Countdown to 10 Years

In precisely 17 days, my husband Bill and I celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary. It’s been an amazing 10 years so far. Lots of joy, happiness, a bit of sadness, some heartbreak, and a whole lot of fun!

We’ve bought two houses and sold one. Both of us entered into jobs we are good at and passionate about. We adopted two wonderful animals, Laura and Olivia.

I found our scrapbook the other day while clearing out one of our downstairs rooms. What memories it brought back! We planned our wedding for less than $4,000!

It was a glorious day! However, I wish I had put more thought and appreciation into our wedding vendors. I know so much more now than I knew then. I get where brides who are planning are coming from.

Here are 3 things I learned with more to come as the month progresses:

Lesson 1:

Record the ceremony at the very least. We didn’t do a video. We had some family with camcorders which produced okay results. We had a wonderful string quartet perform.

However, their music now sounds like an old-timey record. While our ceremony was filmed, there’s no video proof of our reception. I don’t recall a lot of the reception. Brides, your wedding day goes by WAY too fast!

Lesson 2:

Understand what happens if you don’t give yourself enough time for photos. I hadn’t started shooting weddings when we got married. We were smart enough to have some of the formals done ahead of time. We had to catch up with photos at the reception.

However, we rushed to get through the rest of the photos to get to the reception. The photographer we chose was more “formal” than “documentary.” I wish I had a photographer like me when I married.

We have several good photos of us together. My FAVORITE was one that captured on our way to the reception. Needless to say, as much as I planned, we were still a bit stressed about this part of our day. We’ll talk soon about albums and my experience.

Lesson 3:

Put your money where it matters. Did we really need the imprinted cake napkins? Did we really need to do pencils for favors? Probably not, but it was the thought that counted.

We also did many things that were expected, like those cake napkins, that didn’t really matter. When money’s tight, really concentrating on where it goes is important.

Always ask yourself, “Do I REALLY need it?” Ultimately, I wouldn’t give it up for the world. I’d marry him all over again, 10 years later.