How To Handle Tough Family Dynamics When Wedding Planning | Wedding Q&A

Well, hello lovely humans and welcome to Engage, a wedding planning podcast for the modern day couple. I'm your host, Jamie Wolfer, and I truly believe that wedding planning does not need to be complicated or time consuming. I kind of picture these episodes like jumping on a quick phone call with your wedding planner. You get your answers and you go on your merry way. Because sometimes not all of us have an hour to dedicate to listening to super long podcasts or super long intros. So without further ado, let's just jump right on into it. Today's episode is going to admittedly be a little bit all over the place. You see, every single month I sit down with the people over in the master plan course and answer your questions in lifetime. So if you find yourself struggling and really need to sit down and speak with a real life wedding planner, I would love to be a part of your wedding planning journey. Join us over in the master plan today to get your questions answered. Until then, take a listen. What is the best way to remember the event? And how can the bride and groom have special time moments at the event? And or what are fun ways to see talk with every guest. Okay, so we've got a couple separate questions here. What's the best way to remember the event? Photos video. That's why we hire them in case you miss anything. Also, I highly recommend having at least two photographers. Not, not that you have more than that, but I recommend having a second shooter. That second shooter, while your first shooter is doing family photos, will be going around taking photos of all the details. They'll be taking photos of cocktail hour, of your centerpieces. So that way you have a physical memory, right? You have the photographs of all these things you worked really, really hard on right there in front of you as opposed to just one photographer who can't really get as many detail shots. And I know for that for me was really important was getting those detail shots. I worked really hard on the design of this. I really wanted to see people at cocktail hour. So having two photographers is a really good way to make sure you capture all of those memories and you can remember it. Another great way that you can have special time together or special moments. I have two videos on preventing wedding day anxiety and then like scheduling pockets to prevent wedding day anxiety on the actual day. Right? So prevent stress leading up to it and preventing stress day up. And that's actually a really good video for something like this. For this one specific thing is because it helps you to carve out time in your day to spend time with each other. And so that I think is super important if you want to have special time. I don't know, I'm using finger quotes. It's special time together on your wedding day. That's where we're going to want to do that. We're going to want to create pockets throughout your day or where you can just look at each other and go, oh my gosh, we just got married. This is wild. So that's the point of that scheduling those in. So I'm sure Rebecca will toss those video links into the chat if you want to take a little bit further of a look at those. But that's important in your timeline. And what are fun ways to see slash talk with every guest. So the most traditional way, and many of you will never experience this in your lives because it is that old school traditional is to do a receiving line. So that means after you get married and you walk out of the church or wherever the ceremony happens to be located, you shake hands with every single person or they walk by you and they shake your hands as they're just leaving. So that can be, in my opinion, very overwhelming, very ineffective, time wise and inconvenient for your overall timeline. Some people still do this. It's deeply cultural and if you do that is not an insult to the culture. It comes from a logical perspective of how the timeline works. But don't worry, if there's ever something you want to work in your timeline, that's the conversation we can have here. Or if you have a day of coordinator, you can work with them on that as well. In my opinion, I prefer table visits at the reception. So here's what reception looks like, right? Grand entrance. What's up? We're married. Yay. Go to your table, start your meal. However that happens to go now. You are typically the first people served. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to sit there and I want you to eat it. Okay? People keep walking up to you, you keep eating. And this is usually when I run up to my clients. And if you've seen enough of my videos, you know exactly what I'm going to say. I run up and I go, this is your only time to eat. You spent a lot of money on this food. You need calories. Keep eating, okay? So if people come up, talk to you, keep eating, okay? Keep eating. This is also a really good idea to make sure the buffet line is not near your table, otherwise you'll see every person walking back by. So eat when you can and then Once you're finished, ideally your photographer and or videographer. Both of them, if you're having both, are off eating at the same time as you are. Okay? So we want photography, videography. We want vendors to be served really quickly, if possible. So that way, once the dance floor opens back up, once we have time for toasts and or speeches, they're ready to go to capture those moments for you or to, you know, run the microphone or play the audio. So once you're done eating, ideally, photographer is done eating, they come with you. You go to each and every single table with your. Now married. I was gonna say fiance. Now married fiance. I have been doing this, you guys, for, like, eight years, and I just seriously said married fiance. Like, that's what my brain thought of. Use that term with your married fiance. Okay? And you go to each and every single table to get a photograph with them. Here. Here's why I love this right one. You get a photograph of every single person. It feels very special because you're coming to their table and you're talking to them, and they're like, this is great. Like, oh, my gosh, I didn't realize you're gonna come see us. Thank you so much.

This is so sweet.

And secondly, because you have a photographer there, they can help with pacing. So they can go, all right, everyone squeeze in together. Big smiles. Cool. Thank you so much. Okay, silly faces. If you want to, you don't have to, and you can spend a minute kind of chatting. Now, bear in mind, one minute. Let's say you have 20 tables. That's 20 minutes. So 60 seconds per table is very, very, very short. Right. However, it's probably more than you would have gotten if you tried any other method. So at least we've got a little bit of FaceTime. We have photographic evidence that they were there. And then your photographer can be the bad guy to move you on to the next table. There's another alternative version of this, where the couple stands on the dance floor and different tables come up with them and the DJ announces them. Here's what I don't love about that Example One, the DJ is just talking over the loudspeaker. Everyone. Every loudspeaker. They're called just speakers. Mm. But they are loud because it still works. And they're kind of interrupting everyone's conversation. So every time the DJ pipes up, it's like, oh, hey, we've got to stop what we're talking about. Because now the DJ saying something, we need to pay attention, and it can kind of make the couple feel like they're really put on display, which is obnoxious for. Especially for introverts. They're like, I don't want to do this. That's why I like the table visit. It's much more quiet. It's much more low key. You have someone else pacing it for you. That's great. And then you literally get FaceTime with every single guest. It's my top tip for that one. Sitting here listening to a podcast is all fine and dandy, right? But sometimes you need an actual person to be asking some of these questions, too. And you may be sitting there going, you know what, Jamie? Actually, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I would love to be able to ask you these questions. Guess what? You need to join the master plan. You've heard me talk about it, but do you know why I love it so much? You get over 10 lessons that walk you through planning your wedding with videos and spreadsheets and other detailed resources. Along the way, join me and my virtual clients over in the master plan and get all your wedding planning questions answered. Literally thousands of couples have gone on this journey with me, and I'd love for you to be next. Check it out@wolferandco.com tmp that's wolferandco.com tmp Listen, wedding budgets suck. They're just like the actual worst. And the hardest part for me is that weddings are not cookie cutter. They're not one size fits all. And I think it's important to make sure that you're budgeting according to your priorities. Build a budget that works with your vision, and you'll be on the path to planning a wedding that you really want. So if you want my recommendations for making your perfect budget for you and your partner, head on over to Wedding priorities dot com. All right, next question. I'm fortunate that my partner's family will be paying for the wedding. They and their friends are wealthy, mostly business owners, whereas my family and relatives are not in a position to spend a lot of money. And I feel bad that they will need to spend a lot on flights, hotels, transportation, etc. To get to our wedding. I want them to know they don't need to give a gift because their gift is showing up. How can I do this appropriately for some guests? Or would it be best to just set that same message for all guests that we prefer no gifts? It depends. Do you actually prefer no gifts or. Or do you still want to get some? Okay. And there's no selfishness in answering this question. A lot of gifts are given in and around the time of getting married in your engagement process. Some people love receiving gifts. That is their love language. I don't think that's anything to be ashamed of. If you would like to have conversations specifically with these family members, I would just make it very matter of fact. Right? Don't make it overly emotional. We don't want to make it like any, any bit of pitying. Here's what we want to do. Hey, FYI, I know that coming to my wedding is really expensive. So you do not need to get me a gift, okay? Your presence is so important to me. That's enough. That's all I need, okay? And keep it low key and don't be like, hey, I know this is going to be really expensive, right? Because that feels like a little patronizing and a little hits the ego. That's personally how I would handle it. Just try to kind of be like, hey, not that big of a deal. I just want you to show up. Don't even worry about it because like this is expensive and I'm super aware of that. So just so you know, your presence is all I need. And you are my gift. You're my gift. And like make it cheesy. If you want to make it silly, make it fun. I've not talked to my father and stepmother for about a year and a half now. There have been. There's been issues in my relationship with my stepmother for years now. However, it reached a breaking point a couple years ago at Christmas when she refused to allow my boyfriend, now fiance, to come over for Christmas dinner. That's a line in the sand to do this. I ended up not going over to their home for any Christmas events. My father and stepmother were very angry about this. After Christmas, I went over to my father's house when my stepmother was out of town and we had a big fight with my father where he called me an ungrateful, useless problem child. Oh, sweet friend. After that I was down and cut contact. I got engaged a couple months ago and we are getting married in October. I have four brothers and one sister. My two younger brothers still live with my father and step still live in my father and stepmother's house, age 19. And my sister will be attending. She's my maid of honor. However, at this point, I don't believe any of my brothers will be coming. And I know I cannot make them come. But should I still send them invitations to the wedding? I'm on the fence about this because I'm nervous that they will give this information to My father and stepmother. I'm worried about them showing up on the day uninvited and unannounced. They do show up and I know they will make a scene. My stepmother will say that I'm ugly in my dress and try to talk bad about me to my fiance's family and talk bad on my fiance to my family, which I don't want to happen. I don't know what my father would do, but I do want my brothers there should. So should I still send them invitations? First of all, Emily, this is. Thank you for sharing this. And this was like such. I am so sorry. I'm so sorry. That sucks. Nothing about that is fun at all whatsoever. I have a very simple, like wedding plannery response for you and that's just to hand deliver invitations and have a conversation with your brothers in person. Hey, I would love for you to be there. Obviously you know that dad, stepmom and I, we're not speaking. It's on the rocks. It's probably best that they just don't come. But here are your invitations and I would love to see you there. If you can come, great. If you choose not to, let me know. But your presence is very important to me. You are so valued, you are so loved. And I don't want this secondary relationship, you know, this outside relationship to affect ours. So I'm here. I love you, and I would like to have you there. That, for me, sounds like the best option here. Now what I would say is if you want to have any sort of like, hard, no, you cannot come type of conversation. Um, you can. I don't know if you want to be the one to have that conversation or if there's someone else in your life that can step in and be like, hey, FYI, you guys are. You're not allowed to come. Okay? You, you cannot be there. So if the concern is that the information is going to get out, that's kind of a separate thing. So if there is any follow up details that you would like to share on that. I know this is so vulnerable. This is like deeply, deeply personal. So if this is all you want to share, that's totally fine. But if I can help you walk through that process of what that conversation looks like with your brothers, let me know.

Yeah, with that, I guess it's just I. I wrote that a couple of weeks ago and there's some stuff that's happened since then, and basically my two younger brothers, they're. They're not returning my phone calls or my text messages anymore, so that's, that's difficult. But yeah, I just, I just don't know because like, it's just, I. I guess, I guess the information is going to get to them at, at some point through someone eventually. So I, at this point I'm just like, well, I might as well just send the invitations anyway because I, I want them to know that even though, you know, they're not talking to me or even though my stepmother says don't talk to her because we're mad at her right now is kind of her opinion on all of that. I still want them to know that I want them there.

Yes. Oh, absolutely. And it's almost like not receiving the invitation feels like another line of sand.

Yeah. Yeah, right.

No, I hear that. I agree. It sounds like at this point you might be dead on. They might not. But we've got time too, right? It's still a couple of months. So if you feel. It sounds like your gut feels spot on, you're like, I think I still need to send it. Right. I want them to know that they are still invited. They're still important to me. Yeah. So I would agree with that. Okay. Thank you, girl. I'm so sorry. That's like. Wedding planning can bring out the worst in the people around us sometimes. But it sounds like some of that started to show way before wedding planning.

Yes. Yes, it did. Several. Yeah. Several years. But yeah, I'm very lucky because my, my fiance's family is wonderful. So I really, I. I feel very blessed. I lucked out.

Yeah. I'm glad you have that. I'm also so sorry and I just want to sit in that with you for a sec because. Cause like that's. It's hard enough to plan a wedding and then like everyone else gets in there and with their opinions and. But I'm proud of you for boundaries. Boundaries suck sometimes. It took years. Took years. Yes. It's almost like we have to build them brick by brick, right? Where we're just like, nope, okay. Nope. Okay. Okay. And then all of a sudden it's up here and you're like, you know what? I think we need like a full on wall now. Thank you so much.

Yep, sounds great. Sounds much better.

Well, thanks for sharing that with me. I'm definitely gonna be praying over that for you. Cause that is, that's messy and I'm really sorry. And if you have more questions about it, please feel free to let me know. Okay. Okay.

Thank you.

You're welcome. If you are struggling with wedding planning and you have questions and you just need someone to listen and to chat with. Come join us in the Master Plan community over@themasterplanwed.com I would love to have you in there. Thanks so much for listening if you haven't done so already. Thanks. Watching for subscribe Jump on over to wherever you're listening to this podcast and leave a five star review so we can let the podcast people know that Jamie knows what she's talking about sometimes. And until next time, Bye guys.