Wedding Etiquette, Wedding Advice, The First Dance goes beyond the standard advice

Wedding etiquette has long gone out the window.

Wedding advice through The First Dance goes beyond the standard advice which is almost always simplistic and at its worst, makes your situation 10 times more stressful.

It's an anything-goes culture which means even more generational conflicts are likely to happen in our culture of Super Sized weddings where one day can easily cost the price of a car.

We believe people can figure out how to navigate their complex relationships with our set of principles, grounded in hundreds of real life stories of couples planning their weddings. Unlike most wedding planning websites with a "Q&A" section, we empower our couples to understand not just what our perspective is on their problem but why we suggest what we do.

For example, one of our couple principles is: "It's about values, not details or things." So many problems occur when opinions or etiquette assumptions collide. My mom insists on X, we want Y (cake, invitations, guests...) Instead of honing in directly on the "thing" that is causing the conflict, it works wonders to step back and figure out what is really underneath that detail. Is it a lifelong dream to have cheesecake as your wedding cake? Is your wedding about having the nicest party on the smallest budget or perhaps about being able to invite everyone even if it means the food, place, and music won't be as nice because your budget is limited?

Our mission is to help engaged couples manage the people stress of wedding planning and have more wisdom to carry over to their marriage. Take a look at what we offer and let us know how we can help you in our Talk With Us section.

- Elizabeth Doherty Thomas, is a co-founder of The First Dance, along with Marriage and Family therapist father Dr. William J. Doherty. The First Dance was a Modern Bride Trendsetter award winner in 2007 for taking on the complex family dynamics of wedding planning. Read Take Back Your Wedding: Managing the People Stress of Wedding Planning for more advice on working through the people stresses of wedding planning as a couple, with your families, and how to strengthen your upcoming marriage through this enormous first task of married life.

Wedding etiquette has long gone out the window.

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