Planning your special day can be one of the most extended planning sessions you’ll have in your lifetime. You’ve spent years finding Mr. Right, and now you’ll spend 6, 12,18 months, or more planning your perfect hill country wedding! So let’s get organized! One of the best ways is to create a wedding binder. Just like your perfect day, there are so many different ways to make this your very own. Of course, you will want to personalize this binder like your gorgeous Texas wedding, and here are a few things to consider.

Digital vs. Old School 

First, you’ll want to decide if you’d like to keep a digital binder, like OneNote or EverNote or if you’re going to keep it old school with a good ol’ fashion three-ring. While there are a lot of things online like Pins, photos, and wedding links (like GrueneEstate.com), you will have a lot of paper as well. So when it comes to deciding, go with what you think will be easiest to manage for your day-to-day.

One perk to a hard copy is you can hand it off the day of to your mom, event planner, or MOH. Should they need to reference a contract (what time is the DJ going to set up?) or verify your table settings are perfect (scrapbook a reference photo), they will have it at their literal fingertips. That being said, paper items like contracts and notes can always be scanned or digitized and saved in the virtual world. Whichever way you go, stick to it. It can be hard to get organized if you have some items in a three-ring binder and others saved in a digital format.

What to Include 

There are a few key tabs you should include in your wedding binder. The first being contracts and receipts. Print and include signed agreements from vendors like photographers, DJ or band, and caterers. This will give you a single spot for everything you’ve booked and quick access to contracts on the day of.

You can also include a tab for day-of-lists. This could consist of the various poses and groups you’d like your photographer to capture and certain songs your DJ or band must play, for example, the father-daughter dance, first dance, exit song, etc. It’s also a good idea to do a quick timeline of the day, like a run of show.

If you’re still in the early stages of planning, include a tab for decorations, color palettes, and other ideas you want to remember. If you’re going hard copy, here is your chance for some scrapbooking fun if you’re into that sort of thing!

How to Organize 

You should organize tabs in whatever way works best for you, be it by level of importance, alphabetical, whatever. One way would be in a timeline fashion, with the day of being the first and notes/planning ideas as last. This way, on the day of you, you can quickly flip to exactly what you need. Of course, if you’ve gone digital, you’ll be able to easily search for keywords, so organization is less critical.