Wedding Blog

This post is long overdue! This is the addendum to my original post back in August about our “Wedding Weekend Packet”. We created the primary packet for our friends and family, but gave our vendors smaller, individualized versions. I promised I would share them, so here they are! We created five separate ones…

Officiant Packet: (download here)
This was given to our officiant as well as to the church coordinator. It includes a detailed timeline of every aspect of the ceremony down to the minute, as time is of the essence! Our ceremony was a bit longer than a traditional wedding ceremony, as we had our pastor give a homily and also had a special song presentation by our in-laws (who sing opera on the side).

Photographer Packet: (download here)
Our photographer packet served as both a schedule and, perhaps more importantly, also a list of specific shots we wanted to make sure were captured in addition to any/all candid shots. Even if you hired your photographer for his/her photojournalistic talents, it does help to list out a few “must-have” shots to guarantee you will get them. As experienced as wedding photographers are, they cannot read your mind and if there are certain special shots you have always envisioned you’d have, I believe it’s safer to explicitly state what they are! The key is to be specific about the formal shots, but also leave enough room for your photographer’s own creative license!

Videographer Packet: (download here)
Similar to the above, except for film!

Reception Coordinator Schedule: (download here)
This was just a setup schedule, given to our reception venue coordinator as well as our friends and family members who were helping with setup. It is very customized to our specific day, but it can help you think about some things you may need in case you have volunteers helping you out.

DJ Materials: We did not provide a packet for our DJ as we filled out their official template. However, I did want to share some of the things that we thought specifically about. A few random but hopefully helpful things to be sure to mention: a) pronunciations of names for the grand entrance, b) songs you want playing during specific events (i.e. cake cutting, bouquet toss, etc.) and c) dress code (most DJs will wear formal attire to a wedding, but it doesn’t hurt to be specific). Everything else, in terms of the schedule for the night and style of music should be pretty standard in terms of what your DJ will ask you about!

Again, my sincere apologies that it has taken me so long to get this post up! We moved after getting married and also upgraded to new computers, so it took an effort to dig these back out from our old stuff! I hope they still prove helpful!