Seven Things You Don’t Want to Throw Away After Your Wedding

So much planning goes into a wedding. The engagement can feel like one long marathon of meeting vendors, scouting locations, maintaining budgets, keeping friends and family happy, along with a myriad of other tasks you never even thought of. These duties can drain your energy and your bank account. After the bouquet is tossed, and the last piece of cake is eaten, you will discover another side effect of your big day. Your wedding has generated a lot of junk. Unless you are a complete pack rat, you will be tempted to take drastic measures to reclaim your closets, tables, desks and other areas of your home.

Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water. There are several items that you will want to keep to tie up loose ends and to preserve your memories:

1. Contracts. The obligations of some vendors do not end on the wedding day. Your photographer is a great example. After the wedding, much of his work has just begun. The contract provides information on the prints, photo albums, copyrights, etc.

2. Written speeches and vows. Photos are not the only way to preserve your wedding day memories. Keep written speeches (i.e. Unity Candle ceremony) and personal vows for your memory book. Add them to a picture frame for an inexpensive memento.

3. Address lists. Chances are it took a lot of effort and phone calls to the parents to compile contact information for all of your family, friends, co-workers, and so on. This information can be an invaluable resource in the future. Think baby shower, housewarming, or new business venture, just to name a few instances where the address list could come in handy.

4. Body measurements. This may seem a little sadistic, but many women like to keep a mental note of their wedding day weight. What better way to remember your wedding day physique than the measurements taken for your gown?

5. Paper goods. This includes save the dates, invitations, announcements, programs, and the like. These may seem like a source of clutter the day after your wedding, but soon they will be a quick and convenient memento of your big day. Do not assume that your mother kept all of these items for you. Make sure you retain your own copies.

6. Specialty undergarments. In order to pull off that flawless look, many brides enlist a variety of techniques, such as Spanx to trim the tummy or gel bra pads to add a little extra up top. Even if these items are unnecessary or undesirable for everyday use, hold on to them. Another family wedding or cocktail party is always around the corner and you will be ready.

7. Dress. While you might not toss your dress out with yesterday’s newspaper, stuffing your gown in the back of an unventilated closet or a musty attic can cause damage. If you plan to keep your dress, research preservation services and make plans to take your dress as soon as possible. There are wedding dress preservation kits available for the do-it-yourself bride. You can also sell your dress through a consignment shop or online. Finally, you can donate your dress to an organization like Making Memories Breast Cancer Foundation, which grants final wishes to women and men suffering from terminal breast cancer.

The wedding is over, and life is slowly returning to normal. Give yourself time to sift through all the wedding day clutter to decide what is destined for the city dump and what could be a priceless memory.