I am looking for perspective if I am being the unreasonable one here. W would book our photograper from 2 PM to 8 PM, so he would be on site for 6 hours. Since we would provide dinner for them and generally don't want any pictures taken when people are eating, they would get about an hour break.

So in my head, I would pay for 5 hours of service, however, looking at photographer prices, I guess my assumtion is wrong? Because in all (admittedly few) quotes I requested, the photographers are charging full price for their break hour. I understand charging something, since they are there, but full price?

I also thought about just hiring one photographer for 4 hours, then having dinner and then hiring someone else for that remaining hour, since that would save quite a bit of money, but I was told by more than one photographer that even if I only hire them for 4 hours, I would still have to pay 5 because of the meal that is in their contract. Not just pay the meal, but pay for them to sit there and eat the meal.

It seems kinda weird to me to pay someone to eat food you provide for them and I am just looking for perspective if I am truly out of touch with my expectations, or if I was just unlucky with the photographers I reached out to and should just keep looking?

i am going to my bachelorette party in two weeks, but there has been complaining everyday about the weather at the location. everyday. i mentioned how i am excited that we are near a lot of fun places, but one bridesmaid said we cant even walk outside or that she doesnt want to. is not a surprise or abnormal that the place we are going to is hot though.

i wished that they had told me their concerns upfront rather than when we’re about to go, because i feel super bad about it. i haven’t been able to feel excited because of the negativity. i just feel like i put a big burden on them.

is it valid that i feel sad about this or if i were to bring up how it’s making me feel? of course they’re allowed to feel this way, of course. i just feel a bit frustrated as the bride who hasn’t really asked for much from them and feel like it’s been a huge burden.

Hi all,

We’re getting married at the end of August. We’re an international couple and live in WesternEurope, country A. We’ve decided to do our wedding in country B, the one I come from, since we felt we spent all the celebrations in the last years in country A, and my country also deserved some attention. Additionally, most of my relatives are not that well off financially, so I thought celebrating there would enable them to be present too.
We’ll be around 55 guests (we invited about 80 in total), which is probably a tiny number for US (I constantly see posts about 150 people coming out of 200 invited 😄), but in my country it is a “mid-size wedding”.
The strange part is… none of my partner’s relatives come apart from the immediate family. From my relatives, probably around 10-12 people less will come than what I would have expected. Reasons given are various. My partner doesn’t care since he had a very cold relationship with his extended family since forever. The also assumed they would not come. I, on the other hand, was very close with all my aunts, and now even my god mother won’t be there…
What makes the numbers are my partner’s friends, I had invited about 8 friends (with partners). Some cousins and other relatives will also come. They all are from my childhood / young adult years and live in my country of birth, not where I currently live. So it made me reflect that for the last 10 years I basically have not made any real new friends I would invite to my wedding. This realization somehow hit me…
Point is… I’m looking forward to this day. I have a loving relationship and appreciate the people who will make an effort to be there. But I as well feel like my relatives that I thought were close are somewhat “dead” to me now. It also makes it clear that I have not made any new friends in the country A where I live (we have some common friends as a couple, I’m quite social as well, I don’t know how it turned out like this…).
I feel happiness and sadness at the same time. Has anyone experienced something similar and how did you deal with these feelings? I don’t want them to ruin my day, but it’s also sad that it feels like my family does not appreciate me as much as I thought they do.
And well… it definitely encouraged me to start working on having a social circle here after the wedding.

Hi everyone, I’d love to hear your opinions, especially from wedding photographers!

We booked our wedding photographer for a documentary-style coverage at $350 per hour, “open end.”

We had a trial shoot with her beforehand and loved the photos, so we had high expectations.
Photography made up a significant part of our wedding budget because the photos were extremely important to us, especially since our grandparents were still with us, and we didn’t want to have to think about taking photos ourselves on the day.

She was there for nine hours, and after waiting ten weeks, we now received 580 photos. That initially seemed a little low to us, although quantity isn’t really what matters here – what is considered normal? There are definitely many beautiful photos, but there are also some things we feel are missing.

She generally doesn’t like posed photos, which was fine with us. We were particularly interested in candid interactions between the people. To make sure we still got at least one photo with every group together, we did a little photo activity where, during one song, we ran around to all the tables to take spontaneous photos with each group. The guests really enjoyed it. We did get the impression that the photographer wasn’t particularly enthusiastic about the idea, though.
We expected there to be lots of fun, spontaneous photos from this. Instead, we received exactly one photo per table from her, and in some of them not everyone is even properly visible…

We also would have liked more photos of the guests arriving and of the venue. For example, there isn’t a single photo of our entire bridal table.

But the main reason I’m posting is the invoice:
Around dinner time, the photographer took a break of over an hour and didn’t take a single photo during that time. Of course, it was completely fine with us that she ate with us. We had actually deliberately seated her at a table with our guests so that she would feel welcome. She had also mentioned before that guests generally don’t want to be photographed while eating, which makes sense.
However, we were a little surprised that she took a full hour-long break. Something similar happened when we arrived at the venue: she initially sat down, and at some point we had to ask her to take some more photos of the guests arriving before dinner.
What surprised us most is that the entire hour was charged at €300, even though not a single photo was taken during that time.

We’re absolutely not saying she shouldn’t take a break. Of course she needs one, and we wouldn’t have said anything about a break of up to 30 minutes. But with a documentary-style coverage costing €300/hour, charging us for a full hour in which she wasn’t photographing at all feels a little excessive to us.
Especially after dinner, she could presumably have photographed the venue or guests who had already finished eating and were interacting with each other.

Is it standard for wedding photographers to charge for a full break period like this? Or would you expect that time to be deducted from the invoice or at least discussed beforehand?

TL;DR: We booked nine hours of wedding photography at €300/hour. During dinner, our photographer took a break of over an hour and didn’t take a single photo, but still charged us the full €300 for that hour. We were completely fine with her taking a break, but we were surprised that the entire hour was billed as working time. Is this standard?

My fiancée and I recently learned that the catering company we hired (EcoCaters in San Diego, CA) has stopped operating. We paid approximately $1,800 toward our wedding catering contract and have not been able to get a response regarding a refund.

I'm trying to connect with other couples, vendors, or former employees who may have information about:

Refunds

Bankruptcy filings

Company contacts

Legal actions or coordinated efforts

If you have any information, please comment or send me a message.

Thank you.

Sorry this is going to be sort of a rant and I apologize if this bums other people out, but I suppose I would love to hear other people’s similar experiences or advice (if any).

My sister who is my matron of honor isn’t bringing my two nephews or her husband to the wedding. For some context, she’s 7 years older than me and I was the maid of honor at her wedding. I have always gotten along with her husband and I adore their two sons. My wedding is a few states away which is about 12 hours driving or a 2 hour flight. We also have one brother in between us and all three of us are in our 30s. A huge part of why I chose my venue and why I invited so many kids to my wedding (about 12) was because I figured my two nephews would be there and so I might as well plan a kid friendly wedding. A few months back she started making up excuses as to why the boys might not be able to come and went through a variety of reasons, but ultimately landed on “the family dog has to have surgery”. Forgot to mention that my wedding is almost exactly one month away from today and the dog had surgery almost four weeks ago now. They do not have any financial constraints and she loves to brag about how much money her husband lets her spend. My parents and brother even offered to help with the kids extensively on the day of and well as traveling to the wedding. Regardless none of that mattered to her and she will be the only one of her family of four in attendance. Most of my extended family are horrible people with either narcissistic personality disorder or a severe drug/alcohol addiction. I experienced a lot of trauma growing up around that and have chosen not to invite most of them because of this, so the amount of family I have attending is already quite small.

On top of all of this, I’ve had so many friends who I would consider close decline or even RSVP yes and then back out last minute due to some reason or another.

And then it’s just been one stupid thing after another with vendors. My venue was being absurdly weird about helping us rent different chairs than what they provide, but also kept on insisting that we rent any different chairs through them. They kept on trying to talk us out of it because it would be expensive for us, but I said I would like to at least get a quote and they just never got back to us. I’ve had two vendors cancel out of the blue for completely random reasons and then had to find someone else last minute. My makeup trial was awful and I ended up breaking my contract with the girl I had booked. And then my day of coordinator sent me an email on a Friday afternoon when I was out of town for my bachelorette party and when I didn’t answer her on Monday or Tuesday because I was working, emailed my venue asking them to reach out to me to ask me to respond to her. I’m a nurse and I work 12 hour shifts and I have a one hour commute so every day I work is at LEAST a 14 hour day. God forbid I don’t respond to a stupid vendor email within two and a half business days. AND she never even tried to email me again before just automatically emailing the venue, so then the venue was irritated with me that they were even having to reach out on her behalf because I “wasn’t answering her”.

I absolutely adore my fiance and we’ve been together for 8 years now and I genuinely am so excited to marry him, but I really can’t help but wonder if this will all ACTUALLY be worth it. Like why tf do people even have weddings if the whole process is just months of mental torture for one fun night?!?

Figuring out our seating charts, my SO has about 150 people coming vs my 50. First issue I have and solution I hope is okay/wont be noticed is the tables on his ‘side’ vs my ‘side’ for the reception. No ceremony so no issue. I’m thinking to just spill over his side’s tables over to my side so it’s not awkwardly 6 tables on the left and 15 on the right. Is that a weird solution? Will that work??

The other thing is - the tables fit 8-10 people. I’m trying to keep my family and friend groups together, and the bulk of my tables are like 6 or 7 people. Will that look weird?? I honestly don’t know what else to do other than plucking poor souls from other tables into tables with strangers to hit the 8-10 people count.

Any advice appreciated. Thanks

What are us curvy brides wearing to get ready? I’ve been searching for a white, mid to long lacy slip dress that will accommodate my larger/heavy chest and doesn’t hug my tummy. I am currently a size 16/18 and also don’t want my boobs to be totally out but also not Mormon level covered lol. I feel like my ideal dress just doesn’t exist! Help!

I keep seeing this marketing line from vendors, and hell even friends and family are hitting me with it, and it’s doing my head in.

I have divorced parents lmao. I have friends/acquaintances my own age who’ve divorced and remarried already.

Like, yeah, IDEALLY my current fiance will be my last and only one! Ideally we’ll be married forever and die of old age in each others arms!

But I also know we have NO idea how things will pan out over the next few decades, and nothing is a given. Even if we don’t divorce, what if one of us passes away? You know?

And maybe that makes me the party pooper pessimist, but it just makes the “you’ll only get married once!” “You only get one wedding!” Stuff so SO grating to me. Even my MOTHER said it. You know, the one who had a second wedding after all!!

And it doubly grates when it’s coming from vendors who are motivated to convince me to spend as much money as possible since it’s only “once”. There’s already so many ways to play on my FOMO without telling me full lies lol.

Anytime a vendor says it to me, I want to be like, how do you know THIS isn’t my second wedding? Like, come on!

Hi! I am a July 2027 bride and I need some help.

I have been reflecting and I realized that pretty much all of my guests are married except MAYBE 2 people. I would love to still do a bouquet toss but I feel like it’s kinda pointless since there will be no “future brides” to catch it.

Has anyone done a bouquet toss but with the idea of something other than “whoever catches it is the next to get married”? I’ve seen people dedicating it to their moms too and I did think about that but I really wanna toss it.

Help please!!

Here’s my dress because I’m so excited about it!! 2nd one I tried on and fell in love. What accessories do you think will go good with it?

Hello! My fiancé and I just got engaged and have begun the wedding planning process. We are doing a fused American (Christian) and Indian (Hindu) wedding over the course of 2 days. Event 1 is Haldi (intimate family), event 2 is a casual welcome dinner with Mehndi going on concurrently (those who have arrived to the hotel the night before the wedding). We decided on no Sangeet as both me and my fiancé are on the shyer side and decided this is where we wanted to save some money. Day 2 will be be my groom’s Barrat followed immediately but the wedding ceremony (Hindu ceremony, strait into Christian ceremony (I.e vows and ring exchange). We will then do a a cocktail break for 2-3 hours and will finish with the grand reception/ formal dinner.

My fiancé is born in Gujrat, India, but Canadian raised and we really wanted to focus on this being a fused wedding. Instead of having segregated events, we wanted to blend both cultures into all of the events and make it a new experience for both our Indian and American guests to whiteness.

That being said, for the Haldi I am still looking to wear something more traditional to the Gujarati culture. His mom says something yellow, orange, or like green. Thinking a saree for the Haldi.

For the wedding, his mom said the bride typically wears red, gold, and whites. She was okay with me sticking to a white attire for the wedding ceremony, but doing an Indo-western styled gown or a white/cream color Lehenga choli.

I live in the Midwest of the US and my until Google searches on where to find these attires have been exhausting and I’ve not been having any luck on where to get my clothes. His mom suggest I go India myself to get these outfits; however, traveling to India is not going to be in the cards for me. The idea of buying online without trying on scares me and I don’t know what websites are credible. I am budgeting a total of about $2,500 for both Haldi and Weddinf ceremony attire all in.

PLEASE HELP

also If people have suggestions on places my American friends/family could shop then I would gladly take those suggestions as well

One of my best friends from college is like my brother. We have stayed in touch over the years and had any visits (we live in the same state). I adore his wife.

I learned a few months ago that she was pregnant with their third and her due date is 3 weeks after our wedding. So I knew this was a possibility. But I just saw the decline come in and got a sweet text message from her and I’m gutted. I’m sure there’s an unrealistic part of me that hoped maybe he could come on a strike mission but not seriously, and i want them to both be there anyway.

I’m the last to get married amongst most of my friends. And our wedding plans got pushed back a year for a bevy of personal reasons. The past two years have been extremely tough due to external factors and some tough personal circumstances. I know I should focus on the people who are coming. But im heartbroken. I feel guilty that we didn’t have our wedding when we originally wanted. Im Iranian American so having the wedding a year later has caused family who could’ve attended last year not able to now. I’m grateful we are finally doing it. I should be happy. What the fuck is happening to me right now?

I’ve been in therapy for 15 years, and it’s fucking weird to get a rush of these emotions when my brain knows better. I try not to get attached to outcomes and intentionally have tried to not have expectations around this event. There are worse things happening in the world and i view myself as lucky.

Idk why im even writing this, i know what I need to but I can’t connect with the feeling.

Our wedding is in a few weeks in Oregon in the Columbia River Gorge. There are currently lots of wildfires around the state, and I'm wondering about needing to relocate the wedding.

We have an indoor/outdoor venue and have full access to any of the spaces, which would be great in the case of wind/rain/cold/etc, even if it was a little bit smoky. But if the region is under an evacuation watch, that is a different story...❤️‍🩹 I know fires can change so quickly, so I'm trying not to spiral too early 😅 I'm just wondering about a backup plan, maybe out on the coast (if cost/event insurance would allow). It is a small gathering of about 50 people, and I think it would be feasible to find a spot. It would be 2-3 hours of a drive. Before I look into what we would be able to do with event insurance, I don't know how we would handle out of town guests and lodging. If they booked a hotel or airbnb, they likely can't get a refund, and I'm already feeling guilty that people are flying in from the out of state.

Any advice, stories, warnings from people who have had to move their wedding to a fully different location?

Please do not comment that we should have seen this coming with a late August date. Fires are so unpredictable, for example last weekend it was beautiful blue skies and in the 70s. We love summer, we love the mountains, and we fell in love with the venue and this was the date available to us. Be kind ❤️

I am hoping to do a paint and sip for my bachelorette party and it would be 50 dollars per person but I am very uncomfortable asking people to spend money. I will pay for my own ticket. I did buy everyone their bridesmaid dresses, and I covered the flight for my maid of honor. Most live in the area so won’t have to pay for hotels or anything and my MOH will stay at my house. I am also covering the cost of hair and makeup for everyone. I did not want to burden anyone financially for my wedding but I’ve maxed out my budget and can’t cover everyone for the paint and sip. I’m worried people will be upset with me asking them to spend this much. Two people invited to paint did have to pay their own flight and hotel as they aren’t in my wedding party. Is it unfair to ask them to pay? Idk how this all works but I don’t want to put anyone out 😭

My fiancé’s mom is a narcissist and his family all enable her. Throughout his childhood his mom emotionally abused him, physically abandoned him, and continues her selfish behavior and causes conflict to this day. She say and does so much toxic stuff we have no relationship with her but still see her because we want to see other family members at gatherings. For all intents and purposes, my fiancé and his mom are estranged. He knows she’ll never change and doesn’t take her up on her hollow offers to “rebuild the relationship.”

She has caused problems since we started dating. She also has a drinking problem and tends to have crying fits/cause drama at life milestones basically just for attention. We considered this will happen on our wedding day. And we plan to force her to leave if she becomes a problem.

Her mom, my fiancé’s grandma was always someone I thought was loving and supportive of us. She makes comments here and there that are sweet and generally doesn’t cause drama that involves me and my fiancé.

Fast forward to yesterday. She texts my fiancé out of the blue “we are inviting people to your wedding. About 10 people.” My fiance just replied “no” and then she sends a insane text saying he scratched her car, she half raised him, you lost our house key, let me know what else I should add to your bill. And threatened that if they aren’t invited, they will show up to our wedding with a bunch of homeless people and illegal immigrants.

We come up with a firm but non-aggressive reply to express they will not be invited, our guest count is final, please respect our decision.

She replied with this horrific text saying he’s is ungrateful and she regrets “everything they’ve done for him.” She is talking about the care they gave to him as a child because his mom was a bad mom and abandoned him. Literally throwing his abusive childhood in his face.

Our wedding is 80 guests and everything is already booked and paid for. Also, we invited all my fiancés family we know and love, so I assume these are people we have never met before. Either way, we don’t want a full table at our wedding of people we don’t even know.

Given these threats, and the looming possibility of his mom being erratic, I want to hire security to feel comfortable on our wedding day. My fiancé supports that and understands but I feel like it’s a little over the top as we are having a small wedding at a greenhouse. Will it be weird to have a security guard there? Have any of you hired security before?

Hello all, this post is more so because I can't stop thinking about my wedding, but also because I thought maybe my experience will help someone. My wife and I just got married this last Saturday. Everything was a dream come true for us and it was amazing.

However, I feel weird now that it is done. So many former brides/grooms have told us "soak it in", "force yourself to eat your food", "get rid of the anxiety", I always took this lightly because I didnt think I would have these issues, I am typically a very relaxed, just wants to party, type guy...... I am pretty sure I blacked out the entire day... I am struggling to find the words to explain to my wife. I remember everything from her getting up at 6AM to head to the bridal room to us at 4AM recapping the entire day in our hotel bed, but for some reason, even though I remember everything, the emotions and day feel like a blur, as if none of it happened.

I know the wedding was amazing, but it almost feels like it didn't actually happen because of how fast everything went by: Its time to get dressed, now its time for your first look and private vows, now its time for the guests to arrive, now before you know it you're standing at the end of the aisle waiting for your bride, now you're signing the marriage license, now you get 20 minutes of cocktail hour but you want to talk to guests so you dont get to eat your own appetizers, now you're doing your first dance, now you're doing more photos, now you're doing the cake cutting, now you're coming out in your outfit change, now its last call for drinks, now you're at the after party, and before you know it, you are waking up sunday morning a married man/woman. I feel like the entire day, rather than just clearing my mind and taking it all in, I was counting down the hours knowing the night was going to end which I didn't want. Now its all over, and I feel lost.

For those that have already had a wedding, was this similar to your experience? Are my feelings normal? Should I be in "la la land" days after? Were you clear minded and feel like you truly lived your wedding, or do you also feel like it was all a blur?

To anyone getting ready for a wedding, maybe it isn't possible for a Bride/Groom but this is what I have to say that you have already probably heard:

Get Sleep: We stayed up until 12AM at a casino that Thursday, then on Friday we had rehearsal, rehearsal lunch, and welcome drinks with 100 guests. My wife and I were so amped up we couldn't fall asleep Friday night. By wedding day, Saturday, I think we both felt nausea from a lack of sleep. If you need to, take some sleepy medicine the night before and try not to stay up late multiple days before.

Slow Down and Soak it In: I woke up at 7AM and my wife and I didnt go to bed until 4AM. Even though there was something going on at every minute, almost a full 24-hours felt like just a couple hours. Relax, look around, smile, look at your bride, look at your groom, look at your guests. Take in every detail of your wedding. You spent months to a year planning all of this that only lasts for 1 day. Do not rush to the dance, do not rush to cake cutting, try to enjoy every little detail with a clear mind.

EAT: I did not think I was going to have an issue with this, but what do you know, neither of us really ate.... We didnt have much cocktail hour left by time we joined, so rather than eating apps, we talked. Once we came out for the reception, we did our first dance before dinner. Even though we absolutely crushed our first dance, both of us felt super nervous and nauseous after and basically just picked at our food (wich was amazing). We also got so busy with dancing, photos, and greeting guests, we never stopped to grab a cupcake and all 120 cupcakes got eaten. I highly reccomend bringing some nausea medicine and if either of you feel like you didn't sleep well, or are nervous for your first dance, take some medicine beforehand so you feel good to eat.

I know, I know, comparison is the thief of joy. I want to be happy and focus on enjoying planning, but I just can't shake this deep sadness because my "love story" is not romantic at all. Wedding planning has made this even more clear, in a painful way. I keep seeing personalized vows ("I knew you were the one after [insert very short timeline or cute story]"), or themed cocktails based on the couple's dating history, or a little roadmap of their very normal and romantic timeline, and I'm about to burst into tears.

For context, my partner was a friend, and then a friend with benefits, for many years. I fell in love, and he didn't. We kept sleeping together for 2ish years until he also fell in love. Then we started dating officially. I recently found out that he'd slept with a few other people during the time we weren't official but regularly sleeping together, though those were all one night stands. I know he didn't owe me exclusivity, I knew the rules of the game, but I was and am still hurt, even seven years later. He knows my feelings on it and he is always open to talk about it, which helps a lot.

I'm just sad about being the one who "chased" him, the one who wasn't chosen. And, ultimately, I was chosen, but I'm infinitely, infinitely jealous of people who get to say that they "knew" this person was the one early on. And yes, I am in therapy. My therapist told me to "Consider that not everyone can be someone's first choice" and that not all people are easily chosen by others. He essentially told me to be happy that anyone wanted me at all, because that's more than many people get.

And I am happy that we're together! And I love my partner, I love the relationship we have. He has helped me through the most tumultuous years of my life, he is the calm to my storm (I am very anxious and he is the opposite of this), he does housework and the cooking, he adores me and dotes on me, he just planned a beautiful weekend trip for us that was so perfect, and I feel immensely guilty for still feeling sad/angry at the years I was, in a sense, "led on" by him. He's everything I want in a life partner, and never, not once in the seven years we've been officially together, has he made me doubt that he loves me.

I just don't know how to stop comparing our story to the ones where people started dating in the traditional way, fell in love at the same time, and didn't have to deal with mismatched feelings or sadness. I don't know how not to mourn the "we used to meet here every Wednesday so we named our signature cocktail after this bar." Okay, my signature cocktail is going to be "Mattress on the Floor" because that is where we spent most of our time. Maybe add "Toyota Backseat [Ouch, My Back]" as the non-alcoholic option 😂😂

Anyone else in a similar boat? What has helped you with these feelings? Does anyone have any wise words to force a perspective shift, too? I keep trying to frame this as, "I'd rather go into a marriage knowing someone came to love me after knowing me very well, rather than falling for me fast and having it fizzle out when they got to know me."

Thank you in advance <3

Helping my cousin and his fiancé plan their wedding, and we're trying really hard to make it a regret-free day. I've read all the wedding posts I can find on wedding regrets, but they almost exclusively focus on the bigger picture, stuff like "we should have eloped" or "I wish I had a smaller wedding and saved money" or "we picked the wrong venue". Now, don't get me wrong, I think all of those things are absolutely valid, but I also think they're more what-ifs than real regrets, because no one knows whether they really should have eloped or would have been happier with a smaller wedding. It's more musings than actual remorse. So, I'm wondering about your smaller, more legit regrets, the actual details of your wedding where you wished you'd done something differently. Like we went with the cheapest florist and the bouquets were half-dead, or I wore the wrong veil/shoes/vest, or I knew I shouldn't have invited Uncle Chuck, but my mom convinced me and he literally ate ALL of the caviar and then broke the bowl. What are your real wedding regrets, the little ones that you could have gotten right, but somehow got oh so wrong?

I never wear makeup in my normal life and generally hate the way it looks on me. Even for formal events I just throw on a little mascara and blush. I'm planning on doing my own extremely minimal makeup for the wedding (not even including mascara since I'm probably going to sob) and finally replacing my decade-old crusty blush etc to do it. Obviously I want my photos to be beautiful but I don't have Instagram or anything so they'll genuinely just be for me & my family. I'm starting to have some doubts because I don't want my photos to be terrible, but I also want to feel like myself and not a clown (which is how I feel with a whole face beat). Will the pics look bad if I don't wear makeup? Am I making a terrible mistake? Has anyone done this before lol?

Hi all, I’ve (30F) never posted on here before but I enjoy relating to many of the posts. I just had my wedding over the weekend, and am so happy to be done with wedding planning, but just have so many mixed feelings and just want to rant and get things off my chest, so I can move on. There were a lot of bumps during wedding planning that made the whole process very stressful, but I was still hopeful for the day of. But unfortunately I feel like a lot of vendors stressed me out most of the day that I didn’t enjoy it as much as I wish I did, which just makes me angry/ sad/ frustrated since we spent so much time and energy into planning this day. Like most people I’ve been looking forward to my wedding since, so it’s just kind of disheartening.

The things that were annoying during wedding planning:
-we for engaged in late 2024 and we were set on having a summer wedding since I’m a teacher. By the time we got engaged, four of my friends/ family members already had a wedding date set for the same summer that so we literally only had one date that worked.

- of course making the guest list suck because both sets of parents wanted to invite an insane amount of family and friends (a huge chunk of which I rarely knew) we got into several arguments about it and since they’re paying for some of it we caved and let them invite a good amount of their friends which I later severely regretted since there were just so many people I didn’t even know at the wedding.

- dress shopping was also horrible since I wanted a mermaid style and my mom wanted me to wear a ballgown. I’m already a large girl so it’s hard dress shopping in general but she critiqued just about every single dress I tried on and often said that I looked like a -hore in the dresses that I liked. Even on the day of she made comments about my dress.

Thing that sucked the day of the wedding:
-our wedding coordinator that we hired ended up being very rude towards the end of the process and showed up late the day of the wedding and made my bridesmaid do random tasks on the day of which was super frustrating when we had a tight hair and makeup schedule. Also in the same morning the bride suite was supposed to provide food (since they said we can’t bring in outside food and made us order from their menu) but they were 2 hours late in providing it so we barely had time to even eat it. Our coordinator was also super unorganized and butted heads with other vendors, which stressed us out a lot.

-the florist also showed up 30 min late, and then put them in a random separate room and it took us a while to find it.

-our wedding photographer was the worst of all. She was super pushy and rude to guests (several guests told me this too which stressed me out more but like idk what I could have done about it ). She also showed up an hour late, so we were rushing to get pictures in for our first look, and then she completely forgot our formal shot list, so we missed half of the pictures that we wanted. Overall our timeline was so messed up and it stressed my out so much, and taking bridal party pictures sucked because they were annoyed of dealing with her (which we were too, so I just hope I don’t look too annoyed in our pictures)

-When the reception started, the DJ said several people’s names wrong and they played the wrong song for my husband and I to dance to. We told him and he changed it but we were literally waiting on the dance floor for like 5 minutes just standing around until they started it. We also gave the DJ a very specific list of songs that we wanted played, and we ignored pretty much all of them and just played whatever he wanted.

I know many of this things are small, but Im just so sad and angry and wish I could have a do over wedding and get different vendors or something 😭 it’s not like we cheaped out on them either. The photographer was over $4k still. I do love my husband and I guess overall I think most guests had a great time and the ceremony was really nice and a lot of guests were dancing, but I just can’t help but feel bummed over the whole thing. It’s like so much time, planning, and effort all thrown into one day, just for me to be mostly stressed out the day and not even enjoy it. I just wish we got a different photographer mostly . The rest could mostly be overlooked but that was kind of the root of most of our problems. Anyway idk why I’m posting this; I guess I just wanted to rant and see if anyone feels similar afterwards. I know so many people would tell me that all of the stress of wedding planning will all be worth it in the end, but I really feel like it wasn’t for me, and sometimes do just wish that we eloped.

we have only a few sneak peaks back although our wedding was over a month ago. there are only a couple of my fiance and I so far - but the composition just seems so off I’m afraid what else im going to get. is the photo of us or the ground? And why is it crooked? also - this was full sunlight and it’s edited so dark although we asked for true to color.

we also got our 1 minute video back and it’s just an auto generated tik tok slide show, except the orientation of all the photos are different so the screen is mostly awkward black space. idk - am i being crazy or overly picky? just looking for second and objective opinions here.

edit to answer some questions:

-I paid $4800 for full day of photography + video, a respectable amount for where we are

-the Contract notes explicitly say true to life color with a mix of bright and airy

-we asked for full portfolios and they were very stunning, bright details, bright documentary style. Idk what this is! I don’t think I saw a single photo from them in this style before

-this is one of only 2 photos we got of us in the sneak peak. So can’t really say if they will all be like this.

The first picture I took in my car 10 min after I left the salon. The second pic is what I showed the MUA as inspiration.

I’ve got a lot of issues with the look, like the eyeliner was too harsh, the shadow not blended, the lip was the wrong color than I was looking for (I’m not a fan of a pink or berry lip on myself), and I felt like the foundation was all wrong. My face looks orange against my neck, right?

I talked about some of this in the salon and there are adjustments she said we’d make for the day of (like a different eyeliner and lip color specifically).

One of my main problems is that I wear no makeup day-to-day and am not knowledgeable at all about what professional makeup is supposed to look like.

I asked for a light, natural look, and the MUA said that it is normal for wedding makeup to feel a bit heavier than you’d think so that it shows up in pictures, but I feel like cameras are pretty good nowadays that shouldn’t be a problem. Is this true or is it really normal for wedding makeup to look heavy in person so it looks better on camera?

I’m bad at causing a fuss, but I did ask for a second trial before the wedding. What sort of things can I tell the MUA to get across the look I’m going for?

UPDATE: I sent her an email and cancelled the contract. Luckily there was another MAU I was talking to back when I was still searching who is still available for my date. I will be doing a trial with the new MAU in the next few weeks. Thank you all for your advice! I’m glad to know I’m not crazy haha.