!
