Friday, September 7, 2012

Cyber-space support


Some time ago I made a breakthrough in staying sane during wedding planning. I found a link on frugal wed and proceeded to link-hop from there.

I ended up on A Los Angeles Love reading thisthis and this. Then I went onto Offbeat BrideBroke-Ass Bride and offbeat bride again. All sensible, rational posts about why wedding planning is crazy and how to say no to the craziness.

The problem with planning a wedding is that's it's essential to have some support, ideally someone who's going through the same thing who understands what you're feeling. Otherwise the craziness becomes overwhelming, and I suspect you have to give in to it. Unless you happen to have a like-minded engaged friend, this support may not be easy to find. I have three engaged friends; one is planning a chic Cape Town wedding, one is not planning anything because she can't work out what country to have the wedding in, and the third is, like me, planning a UK wedding from NZ but is earlier in the process.

This is where blogs are really helpful. I haven't joined the ranks of Offbeat Bride - I'm having a church wedding and a sit-down meal reception, it doesn't sound very Offbeat - although Ariel says that maybe she should have named it Authentic Bride, because you shouldn't be offbeat just for the sake of it. I also haven't read much of Broke-Ass Bride, as I'm still struggling with the idea that my wedding is a budget wedding. I have found lots of independent bloggers who comment on posts and offer advice - and this is awesome.

I've also been contacted by someone I went to university with. We lost touch after graduation but she saw my blog link on Facebook and has been reading it regularly. Her wedding is in the same area as mine, but a couple of months later. She's sent me a few messages with questions and details of her day, and I'm hoping we can help each other through the process!

I think I expected my support network to be mainly my closest friends - but they're not in the same place right now and I'm wary of boring them with details. I'm glad that I've found people who want to talk weddings, although I may need to search for some new blogs as they're all getting married before me!

Note: the blog has reached 4000 hits today! Very exciting!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yay, congrats on 4000 hits!

A Los Angeles Love was a really great blog. Just my style too - nothing but quality content, no filler stuff, no sponsored crap, no posturing. It even won wedding blog of the year in 2010 or something. Anyway, I'm really glad you discovered it. And I'm really glad you found a planning buddy too!

H said...

Thanks! I liked the style too - may have to do some archive trawling now!

Ashleigh @ Made in Morningside said...

Hi. I'm a new follower, getting married May 2013 in Scotland. Just thought I would chip in with www.apracticalwedding.com it has kept me sane through my engagement so far xox

H said...

Thanks Ashleigh, good to hear from you, especially as your wedding is around the same time as ours! I've dipped in and out of a practical wedding - there's just too much there I could waste days on it!

Post a Comment