Family Dynamics: Navigating Expectations and Relationships in Wedding Planning

Planning a wedding can be a beautiful journey, but navigating family dynamics can add a layer of complexity. In our latest episode, Brittany Ellis shares invaluable insights on how to maintain harmony and set boundaries when planning your dream wedding! 💍✨

From managing expectations and involving key family members in the decision-making process to handling the guest list, budget, and cultural traditions, this episode covers it all. Discover practical strategies for open communication, compromise, and respecting everyone’s opinions. 🗣️🤝

Plus, get tips on developing a wedding timeline that keeps everyone in the loop and ensures a smooth and joyous celebration! 🗓️🎉 Whether you’re a bride, groom, or part of the family, this episode is packed with advice to help you navigate the path to “I do” with ease and grace.

Tune in now and let’s make your wedding planning experience as harmonious as possible! 🌟

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ABOUT EVENTRICS INDIAN WEDDINGS

Eventrics Indian Weddings is an award-winning team of experienced wedding planning and management experts, specializing in large-scale Indian Weddings & Fusion Weddings in Miami, Orlando, Palm Beach, and destinations worldwide.

The Eventrics Indian Weddings team offers complete and partial planning services with a personal and hands-on approach. We believe each couple deserves a fully invested wedding planner to be engaged throughout the entire process to ensure no detail is missed or overlooked!

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction: Family Dynamics in Wedding Planning
• 3:01 Maintaining Open Communication and Setting Expectations
• 7:59 Navigating the Guest List and Budget
• 9:38 Assigning Roles and Responsibilities
• 15:48 Incorporating Cultural Traditions in the Wedding Timeline

Transcript

Brittany (00:00.55)
Hey everyone, welcome back to Beyond Vows and Veils. Thank you again for joining me each week to listen, learn, and discover more ways that you can make more informed decisions on your wedding planning journey. So today we're tackling a difficult topic that I feel like hits close to home for many newly engaged couples, which is family dynamics. Planning a wedding is a very joyous time, but it can also bring up a lot of expectations and otherwise relationship challenges, because there can be a lot of differing opinions

about the guest list or the traditions that you need to incorporate and navigating those roles in different involvements of parents and in -laws and managing family dynamics can sometimes feel like a really delicate balancing act. So in this episode, we're gonna explore practical strategies for maintaining harmony and also setting up just kind of like the boundaries involved with wedding planning and hopefully fostering open communication. So whether you're dealing with well -meaning but over

involved in laws or relatives or just trying to honor your diverse culture and traditions, I definitely think that this episode is going to have you covered to keep the peace and focus on what truly matters, which is your love and commitment. So let's dive into the heart of family dynamics and wedding planning and let's make this journey as smooth as possible. Thank you again.

So JR, that's the end of the actual intro and now I'm going into the actual episode outline.

Brittany (01:34.532)
Just...

Brittany (01:56.216)
Okay, and now I'm gonna start the actual topic.

Brittany (02:09.188)
So as a seasoned wedding planner, often scratch that.

Brittany (02:19.974)
As a seasoned wedding planner, I often deal with a lot of different family dynamics, especially because I specialize more in cultural traditions.

I guess the situation that wedding planners especially dealing with cultural events that are often put in is figuring out what is the best way to navigate family expectations and I think one of the first things that's very important for even the planner, designer, Venue coordinator, whoever it is involved with your wedding planning journey and even yourself Of course you have to decide who are the key family members that are involved in this planning process and

What are their expectations? So we'll talk a little bit more about expectations and just like talking about making sure you kind of navigate that in advance. But I always think that it's very important that when you go into the planning journey to have a very candid but important, clear and open communication with all the parties involved because that's going to really support the overall planning journey in general. So.

When when we onboard a new couple before we get into budget analysis and potential venue you know research and all that good stuff I always say who are the individuals that need to be copied on all documents? on all emails? Who's going to be shared on your online platform? All of those things I think are really important for us to make sure that we navigate upfront to just make sure that we're also honoring and showing respect For the individuals that are going to be involved. now sometimes family members may just want to be copied on documents, but not necessarily on all

the emails. So understanding that dynamic as well is important for families to hash out first and then also to communicate that to your planner who's going to be pretty much involved with a lot of your decision making process. But that also bleeds into, know, when you start to talk about, you know, the venue, are they going to be heavily involved in that? They meaning your parents, your fiance's parents, siblings, aunties, uncles, you got to kind of narrow down the pool. I always say, listen,

Brittany (04:27.492)
Bring the army. I love it bring the whole family But ultimately we really have to hone in on who is going to be the key decision maker when it comes to Essentially the finances and also just the contract signing and things to that but ultimately I think that Every family and every couple that I work with definitely wants to have a balance between You know what the maybe the couple wants and what the family wants. So I think overall There are going to be things that arise during the planning process and one of

the very first forks in the road or sort of points of conflict commonly is, you know, overall the guest list. So when you are first engaged and it's very exciting and you and the family are discussing, you know, where you're gonna host it or how many different events you're gonna look at, usually the guest list is the very first sort of fork in the road between couples and families because parents...

are excited. They obviously want to invite everybody to your occasion. They want everyone to celebrate this union. They want to be able to bring in the people that they feel like would really be a benefit to be there. And sometimes that guest list, of course, can uptick into, you know, a couple of hundreds, maybe even close to a thousand if you've got a really big family. And in addition to that, they've got a lot of friends. And so really making sure that you can figure out what is realistic for number one, the

in which you're planning, like what can those venues actually house? So I'm not helping you out much if your venues can house like you know convention style attendance levels. That becomes really difficult to navigate because now you've got the space for it. But the second thing I always like to point out is obviously

budget, right? So the number of people that you invite directly correlates to the number of your final expenditure at the end of this whole process. So unless we sort of have unlimited funds, it is a relatively important conversation to have. And so that kind of brings up the next sort of conflict or forking the world topic or just just in general, doesn't have to be conflict, just a difficult conversation to have, which is what is the budget? What is the financial contribution that either both sides

Brittany (06:43.032)
the family are making, one side of the family is making, the couple is making. And so understanding going into that and then just being respectful of what is comfortable for everybody is important to just discuss upfront. So if you have a guest list and that's taking you over the expenditure that you want to be at, then making sure that you can have a really nice...

open communication conversation about okay, well if we invite this many people The overall experience level that we're going to be able to produce is going to be x Are we comfortable with that? is the couple comfortable with that? and really as a wedding planner Those are the things that we talk about in the very beginning with the families like let's talk about guest list Let's talk about the traditions that you want to incorporate throughout the course of the weekend Let's talk about the number of meals decor expectation level of vendor expectation and all those things are going to come up

because ultimately that is probably some of the most difficult topics to come across or cross over that bridge to get to the next steps. And so it's very important that we go through that in the beginning. So again, your bigger conflict topics or just points for discussion are going to be:

how many people are attending and then is how many people attending still allowing us to align with the couple's vision and because of the budget expenditure, right? And so if that, if both those checkpoints are met, great, we can move on to the next step. And if they're not, then let's gauge on some other creative things that we can talk about, whether that be the tier of venue that we're going to, the number of events that we're hosting, because at some point there has to be a little bit of compromise on both ends in order to land in the middle

really exceptional experience. I also think that it's important that when you do have family involved that we there are kind of sort of roles and responsibilities. I know that sounds really odd but

Brittany (08:43.234)
If you have very clear roles, I think it makes the decision making and just the process in general a lot smoother. So for example, let's say that I'm working with a couple who pretty much is my main point of contact. My role is obviously their wedding planner. I'm keeping things moving. They are my boss. I'm presenting information to them and then collectively as a team, we're strategizing and coming up, you know, with, you know, the best venue to select or the vendors to bring in the timeline that we're going to develop and all those sort of details. So I think that it's

important going back to that roles and responsibilities. Like when are we queuing in parents? Are parents involved with site visits? Are they involved in budget conversations? Are they involved with contract review? Or they sort of just once we've hashed it all out between couple and planner and we're like, hey, this is the photographer we want to hire. Is their role just a final review on their end to make sure that they're comfortable? And again, as a planner and the couple,

your responsibility and job is to make sure that that contract is in alignment with the budget that has been approved, meets all the requirements that would maybe have been discussed offline. So for photography, for example, maybe one of the things that the family expressed to you was that it was important that they had a third shooter specifically just to go around and take candids of them with their friends and family to not tie up time from your lead photographer who is taking pictures primarily focused on the couple in

immediate family along with maybe decor shots and what have you. So again, I think having those intentional conversations up front and then assigning sort of the roles and responsibilities and how they're going to manage their input is a really supportive way to sort of.

handle or manage different various opinions because they know that there's going to be a lot coming out at you. But we also want to be giving that respect that, we've done our homework. This cross checks all the things that we initially talked about were important for us. Now you do a final review and let's discuss it. Or maybe your planner even offers to do a one on one with parents or whomever is going to be one of those key decision makers just to give them that space to answer questions that they may

Brittany (10:55.94)
What I've really learned in all the years that I've been doing event planning regardless if it's cultural events or not is that

Parents more specifically I should say parents definitely like to be involved and they want to feel Heard and they also want their concerns to be curbed and a lot of times no offense to my lovely couples obviously we're very close relationship with your families, but sometimes they need to hear it from somebody else in order for it to resonate and so a lot of times having that conversation with maybe a professional that's in it every day like your planner or being able to talk directly

professional in which we're contracting rather again that be the photographer or the hair makeup artist or whatever allow them that space to also be able to have some of those questions and conversations curved that may be otherwise you're not able to support them on directly.

And I think the other outline of this, especially speaking to my cultural couples, is that parents are also usually concerned if they don't have some level of experience in cultural traditions and practices. And so I think it's very valid and very important that if you choose a vendor that you love, but maybe doesn't have a lot of experience on that level, that they're able to have a one -on -one conversation with that vendor or with your

and just kind of get pick their brain on what their experience has been like working with them in the past and what have you. Because again, I think we're all just trying to get to a conclusion here and that a lot of times is a compromising conclusion. And a lot of that just comes from people feeling hurt and also any fears that they may have pertaining to the planning process being.

Brittany (12:45.656)
Discussed throughout right and being addressed because the last thing we want is there to be some sense of uncertainty going on and then that continues and all the months leading to the event day and then on site they're not able to relax because essentially

whatever they were sort of feeling during those planning stages wasn't addressed early on. And so I think it's really important that in order to maintain, you know, just a good relationship throughout and for everybody to feel comfortable and happy and just stress management is just giving that sense of appreciation and acknowledgement for all of those individuals that are involved, regardless of their role or level of support and involvement.

And outside of that, would say that I've had a lot of couples who have definitely struggled with in -laws and parents, again, just going back to that guest list scenario. And I will say that through conversations of saying black and white, this is the type of event that we can have for 350 people. And then,

to cross compare and apples to apples comparison. Here's the type of event that we can have for 600 people and families being able to look at that.

with some level of discernment to decide for themselves what ultimately is important. And sometimes it's not always the exact number that the couple wanted to land on, but maybe it's saying, okay, let's meet in the middle and let's compromise and tweak on these numbers. And then now we're at a happy medium where everybody feels comfortable. And we talk about, you know, tiering out guest lists and things like that in other episodes. So that might be supportive as a scenario if this is a couple that's listening to this

Brittany (14:34.208)
to potentially help them on their journey and navigating how to get creative with the number of guests that are looking to be invited. But overall, I think that it's incredibly important that all family members are heard and then ultimately we come up with a strategy together or with your hire professional to figure out how everyone's going to be able to compromise. What are our compromising points and really what aren't. And then the final stage that I did want to mention or

with family dynamics, I do a lot of fusion weddings, which essentially means, you know, maybe the bride is South Asian, but the groom is, you know, American, or maybe he's Korean, or what have you.

When it comes to timeline development and management, it is so critical and important that everyone feels heard in the outlining of your actual event details. So when you walk into the perspective of your wedding weekend, I always say look at it from the guest perspective, look at it from the vendor perspective, look at it from bride perspective. You wanna walk through your timeline from very different windows of perspectives so that you can get the best outcome overall.

process is making sure that your families are cued in on timeline discussions. I can't tell you nine times out of ten, which is fine. It's part of the process. Usually when I onboard a couple, we talk about the timeline once and we outline a very generic structure. That generic structure sort

buys us time or gets us through until after the vendor contracting and venue contracting has taken place. Usually once your team is hired, I always say the real work can begin. And that's where then we like to cue families or again, whoever is gonna be our key decision makers. And we like to get nitty gritty with the timeline at that point.

Brittany (16:31.14)
Okay, let's talk about cultural traditions and customs. Let's talk about the things that you need to make sure everyone's feeling heard on. What is important to Bride's Side? What's important to Groom's Side? And if it's a culture also that we've not even participated in or we're not as familiar with, taking the time to chat with those family members or a key individual in that family to understand their customs and cultures and show that respect so that you're not making that assumption

as a planner or even as a couple on how you're gonna best develop your timeline. Get all the information in at once and then start to figure that out together because a lot of

It's not that not everything can be crammed into one day. It's more just like, we being intentional with the time that we have and is it realistic for all parties involved? Or is bride not willing to get up at three o 'clock in the morning for hair and makeup? That might also be an option. But I think timeline development and also final meetings prior to the wedding date are critical. So if you are hosting a cultural wedding and let's say the groom side's American and the bride side's Indian,

Most likely a lot of the groom's immediate family is going to have no clue what's going on during the wedding weekend unless you actually take the time to share with them those details. So I always like to do a final walkthrough of the timeline and keep it high level for the immediate families so that on the wedding weekend nobody's looking at my team like deer in the headlights of what does this mean? What should we be doing right now? And I think again that goes back to just honoring showing respect and acknowledgement

for everybody's different opinions because they do matter and making sure that everybody feels really comfortable and puts their best foot forward on site for the event day because most likely if you're doing a fusion wedding your attendees are also not going to know what's going on and if the immediate family is all united on that information then they're best able to also be proper hosts for that occasion. So overall I hope that this podcast was supportive for you. I really just wanted to kind of navigate some of

Brittany (18:39.681)
you know common expectations and questions and you know conflict points that we run into to best support you on your journey and as always feel free to reach out to our office if you have any questions. Thank you again for your time. Have a good day.