Cancelled Wedding

October 1, 2016

That was the date my fiance and I had set for our wedding day which we chose last November and gave us almost one whole year to plan it out.

Venue, flowers, photographer, limo, centerpieces, videographer, favors, and so on. It was what seemed to be a never ending list of things we still needed to plan and here we were, five months until our "wedding day" and more than half of the things on the wedding checklist were still unchecked.

Those who know me well are well aware that I am not big on details or fancy parties for myself. I began to feel incredibly overwhelmed when constantly asked how the wedding planning was going. It wasn't any one's fault of course because it's a typical question to ask someone with a wedding only five months away, but I couldn't help but think, what is going on with the wedding planning?

All of the checklists, the family drama regarding "no kids" at the reception, the ridiculous prices for certain extras was just all too much for me to handle. This is no way knocking those who do have a big lavish wedding, kudos to you for having the money and patience, but it's like a part time job. 

When did weddings become bigger than the actual marriage? Since when did it become necessary to pay so much for a one day event? With each day that came and went I couldn't stop asking myself, why do we need to spend all this money? I get mad when he buys me flowers or anything that isn't something we both can't enjoy, so why this? 

Getting married is supposed to be the happiest time in your life, before having children of course, but at what cost? You have a big wedding, beautiful venue, amazing flowers, gorgeous center pieces, flawless dress, etc. then comes the day after and you realize you just spent $10,000 plus in one day. All of that money, gone forever. 

Will you have the memories, of course, but all I could personally think of was how that money can be used toward our first house. Toward traveling the world. Toward experiences with the person that this entire wedding is about. 

So here we were, now four months before the wedding, and I told my fiance how I was feeling about it all and to my relief he said he felt the same. THANK GOD, I thought to myself. We both realized that throwing a big party to what it had escalated to wasn't even what we wanted, we had added on certain things to please the families and not ourselves. It turned into, well so and so should be invited because of this, and so on. At the end of the day we realized that our marriage is about him and I, not a wedding, not a party, not for anyone else. 

Cancelling the wedding was the greatest decision we could have made for us as a couple. We still plan to get married of course, but our own way. We decided to have a weekend getaway in Vegas and get married with our bridal party there to witness and join in on the fun times to be had in Vegas. For our family, especially the parents, we plan to celebrate our Church wedding with a dinner after with our immediate family. 

Not only will this save us an insane amount of money, but the money we did have saved toward the wedding will be used toward a house in the near future, God willing. All I know is, God placed the man of my dreams in my life and the only thing that matters is that we're both happy, we're both committed to each other, and we don't need to spend all of that money to seal the deal. 

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Marriage is to be held in honor among all, and the marriage bed is to be undefiled; for fornicators and adulterers God will judge. Make sure that your character is free from the love of money, being content with what you have; for He Himself said, "I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you," so that we confidently say, "The Lord is my helper, I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?" - Hebrews 13: 4-6