You Are Engaged! Now What?

Congratulations - you are engaged! My engagement night was one of the happiest nights of my life and I think I had a huge smile and glow for at least a week afterwards.

It is such a happy and exciting time and I hope you enjoy every second.

However, there are questions you receive from friends and family as soon as it happens like, "When is the wedding?"

"Have you found a venue?"

"What is your wedding dress like?"

These questions, as well as your own questions you have about your wedding, can be a lot to handle when you get engaged.

As someone who has been in the wedding industry for almost 10 years, I have put together this list of my top 3 things that I think will help you with the next few steps after getting engaged.

1 - Take Out Your Pen And Paper

Make a list of everything that is important to you and all of the hopes and dreams you have for your wedding. You will be surprised at how seeing your biggest desires for your wedding written down helps clarify what is important to you and what matters to you most on your wedding day. Once you have these thoughts and goals written, make bullet notes and put them in order from most important to least important.

Know what you want and what is important to you during your entire wedding planning process. There will be so many meetings with the venue, DJ, florist, photographer, coordinator, where you will be asked dozens of questions. In those moments, you need to know what you want for your wedding so you don't make decisions in the moment that you will later regret.

Before you start making wedding decisions, pull out a pen and paper, and figure out what you want ahead of time so you don't panic in the moment.

2 - Prioritize

There are so very many decisions to make when you are planning your wedding. Seating charts, color schemes, cake flavors, your couple hashtag, etc. It can be a tad overwhelming at times. My advice is: prioritize!

Start with making these decisions first:

1. Hiring Your Wedding Coordinator ;)

2. Pick A Season To Get Married In

3. Deciding Your Wedding Budget

4. Picking Your Venue

5. Buying Your Wedding Dress

If you have something else that really matters, add it to the list! But prioritizing these things will get the ball rolling on everything else. These 5 things are big, important details and if you get them out of the way first, it will be the gateway for the rest of the decisions.

3 - Have Fun Along The Way

It is easy to feel overwhelmed or bit stressed when planning a wedding, but remember, this is a special time that you will look back on with fond memories. So, when making these decisions and starting your wedding planning process, remember to not get overwhelmed with what you have to do, but instead, focus on all the fun things you get to do while planning your wedding.