In the whirlwind of planning and executing a wedding, it’s easy to let certain details slip through the cracks. While some regrets are minor, others can linger long after the confetti has settled.
A user asked the forum, What’s the one thing you regret doing for your wedding day? Here are the common responses.
REGISTERING FOR CHINA
“Registering for gd China. I didn’t want it. Knew we would never use it. Received everything. Never have used it in 25 years.”
TELLING PEOPLE NOT TO TAKE PHOTOS
“My number one regret is telling people not to take pictures. I know it sounds dumb, but it is much worse than that. In our agreement with our photographer, she told us that other cameras were not allowed as the flash from another camera could ruin our pictures.
So we politely told people to refrain from taking pictures and explained the situation. We had a great wedding, and the photographer even sent an extra photographer to work the wedding (2 instead of 1).
A few weeks after, we tried contacting her for the photos. We got ghosted. We tried for about a year to track her down. We were still willing to pay for the photos, even unedited. We just wanted the photos. Fortunately, some people didn’t get the message, so we have a few (10-20) photos from our wedding. The worst part was that someone had contacted my wife through FB two weeks before the wedding warning us about her, but we decided to take the risk because there probably was no way to get another photographer at that kind of time. When she showed up for the date, we were relieved and thought we dodged a bullet.”
LETTING THEIR MOTHER-IN-LAW SPEAK
“Letting my mother-in-law have any say in anything. She ruined the food.”
NOT HAVING GRANDMA AS A FLOWER GIRL
“Not having our grandmas as flower girls. We didn’t have anyone to be flower girls, and I didn’t think of asking grandmas until way after the wedding.”
HAVING OUTDOOR WEDDING
“Having an outdoor wedding in August in South Carolina. Timing necessitated it. Otherwise, I loved my wedding and loved my wife.”
NEGLECTING THE BREAKFAST
“Not having a good breakfast.
We got married early in the day on a beach, and all I could think about was how much I wanted a breakfast sandwich with eggs, cheese, and bacon on a toasted English muffin with just a touch of hot sauce!”
WEARING THE WRONG SOCKS
“I (the groom) accidentally wore Christmas socks with a clearly visible Santa face peeking out as I moved.”
PAPER INVITATIONS
“Paper invitations and RSVPs. Set up a wedding site and have people RSVP there. The amount of stress I put myself through trying to get paper mailed back to me in an era when no one uses mail anymore was so unnecessary.
At one point, we’d gotten very few RSVPs back, and I had a total crying meltdown about how no one was going to come. Of course, they were going to come; it’s just no one uses mail anymore. Save yourself the headache and the money. It’s my biggest wedding regret.”
NOT TAKING PICTURES
“Not taking a picture.
We just did a quick wedding for legal purposes, with my friend presiding and my aunt and uncle as witnesses. It was a nice little sweet ceremony that lasted about 10 minutes over a nice area with a view before we went to dinner. Didnt, realize we hadn’t taken any pictures until like a week later when we wanted to show someone. Whoops.”
MAKING CUPCAKES; IS A LOT OF WORK
“Making cupcakes instead of buying a cake. We did a lot of DIY–made the beer and mead for toasts, assembled flowers and centerpieces–because it was cheaper, but also we like making things. But the cupcakes, in retrospect, were a ton of work and not that great.”
REGRET HIRING THE COORDINATOR
“I regret the coordinator they gave us for the ceremony.
The dude got flustered and started second-guessing everything right before the ceremony. Like he somehow forgot how a wedding works at the last moment when all of our guests were there. “OMG, what song do you want to play while she walks down the aisle!” I dunno, dude, the one everyone walks down the aisle to. The wedding song. The one we already told you to play.
I ended up taking charge and sorting everything out. Really wish I could have just gone with the flow on my big day.”
NOT PREPARING A SPEECH
“Not preparing a speech. I thought I’d just go up, thank everyone for coming and sit back down. Short and sweet, get it out of the way. That’s exactly what I did, without mentioning my parents or my wife.”
INVITING WRONG PEOPLE
“Inviting people, I didn’t really want to invite. They just cost you money, you don’t interact with them at all, and they usually don’t bring a nice gift to make up for it.
Except for letting all of the divorced aunts and uncles bring +1s. Because that led to a whole jealousy competition train that was extremely entertaining.”
ENDING HEARTFELT SPEECH WITH A JOKE
“Gave a heartfelt speech that ended with a joke. The punchline being “…and your presence here means almost as much as the envelopes you brought with you.”
Crickets. I still cringe.”
INVITING PEOPLE WE DON’T LIKE
“There were a couple of people that we decided not to invite. More accurately, we needed to cut a few after booking the hall and realizing how many we could fit in the room. I didn’t realize how hurt those few people would be. They brought it up years later. I still feel bad about it. My wife’s uncle and his wife are horrible people, and they brought people that weren’t even invited and basically forced them into their already full table. It was awkward. I regret inviting them and not inviting the hurt friends that I mentioned above.”
NOT HIRING A PHOTOGRAPHERS
“Not hiring a photographer. We thought we’d save money and just ask friends to take lots of pictures. They took some, but I have maybe five pictures worth looking at. No pictures of the cake or table settings. I kind of remember what they look like. The only decent pic of my husband and I have our flower girl in it. She’s sweet, and I love her, but it looks like she’s our kid. Every time people see the photo, they’re like, “I didn’t know you had an older child…” Hire a photographer, people!”
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This article was originally published on Mrs. Daaku Studio.