Aaron and I celebrated our five year wedding anniversary this past weekend and it was so fun to actually be at a wedding on the evening of our anniversary. We took a trip down memory lane all while witnessing our friends declare their love for one another. Plus, this past spring we were asked to be a part of a styled wedding photo shoot, which I thought would be fun with our big anniversary around the corner. Obviously, a lot can change in 5 years especially the style of your wedding, so it made me think about whether or not Aaron and I would change any thing about our wedding. The answer is simple, I wouldn’t change a thing. However, if we were to get married today I’m sure there would be things that would be a lot different. For example, the style of my dress or the colors of our wedding – I love what they were, but today they definitely wouldn’t be in style anymore. Although I wouldn’t change anything about our actual wedding, I would do a few things differently when it came to the logistics of our wedding and wedding planning…
Dress: Lovely Bride, @lovelybride, lovelybride.com.
Hair: Lauren Wohlin, @l.a.dub; S & L Trends, @sandltrends.
Let’s be honest, our wedding was perfect for us and we wouldn’t change a thing, however we learned some life lessons that might help you as you plan your wedding or maybe on your wedding day…
- Life Must Go On – After Aaron proposed, I remember that money was super tight. We were both trying to move up in our careers, which meant taking paychecks in order to getting to where we wanted to be. Instead of staying in all the time, I wish someone would have told me that life goes on even though you’re planning a wedding. I definitely could have been a bit more creative when it came to doing things with friends that didn’t require money, like hiking or doing wine nights at each others house.
- Include Friends & Family More – Both Aaron and I were one of the first people of our friends and family to get married. Instead of sharing the planning with our friends and family, I felt like I would be annoying by talking about it, but looking back it would have been nice to share such a big part of our year with our loved ones. Also, it would have been super helpful during the last couple of weeks leading up or even just the weekend of because then we would have been able to call on friends and family for support. I remember the night of our rehearsal dinner (Friday) the wedding planner discovered that one of our champagne flutes was shattered. Instead of spending the whole next day (Saturday) with family and friends, I left the welcome brunch to exchange it, when I’m sure one of my local friends who lived near the store wouldn’t have mind running that errand for me. Thankfully we got married the following day on Sunday.
- You’ll Fit In Your Dress, I Promise! – I worked so hard the year leading up to our wedding to get my thyroid under control and the extra weight I gained from the disease that I continued my super healthy eating into the wedding weekend. I was worried that too much champagne or not following my super clean eating would prevent me from fitting into my dress, which is crazy! Two to three days of being a little relaxed in my diet would not make that much of an impact. In fact, I ended up losing an additional 5-10 pounds from the stress that the seamstress had to remove four inches from my dress just days before the wedding.
- Care Less About What People Other Than My Husband Think – Sure, this sounds a bit rude, but I definitely would have cared less about pleasing everyone else and more about making sure that the two people getting married are happy. We didn’t have a ton of crazy demands from guests, but I do remember a specific situation where I was so concerned about my sister feeling left out (I had three Maid of Honors; my sister and my two BFFs from high school) that didn’t take a photo of my two best friends and I on the big day. I have a photo of all four of us, and individual photos of each of them and I, but not a single photo of the three of us from high school, which I really would love to have to look back on since we have one from another wedding we were all in together. I know it sounds silly, but this day only happens once so make sure to do the little things that make you and your future hubby happiest.