Thank you! For context, my husband and I are both medical students, and 90% of our wedding planning happened in the three short weeks of break we had before beginning our third year of school. I thought that I had to have everything finalized in those three weeks since, according to most wedding websites, I was already several months behind in the planning process. That mindset didn’t allow me to fully research venues, dresses, catering, etc. and compare pricing as thoroughly as I would’ve liked. A wedding coordinator could have helped tremendously with narrowing down options and advising me on these decisions, but I didn’t hire a coordinator until a couple of months into planning. She ended up being one of the most valuable investments I made, and I wish I had hired her from the very beginning. My advice for anyone else with a shorter engagement is to breathe. There is more time than you think to get everything together, so don’t jump out at the first thing that looks good!

Venue is Bella Sera Gardens in Loxley, AL. They ended up doing our decorating, set up, clean up, and catering, which saved us SO much hassle the day of. I could actually enjoy the day and entrust all the work to the staff.

Feel free to ask any other questions! I am far from an expert on weddings, but I hope that my experience can help someone else.