Does your FI help you with the wedding planning?!

My other half is lovely and I cant wait to marry him. He has had a big say in the wedding, but that is it, just a say. ..I have done everything! Sorted decs, emailed the organisers, booked all the legal stuff, sorted the outfits etc etc. He doesn't know why I am stressed with less than 3 months to go. However, to be honest I love it, I am such a control freak it probably wouldn't have worked any other way!

I'm pleased with how much my OH is getting involved. He's helped pick centrepieces (he says so I stopped stressing about it!) and has a say before I finalise anything.

i just wish that he would say and pay. Currently I have forked out for everything...

Could you give your OH a deadline? I've found that if I keep mentioning stuff to OH he gets annoyed and cross so we decide a time it needs to be done by, then I don't nag and he gets it done in his own time.

Good luck!!

I've done everything! Still loads to do but he's so chilled. I don't mind, will be a nice surprise for him when we get married, he won't know about anything other then the band, suits and transport. I'm hoping he will be proud of what I've done :-)

As feminists I really hoped we wouldn't be the stereotypical bride and groom, with the bride doing all the work. Unfortunately I am just too impatient to wait for him to sort things so have pretty much taken care of everything. An example, OH has always said he wants a suit made for him by a tailor for his wedding suit. I tried not to nag him but knew that if he left it too late he would find that he couldn't get his dream suit. I nagged him for about 2 weeks and he eventually made an appointment with 11 weeks to go until the wedding. The tailor himself said OH was cutting it fine. He's very laid back and a last minute person, I certainly am not. Your situation sounds similar to mine I'm afraid.

This is pretty much word for word what I was going to say! Even down to the suit issues, although we're not quite so close to the wedding yet!

I'm glad you get help in the sense that your OH is giving you his opinion on what he likes as well. When I ask my FI if he likes such and such, he will let me know if he likes it or not... Good luck!

Thanks, I'll definitely need some luck hehe! FI doesn't really know what the word deadline means. I don't give him timelines cos he won't stick to them... I'm glad your FI is helping you out with ideas. Can he chip in a little, even if it's just flowers or your dress?! Good luck to you too x

I'm sure your FI will be so proud of you, it'll be fab! Even though I've ran most ideas past FI, he doesn't remember a thing about our wedding so when people ask him about our wedding plans, he always says he hasn't got a clue... Good luck! x

Mine helps out occasionally but usually just hinders my plans lol!

I have left him to a few bits but not much. He has done his suits and thats about it! I have made all appts and purchases. I find it easier. My OH is so indecisive its easier to just do it myself!

That's exactly how I feel!!! I know it's more of a bride's dream to organise the wedding but as you said, our men could do with a kick up the backside. I've also decided to take care of pretty much everything now. I tease FI saying if he went on 'Don't tell the bride', we probably wouldn't have a wedding cos he's so last min. I'm glad you eventually got your FI to sort out the suits! Good luck x

Haha! It does sound like you're better off taking care of everything yourself... He's probably thinking, Oh this wedding planning business isn't so bad ;p. Good luck! x

Mine helps with a lot of the decisions, he chose the colour scheme and on most things I show him the options I like (normally 2 that I'm split on) and he chooses one, but I have physically done everything and am making all the decorations, favours, invites etc myself, but then I am on maternity leave and he works 60 hours a week so it's a little different for us, gives me something to do asides from playing with my lovely baby so I don't mind :-)

I know exactly how you feel and have had two seperate conversations with the OH about this - he looked a bit like a told off puppy and I felt guilty! Like yours he is very laid back so much so that nothing would get done. I think I have asked him about cheese booking for the last 2 months!

In his words he doesn't know what needs doing or by when so today I wrote down a bullet point list and highlighted stuff in yellow which was urgent (I actually freaked myself out slightly with how long the list was!) and put myself, him or both in brackets such as ring shopping. This is now on our laptop, his email account and will be printed out and put on the fridge. Even my OH said it would help him work through and give him prompts. Some of them are really easy such as confirm church cost. Maybe something like this would help?

I have found if I ask and ask then he just goes into auto and says yep will do then forgets all about it. In his words I thought you only had to sort out the big stuff and turn up!

When I have discussed wedding with him i.e. him not doing a lot about it I calmly say it's our wedding, I don't want to do it all on my own and I need your help - it has actually worked (despite the two conversations) and he has sorted stuff after each time just lost momento a bit after a few weeks.

My OH isn't really actively 'helping' with our planning. It often feels like he thinks that just doing a few bits a couple of weeks before hand will be fine. That said, I know that I'm also a little bit OTT thinking about the wedding and he's got a lot on his plate at work. I'm making lists and spreadsheets and as we get more and more sorted he'll be able to have his input.

Our planning is the same as another poster above, I'll do a lot of research and poking around and then pick out a few favourites and he'll say how much he likes or hates it and we go from there. We're lucky that we have pretty similar tastes. The most frustrating moments have been when he says he's not sure but can't pin down why so that I can try to find a compromise...

I think the key here could be to take a bit of a step back. I agree on giving deadlines, he might surprise you and stick to it

OH and I have done pretty much all of it together. It's just what worked for us :-)

I'm really lucky actually, my OH has done everything that I've asked him to do and had a real input in most things really. Sometimes he just needs a little more 'encouragement' though, or I swear we'd never have got anything ready! With 6 weeks to go, I'm getting a little stressy so glad I'm not having to do it all on my own! x

Certainly am. We work very similar to some of the others. I research and look and he just pretty much says ok thats fine.

We have similar tastes so its not too difficult luckily. He's happy to leave me to it and knows I wont pick anything he doesnt like. I have tried to involve him but think its all a bit over his head really.

Guest list was a joint stress and more so on his part so I wont be in a rush to ask him to do anything else soon after that lol

We have a total role reversal. My OH is totally 'the bride' and he loves it. We'll see how he goes nearer the time but since we got engaged he has been the driving force behind it all!

He wanrs a big white traditional wedding whereas I would rather elope. So he's arranging his traditional wedding! He's making me go to a wedding fayre in a few weeks!!! I'm happy to let him arrange it all although I will sort out my dress. I don't care about 'the show'; I just want to marry him and cant wait!

I think I did more on balance but part of that is cos my H has a busier and more responsible job than me. I sometimes get quiet moments during the day where I can browse online etc whereas he rarely does. But he still did enough - he sorted his suit with no input whatsoever from me and paid a couple of deposits. I was happy enough with how it worked out

I say we've done everything together, but I think what I actually mean is that I have done most of the finding of suppliers, said what needs to be sorted out next etc, and then we've worked on those bits together, so I guess I have actually done more than him. Everything thats been picked or bought has been a joint 'we both like that' decision (apart from our outfits) but if i hadnt said 'here's a bunch of photographers/cake people/florists, pick which you like' we probably still wouldnt have any of that stuff :-D he gets really involved when we're there, like for cakes when I said oh what kinda style do you like he briefly looked online and picked the simplest plainest thing going, but when we actually met the cake lady he was all into the magazines and talking styles and shapes and tiers, and then we discuss how excited we are by that particular thing for a while! Like IGBMN - sadly I did in the end have to have a mini hissy fit to get him to actually make a suit appointment, else he'd still be waiting to sort it. It helps that we'll have had about 18 months to plan it so we've done done bits as we've gone along, not suddenly had to sort everything out in one go, so we can do a bit of ah lets sort this out, but then have a break, doesnt get all constantly 'wedding, wedding, wedding' then.

(If yours was mine tho I would have had a go about him not sorting out something for his moms 60th - i refuse to get into the thing where for some reason because im the woman i have to remember and sort out everyones birthdays - er no! slippery slope!)

Have a few days off plannig, chill, regroup, then have a look whats left, sounds like youve pretty much sorted everything, make some lists, tell him again to look at the honeymoon stuff and give him a deadline that it needs to be sorted by, and if all else fails remove the plug off the playstation ;-D

Hahaha - I like the playstation trick treacle tart!!

We haven't done a lot yet but I am also finding some options to discuss together rather than expecting him to sit for hours and trawl through websites. I think that will work best for us as he isn't a details man.

I am also learning which things he actually cares about and which things he doesn't (I am pretty sure he doesn't care what favours we have - prob doesn't even know what they are!! - or if the napkins match the colour theme). I think some things one of you will care about and one won't...that's natural...so pick your battles

We have just started planning, i did all the "investigating" when looking into venues and photographers, i picked my favourite and the best value, i showed other half them (after i stalked like 20 different places, emailed about prices etc) and then once I chose my favourite within our budget I showed him a choice of 3, he picked the same as me and he comes with me to appointments like when we went to see venue and photographer, both liked the first one we picked and booked. So he does kinda help, puts his opinion in but if i'm honest i think he just nods to what he thinks i like best lol! I think a lot of men don't understand how much planning goes in, I am now looking into hair and make up, trying to book the stuff that gets booked quickly, my friend got married this month and started planning a year and 2 months before her wedding and her first choices for eveyrthing had been booked so she had second, and third favourites for a lot of her suppliers. Was still a very nice day though

Does he have jobs to do, seperate the work load a bit, he can be solely in charge of certain things; his clothes, his BM, he can figure out entertainment or make a draft of timeline or something? Tell him how fast things do book up and explain you want your first choices and not your 2nd, 3rd, 4th etc x

Please dont get me wrong i love my other half and think the world of him otherwise i wouldnt of said yes, however this wedding is soely down to me! I have done verything for it!! He has helped with nothing! Any time I ask him to help he ends up taking months to look at anyhting and I end up doing it myself! He said he did the hard bit by asking me to marry him so now its my job to plan!

The first time I got married, my ex didn't really get involved at all. I remember being sat in my lounge about 2 weeks before the wedding freaking out because I still didn't know what the centerpieces were going to be, and he was sat on the sofa watching tv. We had a number of arguments about whether he actually wanted to get married, he was so disinterested during the planning.

This time, OH is much more interested. He's met with the venue, the photographer, and even potential florists with me. We even have long discussions about invitations, centerpieces, outfits, music etc. However, he doesn't get why so much needs to be done so early. He understands a little more after the venue and photographer told us how far in advance he gets booked up. I bought him this for Christmas as a joke, and he's actually reading it ? ❤️.

I’ve done a lot of the planning and organisation of things, this is mainly due to the fact I’m a more organised person then my H2B. Like a lot of the other ladies have mentioned, mine is very laid back and does things in his own time where I am not and need structure.

This doesn’t bother me as it means I can get on with things that are big to make sure they are completed. I’m not nagging him on suits or anything as he seems to be picking things up now and I have given him some big jobs for the wedding such as the music for the day, the invites (he’ll design these), the STD’s, his guest list. I’ve just done most else as I know he doesn’t care about the smaller details, his little mantra is as long as I’m happy he’s happy. Although i always check before I do anything to make sure he likes the idea.

What does FI stand for?

I was confused by that too. I thought maybe Future Intended? But that doesn't make sense as they are your intended now.

OP - we tend to use H2B and OH more here, just FYI

A week after proposing my OH went online and bought place cards and was looking at venues- enough said!

Omg I'm so glad this isn't just me

my oh will help but it takes him sooooooooooooooooooo long

and im sure he thinks we just show up on the day and it's all sorted ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh

he does try at times but I have done almost everything myself

he helped choose BM outfits and his own ring

but then he makes me laugh when I was stressing over making confetti cones he was like "can't we just put some in envelopes and hand them out?"

ummm no we are not having envelopes of confetti lol

but it doesn't help I'm a control freak and won't let people help me

ive found if I want anything done I'm best to write what I want him to do on our notice board and give him a dead line.

Im sure that it's not that he won't help but more he needs very specific direct instructions to know what to do (and that means more work for you than doing it yourself ha ha ha ha)

just speak to to him about it

xoxo

My OH is a project director in the real world but when it comes to anything to do with personal stuff he is awful at planning. Everything is last minute. Over the years I have found that what works best is to give him specific tasks, tell him when I would be comfortable with them being done by (and why) and then just leave it. If he hasn't booked things by a certain date then he has to sort out the mess. I find if I don't say upfront the dates and why then he sets times in his own head as to when he will do things by when I have a completely different timescale in mine. But stepping in and taking responsibility myself means he would never worry about anything as he knows I would always pick it up and it is never his problem. That isn't a pattern I want repeating in the rest of our married life.

For the wedding I sent him an email with a list of things which were his responsibility and when I would prefer they were sorted by. He did them all by the dates - most of them last minute on the day I had set but they were all done (I set them all with realistic dates and not stupidly early). Even though internally I was a little worried he wouldn't do them I had to trust him to sort them. He is organising the honeymoon himself and I am leaving it to him. We are touring NZ so he has had quite a job working out what we could fit in, how we were getting around and booking hotels and trips etc. I know if I start asking what has been booked etc and what hasn't I will start fretting so I'm not asking!!

When we got engaged my H asked how involved he had to be in the planning. My answer was that I needed his cheque book and for him to turn up on the day.

It was kind of a joke, but also how I knew things would be. I knew that he wanted to be married to me, but I also knew that the wedding was my dream and my day. The whole idea of it freaked him (as in genuine mental health issues) and was too stressful for him to cope with. The most involvement he had was me saying 'I've decided this.......are you ok with that before I confirm the booking' and that was only for the big things like venue, food choices, etc. The rest I just did. Literally to the point that it was only when he went to get dressed on the day that he found out the colour scheme! His only decision was who his best man would be.

One of the things i loved most about the day was seeing his face at all the little details and personal touches I'd added. He still says what a great day and how perfect it was.

This is exactly what went through my mind as I was reading the OP. I really can't be doing with grown men or women who spend all their time on games consoles while everyone else runs around after them. I would have had a major strop about his mum's birthday. It's lovely you did it for her OP, but he needs to grow up and take some responsibiity.

In terms of wedding planning, yes I have done most of the leg work because it's what I'm good at and like doing. But, OH has played a massive role in all the key things and has insisted on being involved from the outset. While I have done all of the work regarding decorations and design, he's looked at everything and said if he does or doesn't like something, but was just as involved as me in the venue, menu, cakes, photographer, ceremony etc etc. It's his wedding too and what we do has to reflect the two of us not just one half of the whole.