The Perfect Way to Begin Wedding Planning: Your Registry

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Now that you’ve announced your engagement to your closest family and friends, and of course shared the happy news on social media, it’s finally time to actually start planning your wedding! A great place to start is creating your wedding registry, which is meant to guide your guests towards what gifts will be most useful to your newlywed life. Here, we’ve got some tips on how to start putting together the perfect registry for you and your needs.

Make It a Team Effort

If your fiancé wants limited involvement in wedding planning, this is one area to insist they’re involved. Your home should reflect both of you and be a place that makes you both feel happy and comfortable. With many of your new home items coming from your registry, it’s important to have both opinions present when deciding what you want to include.

Take Inventory

Sometimes having too much of something isn’t a good thing. This is why you and your fiancé need to take stock of the items you already own before making your registry. Once you know what you own and what you can add, look around and see what you can replace. That stained mattress which has seen better days is a good place to start and your registry is the perfect excuse to upgrade to a newer, more comfortable version.

Cautiously Listen to Opinions

While you and your soon-to-be spouse should share and listen to each others opinions, when it comes to other people’s opinions, listen cautiously. Everyone has an opinion on how you should plan your wedding and what you absolutely need to include on your registry. But just because that’s what they did, doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the right move for you. Consider their advice as it’s given, but don’t regard it as the end all be all.

Go Big and Small

Your guests likely won’t be bringing your gifts to your actual wedding, but will instead give them to you at your bridal shower or at some other point during your engagement. So do not be afraid to add large items to your registry out of fear that your guests won’t be able to get the gift to you. If you want a nice fire pit for your backyard, but it was too pricey for your budget, this is a great way to ask for it! Plus it’s always good to have a wide variety in size and price range. Guests can group together and contribute to a more expensive gift while also buying something smaller and less expensive that’s just from them.

Don’t Be Afraid of Funds

Some people will tell you that outright asking for money is tacky, but that honestly couldn’t be further from the truth. If you find that you aren’t in need of many material items for your home, adding a fund to your registry offers you options toward reaching a goal. Now there are plenty of ways for you to ask your guests to contribute money, whether it be a honeymoon fund or a more general fund that you can use toward a down payment on a home.