Wedding Planning: It's Not For Everyone

The moment I got engaged, I started planning my wedding. Seriously, like that night, in my head. Of course I already had some ideas...what girl hasn't been thinking about her wedding (on some level) for years?

Before we were engaged I imagined that the time spent planning my wedding was going to be a glorious time. I couldn't wait to buy a wedding planning book, tons of bridal magazines, and sign up for The Knot. Arsen and I had been talking about getting married for long enough that I had considered buying some of this stuff before, but I knew I would feel like an imposter without a ring on my finger. So finally, I could do all of the things I'd been dreaming of for so long. 

And then reality came crashing down. Planning a wedding is hard. It's stressful. It's actually quite infuriating at times. And this is why: EVERYONE has an opinion. EVERYONE thinks they know what's best. Yes, it was my wedding, but I had to take into consideration what I wanted, what Arsen wanted, what his family wanted, what my family wanted....and everyone wanted very different things.

The first couple of months weren't bad. We started looking for venues right away, and I found a few that I loved. Two of them were way out of our budget (who can pay $48,000 for their venue alone? Not this girl.), but one was perfect. It was so cute and quaint, beautiful and white (a blank canvas is what they called it), and everyone there was so incredibly nice. I was sold. So was Arsen.

But then....then we started writing up the guest list. This venue had a capacity of 150 people. Let's just say we went way over that. Way. Apparently in the Armenian tradition, you don't just invite the bride and groom's friends. You invite the parent's friends. And the sibling's friends. And their grandkids and aunts and third cousins. It was hilarious. I felt so bad for his poor mom, because she kept trying to narrow down the list, but she was so upset and worried that people were going to be offended if they weren't invited.

This is one of the many reasons that we had to have two weddings. We just couldn't narrow the list down to 150 no matter what we did. We probably ended up having about 150 at each wedding, so obviously it was a necessity.

After the venue debacle was decided, it was time for all of the little details. Oh my, there are SO many little details. Cake tasting was awesome. Shopping for my wedding dress was amazing. I found the one I wanted on the very first day. Picking out tuxes wasn't bad, because I left that in Arsen's hands. And taking our engagement photos was a blast. But literally almost every other part was not pleasant.

I think part of the reason this was a less than joyous time in my life is because my mom and all but one of my bridesmaids were more than three hours away. So I just didn't have much help, even though my mom made several trips down throughout the course of the planning process. And I will be the first to admit that I get stressed out easily. And overwhelmed. And I tend to blow things out of proportion just a little bit. So poor Arsen was the only one who got to deal with my insanity on a daily basis.

But when it came down to it, none of it mattered. The wedding was beautiful, and incredibly fun, and meaningful and sweet, and I didn't even notice all of the millions of little details. Of course there were day-of catastrophes, of course everything wasn't perfect. But in my eyes, it couldn't have been better.

So for any of you girls out there who are newly engaged or know your time is coming, brace yourself. It can still be a wonderful time, but don't get too down if it's not the perfect wedding planning process you always imagined. In the end, it will all work out.

Now, feast your eyes on some of our fun engagement pics: