Tenomania.com

Getting married? Congratulations! But you probably have a million things to do to prepare for the big day. If the list of to-do’s is stressing you out and making you wish you could afford your own personal wedding planner, let technology make the planning a little more easy and enjoyable.

1. A new kind of address book

Get rid of the handwritten address book you’ve been carrying around and enter the information for your invited guests, new family members, and vendors (such as your caterer or florist) in the Contacts folder of Microsoft Outlook® 2002. It not only makes it easy to change information without erasing or crossing out, it keeps the information in one central location. No more worries about accidentally leaving your address book somewhere with no recollection of where it could be.

Hint – You can create separate Contacts folders specific to your wedding to add a little organization to your address book. This will allow you to import and export that information for other uses, which you will learn as you read on.

2. A simple communication tool

As you enter information into Contacts, be sure to include e-mail addresses for your wedding party and vendors so you can use e-mail to easily keep everyone up to date on all wedding activities.

Hint – If appropriate for your taste, you can create a custom template for your e-mail so that when you send it out it has a wedding theme. Add a wedding bell for fun!

3. A to-do list that almost does the work for you

Of course you have a list of one hundred things to do. You could write them all down and try to keep track of them on paper, but instead, try using Tasks in Outlook 2002 to keep them in a central place. You can set due dates and/or identify the progress you have made on your tasks. And if you haven’t checked off an item by the assigned due date, you get a nice reminder that it needs to be done.

Hint – If you need to assign a task to your spouse-to-be, your maid of honor, or your best man, you can do so by checking the Assign Task option and it will send the task to them in e-mail. You will then either receive an e-mail message when it has been completed or a reminder if it hasn’t been completed.

4. A calendar that keeps you on task

As you schedule appointments for things such as clothing alterations and food tasting, use the Calendar in Outlook 2002 to enter your appointments. And be sure to set a reminder to prevent you from forgetting! If you have followed our first tip and entered your wedding party in your Contacts, you can pull up your attendants’ e-mail addresses and send them a meeting request with the time and date for an appointment, such as clothes shopping. If they accept, it automatically enters the appointment into their calendar with the reminder you have set.

Hint – Set reminders for important appointments a day ahead to prevent you from forgetting until the last minute.

5. Unique invitations that stand out

If you are having a tough time rationalizing paying a professional printer to make your invitations, you can stand out from the rest and create your own. Microsoft Word 2002 is great for adding photos, clip art images, and special formatting to make your invitations shine. Not only will your invitations look unique, but you can also keep a consistent theme by creating the rest of your wedding documents, such as engagement announcements and ceremony programs.

Hint – If this sounds like too much work, check out the

Templates site on Microsoft Office Online, where you will find wedding-themed templates already created. You can download these and edit to your taste.

6. Your own custom envelopes

If you decide to create your own invitations, why not go a step further and print matching envelopes as well? With the contacts you created in Outlook, you can use the Mail Merge option to import the information into Word and thus print your own envelopes with the invitees’ names and addresses as well as your return address.

Hint – To add a special touch, you can even add graphics to your envelopes.

7. An interactive budget

Ah, yes — everything costs money, and boy, does it add up fast. Get rid of the calculator and let Microsoft Excel 2002 track your expenses for you. By creating a budget in Excel, you can automatically calculate your total expenses as you go. It’s a good way to see how you are doing based on the budget you set forth, and it’s simple for you to know what you have left to spend.

Hint – If you would rather not take time to create your own budget spreadsheet, check out the Templates site for templates you can use.

8. A tracking system that works

Keeping track of your RSVP responses, all those presents, and the thank-you notes you need to send can be tough. Excel makes this simple. As you get responses or open presents, type in the person’s name and the response or gift associated. Once you’re done, you can sort the list by the "yes" or "no" response to determine how many people will attend or to whom you need to send thank-you letters.

Hint – If you created a Contacts folder of your invited guests, you can export their information into Excel 2002. That way, their names and addresses will already be in the spreadsheet for you to use.

9. A memory book to share

Add a little something different to your reception: Run a slideshow with pictures of you and your spouse during the reception. With Microsoft PowerPoint® 2002, you can take a basic presentation of photographs, add music and custom animation, and turn it into a continuously running slide show that seems almost like a home movie.

Hint – Create a similar presentation with pictures from your honeymoon to send to family and friends who live far away, so they can see what a great trip you had (and you won’t have to spend money on additional copies of pictures).

10. The extra mile

If you want to make things easy not only for yourself but also for your guests, take some additional steps in your planning with these suggestions. Avoid annoying phone calls with questions about where to stay and what to do by creating a personal wedding Web site with Microsoft FrontPage® 2002. On the site, you could post pictures and information such as suggested hotels, fun activities to do in the area, and stores where you are registered. For guests without e-mail access, you can use Microsoft Publisher 2002 to create a beautiful, full-color wedding guide to drop in the mail instead.

Hint – For the ultimate "professional" look, use Publisher to create beautiful, full-color invitations, thank-you cards, or even your wedding program or dinner menu — all templates included!

Now that you’ve read all of these tips, get your wedding planning started. It should be a piece of cake!