When you stop and think about it, often it’s not the big things — such as the church, the banquet, and the band — that make your wedding memorable. Rather, a few small personal touches will cause your wedding to stand out in the minds of the participants and guests for days, weeks, months, and years to come.

Have you thought about planning the wedding around a warm, friendly theme to tie everything together? If you are having the wedding in the autumn, you could choose autumn leaves as the theme. Create your own logo that uses autumn colors and a motto such as “Warm at Heart.”

When planning the wedding, your logo would appear on your invitations, decorations, guest book, and programs. As part of the ceremony, the speakers and singers could perform pieces that relate to the theme. It is always so thoughtful to publish some of the poems and songs in the program you give to guests so they have a wedding remembrance to keep.

Autumn flowers are especially beautiful for table displays and of course the bouquets, corsages, and boutonnieres. The wedding attendants can wear autumn colors. The flower carriers can drop autumn leaves instead of flowers. Your tables can be named autumn colors, such as gold, green, orange, crimson, etc., or other autumn themes, such as cornucopia or hearth, and decorated to reflect the theme.

To round out wedding planning, the favors should fit into the wedding theme. Perhaps you can create little jars of home-made soup mix, pasta, or risotto the guests can prepare at home. Decorate the little jars with your wedding logo, ribbons, and flowers. This little food gift will give your guests another opportunity to re-live the joy of the wedding after they get home.

When your guests receive your thank you note in the mail a few weeks later with your logo, they will smile and remember the little things you did to make the wedding so memorable. A cute wedding planning idea is to put on the thank you note a photo of you and your spouse on the honeymoon with both of you wearing T-shirts, one of which says, “Thank” and the other “You.”

These ideas are just some of the little touches that will make people remember your wedding. You can find many more ideas on the Internet. There are literally hundreds of websites that are filled with great ideas on wedding planning, themes, invitations, favors, music, poems, flowers, and thank you notes. Just take a look around and use your imagination. Pretty soon your mind will be brimming over with novel ideas!

So you’ve been to your local bookstore, surveyed the rather large collection of wedding books and wondered how anyone even gets through this whole planning process… and why all those wedding planning books are so thick!

This is completely understandable – it is a bit on the daunting side. Planning a wedding is definitely not something you can throw together in a matter of days, and there will certainly be quite a few projects along the way to keep you busy.

But these ‘projects’ can actually be fun – a lot of fun! And with a plan, you may even find yourself looking forward to them…

1.) Most importantly, keep things SIMPLE.

There will always be another photographer to interview, another centerpiece idea, another wedding favor website. When you find something that “clicks” with you, go with it! You’ve just crossed off one more thing on your wedding checklist.

2.) Decide on a good filing system before you begin.

Order a box of file folders or an accordion file with multiple sections to hold all of your contracts, notes, etc. If you’re really ambitious, consider investing $20-30 in a labeler at an office supply store – it keeps things especially neat and organized. As you go along, designate one folder for each aspect of your planning — caterer, rehearsal dinner, guest list, etc.

3.) Get started! Begin tackling items on your wedding checklist.

Look at the first group of to-do’s on the list. Don’t try to do all of these at once – take one at a time and consider putting the others on your calendar so that you know they’ll get taken care of, just not all today.

4.) Don’t be afraid to delegate.

Family members and attendants will more than likely be willing to help take on some of the planning tasks – if they offer, take them up on it! If there are parts of the planning that you know you don’t need to be (or care to be) directly involved in, ask for help.

5.) Have FUN.

While some tasks will take longer than others, there will be others that will balance out all of the hard work – treating yourself to a day at the spa for example. Also, consider subscribing to one or more bridal magazines – when you think you’ve run out of wedding ideas, these glossy guides are a great pick-me up.

6.) And lastly, don’t worry that you won’t possibly be able to do all of these things…

Everything will get done, in due time, and you’ll see all of your hard work pay off when things really start to come together. So start planning, and have fun!

It is traditional for the bride to give the groom a gift on the wedding day. Although the wedding rings that the couple exchanges can be considered gifts, many brides choose to honor their groom with an additional gift that suits his personality.

The gift of the bride and groom exchanging gifts is beginning to fade as many couples who spend a great deal of money on their wedding or honeymoon may decide that there is no need to exchange gifts in addition to the wedding and honeymoon. If you do decide to honor your groom with a gift on your wedding day, it is more important to choose an item that he is sure to enjoy than it is to spend a great deal of money on the gift.

A photo album complete with a picture of you and the bridesmaid or the entire wedding party can be another unique gift idea for the bridesmaids. You could purchase photo albums with the date of your wedding engraved on the front cover and start the photo album with a picture of you and the bridesmaid. This is a wonderful gift idea because the bridesmaid can place her photos from the wedding day in the album and will always have a precious souvenir from your wedding day.

Gift certificates to a spa or a salon also make unique gift ideas for your bridesmaids. Your bridesmaids most likely spent a great deal of time and energy in helping you to plan your wedding. The week prior to your wedding was also probably especially hectic with a great deal of last minute details to attend to and errands to run. While you will have your honeymoon to relax and renew your energy your bridesmaids do not have this luxury so by honoring them by presenting them with a gift certificate to a spa or salon you are giving them the gift or being pampered and the gift of relaxation.

A few more unique gift ideas for your bridesmaids’ gifts include handcrafted or homemade gifts. For example you could put together a CD of some of your bridesmaids’ favorite songs. You could make the CDs different for each bridesmaid and include a photo of the two of you on the cover and include a heartfelt poem on the inside of the CD cover. You could also create a scrapbook for each of your bridesmaids. You could either make the scrapbook a memory of your entire friendship together and include photos and other items from your various adventures throughout the years or if you plan ahead and take many photos documenting your wedding preparations, you could create scrapbooks as a remembrance of the wedding planning that you shared.

Any item that relates to a specific hobby that the groom enjoys is a great idea for a wedding gift for the bride to give to the groom. This is a popular choice because giving a gift that relates to one of his hobbies demonstrates that you understand his likes and that you want him to continue to engage in activities that he enjoys.

Another unique gift idea for a bride to give to her bridesmaids is a gift certificate to a local restaurant. Assisting in your wedding preparations was probably extremely stressful and time consuming for the bridesmaids and they certainly deserve a night on the town and the opportunity to not have to cook for a night. This simple gift lets your bridesmaids know that you appreciate their efforts and that you want to thank them for all that they have done to support you.

Unique gift ideas for the bridesmaids can also stem from the wedding theme. For example if you are having a beach themed wedding you might want to give your bridesmaids a gift of a tote bag, a beach towel and a novel to enjoy on the beach. This unique gift idea ensures that your bridesmaids will remember your wedding fondly the next time they are at the beach.

Although the tradition of the bride and groom exchanging gifts on their wedding day is beginning to fade, many couples still wish to honor this tradition. Many couples spend so much money on their wedding and reception that they feel as though they cannot afford the additional expense of buying gifts for each other. While it may be true that the couple cannot afford one more extravagant gift it is also true that a truly thoughtful gift for the groom does not have to be overly expensive. If the couple is partaking in this tradition it is advisable that they exchange gifts that truly reflect the personality of their spouse.

Even the smallest things can help save money on a wedding.

For brides, making just a few changes can help save a few pennies and trim a few dollars off the cost without making a huge impact on how a wedding looks and feels.

1. Book your venue early. Some places will give discounts for couples who book their venues well in advance.

2. Plan your wedding off-season. June, September and July tend to be popular months for weddings. By having your wedding in off months, October through April, you may be able to save money on the place you hold your reception. Planning your wedding for a day other than Saturday can save you money as well.

3. Make your own invitations. Using simple word processing and desktop publishing software and nice paper, you can make your own invitations. The best benefit is that making your own helps you to create something one-of-a-kind.

4. Consider the church fellowship hall or your mom’s backyard. Many brides are taking advantage of free venues to save money. Finding a good, free location to hold your reception can save thousands.

5. Forego the photographer for the reception. Instead, place disposable cameras on the reception tables and let guests take pictures for you.

6. Ask your caterer about children’s plates. Some caterers will discount children’s plates by as much as 50 percent. If your reception is family-oriented and includes children, the savings could really be substantial.

7. Consider gown alternatives. If you’re not super-sentimental about your wedding dress, consider alternatives such as buying your gown from a thrift store, buying a plain dress and embellishing it yourself, or even having your dress custom-made. Many seamstresses can make a simple wedding dress for less than the cost of one from a wedding store.

8. Use family and friends to the best of their abilities. If members of your family or your friends have special talents — your sister can do calligraphy, your uncle is a florist, your soon-to-be brother in law is a DJ — ask them for their specialized help.

9. Buy bridesmaids dresses from stores other than a bridal salon. Many retail stores, such as Sears, or catalogue businesses, like Speigel, will sell cocktail dresses during the holiday season. Buy bridesmaids’ dresses after the holidays, when they go on sale.

10. Forego save-the-date cards. Instead, send electronic invitations, like Evite, months before the big day to let people know what you’re planning.

A wedding doesn’t have to be a black-tie affair, but with a little planning it can be the day of your dreams, for less.

Just remember, if you get married in blue jeans and serve bologna, you’re still married. And that, ultimately, is what’s most important.