Not another Level 3

I recently had a conversation with a couple. They were (like many others) unlucky in that they have, for various reasons, had to reschedule their wedding 3 times in the pandemic. The emotional, financial and relational toll was therefore quite high. Luckily they were able to get married on the fourth attempt and to see the relief and excitement on their faces was priceless!

I recently had a bout of covid myself and although the physical symptoms are no fun at all my experience was that the emotional and spiritual effects of getting a positive test result as well as the isolation and also the uncertainty of how my body would react to the infection was just as bad.

Planning a wedding under normal circumstances can be quite stressful so my advice is to have a look at the things that you are able to control in the middle of all of the things that you can not control and hopefully this will alleviate some of the extra pressure and worry that are synonymous with planning a wedding these days.

Find out about postponement/cancellation policies:

Have an open discussion with your vendors regarding their policies as you you do not want to be held liable for penalties should the date have to be cancelled or postponed. Many do not have their terms and conditions written down and it is important to get clarity from your vendors. The financial stress is a big contributor to wedding planning worry and managing your budget is essential.

Find out about plan B’s

If you have an outside wedding there is always a chance of rain, that is why venues will always have a plan B. Just like with the weather, spiking infection rates could occur at any time cutting your guest list by half or even prohibiting large group gatherings. This is why it remains important to have different scenarios planned and communicated to your guests and t0 your vendors. You would be surprised at how forgiving and flexible people can be given the fact that we are all living through this reality together.

Try to project trends

When picking a wedding date it might be a good idea to have a look at past societal trends in order to give yourself extra peace of mind regarding the date. For instance, we know that Decembers are traditionally holiday times in SA and that the likelihood of stricter crowd measures is s little bit higher in this time, so perhaps a smaller guest list could keep you within the brackets of limitations. Or if you know that winter is a higher than normal infection rate time then perhaps rather consider autumn or spring as an option.

Flexibility is key

Someone once said to me that the people who are able to deal with change the best are those who are more likely to be happy in life. This is a rather broad statement, however I do believe that it is true and that we can all grow a little bit in this area. The tough thing with a wedding though is that the disappointment of possibly starting from scratch again is very difficult to come back from, my suggestion is therefore to continually be in conversation with your partner and your families because they are often a mirror that helps us to see things that we would not naturally see for ourselves. They are also our support.