Post Wedding Checklist: 10 Things to Do After the Big Day

PC: Shannon Burrell Photography

You never thought this day would come, but it’s really truly the morning after your wedding. Wouldn’t it be so excellent to teleport directly to honeymoon-relaxation-forever-in-bliss mode, with not a single post wedding checklist item in sight? Alas, you and your sweetheart have a few more items to tackle before you can fully dive into your life as newlyweds. Without further ado, here are 10 things to do after your wedding—some easy, some difficult, and some that are actually a little fun. Keep scrolling!

Say Thank You to Your Wedding Guests

Wedding hack! Writing thank you cards is one of those things to do “after your wedding” that you can tackle months in advance. As you create your guest list and collect RSVPs, start a spreadsheet to help you map out your correspondence, especially to friends and family you know will be in attendance. Keep your card phrasing short and sweet, writing batch-by-batch with your sweetheart so you don’t get overwhelmed at any one time. Easy!

When do you send wedding thank you cards for gifts, you ask? For gifts received before the wedding, send a thank you note within two weeks of arrival. For those received on or within a year after your wedding, send a card within three months.

Check Your Wedding Hashtag

PC: Erika Diaz Photography

You made some cute signs and spread the hashtag love. Now it’s time to enjoy your guests’ posts and photos on social! To help crowdsource and save your media, head to a site like “If This, Then That” (ifttt.com) to help you link content and accounts among different platforms.

All you need is a predetermined if-this-then-that “recipe” for connecting one action to another (e.g. if a photo is uploaded to Instagram with your wedding hashtag, it gets uploaded to a preexisting Facebook album). Fabulous!

Create a Wedding Album

Between hiring a professional wedding photographer and crowdsourcing from your hashtag, you’re sure to have a big cache of photo and video content from your big day. As you tackle things to do after your wedding, take some time to save highlights in an analog or digital wedding album—both as a lovely keepsake for you and your sweetheart and an easy way to share content with friends and family online.

Clean Your Wedding Attire and Preserve Wedding Dress

PC: Rachel Laxton Photography; Dress: Mallory Dawn by Maggie Sottero

Call us biased, but we say your wedding dress is the best heirloom from your big day! Of all the things to do after your wedding, cleaning and preserving your bridal gown is one you’ll be especially happy about for years to come. We all know how easy it is to lose track of treasures over the years, so don’t let your dress be one of them!

Leave Online Reviews for Your Vendors

If your wedding vendors worked their butts off to help make your day gorgeous and special, there’s nothing like a glowing 5-star review to make their day! As you work through your post wedding checklist, be sure to post on any Yelp, Google Business, and vendor websites available to you. It supports the business in gaining new clients, helps future brides in their planning, and heck, even adds to your good karma as newlyweds. It’s everything we love about loving weddings!

Freeze Your Wedding Cake

PC: Shutter Go Click Photography; Dress: Ettia by Maggie Sottero

One of the easiest (not to mention tastiest) things to do after your wedding is to save the top layer of your wedding cake. It’s considered good luck for you and your sweetheart to share a slice on your first anniversary and is the perfect way to reconnect and reminisce!

Find or Revise Your Insurance Plans

A slightly mundane but fairly satisfying part of your post wedding checklist is to find or amend insurance plans as a married couple. This might mean adding a spouse to an employee health insurance policy, revising an auto or life insurance plan, or reviewing new enrollment and financing options now that you’re married. (There’s nothing like adding your spouse as a retirement beneficiary to make you feel like an actual real-life grownup!)

Talk About Your Finances and Taxes

PC: Alex Lasota Photography

One of the more serious sections of your post wedding checklist includes talking to your new spouse about finances and taxes. This is a great way to avoid errors and conflict during your first year of marriage. Here are some finance-related things to do after your wedding:

• Tie up loose ends from your wedding budget (be it unexpected fees or miscommunication with family about their monetary contributions).
• Reconnect on any upcoming expenses (such as a honeymoon or an approaching holiday).
• Discuss your strategy on joint tax filing, as this may affect your payroll taxes and/or returns in the subsequent season.

Money can be a stressful post-wedding topic but easily managed with honesty, communication, and proactive resolutions! For a comprehensive guide on how to manage your finances as newlyweds, click here!

Change Your Last Name (Only If You Want!)

If you’re keeping your last name, you’re all set. If you’re taking your partner’s last name, hyphenating both your last names, or opting for a new surname entirely, you can start as soon as you’d like after the wedding. The process of changing your last name is fairly straightforward, but it definitely takes some time in your post wedding checklist.

In a nutshell, you map out all your legal documentations (from social security to bank accounts), and then use your marriage license to update each with your new surname. So ready, set, get to your nearest DMV!  

Plan Something New to Look Forward To

PC: Jordan and Scott Photography; Dress: Meryl Lynette by Maggie Sottero

And lastly, take some time to lift those post-wedding blues! It may seem counterintuitive, but once all the collecting, DIYing, curating, strategizing, and partying of your engagement is over, you might feel like your serotonin is in a bit of a free fall. To combat that just-married rut (i.e. you’re feeling a little bored, lonely, or aimless), look to make some new plans with your new partner.

Remember that you have a ton of stuff to look forward to as a married couple, be it as complex as buying a house together, or as sweet and simple as planting a garden or adopting a new pet. When you refocus on these long-term projects of marriage, you’ll never be short on happy things to look forward to!

Feeling a little more prepared to take care of big things to do after your wedding? Just a friendly reminder from us at Maggie Sottero—as you’re basking in the afterglow of your wedding photos and celebrating your impeccable taste and party-planning abilities, be sure to share some wedding-dress love with our hashtags #Maggiebride, #Midgleybride, and #Rebeccabride!

And hey, if you’re still in the “pre” portion of your planning, check out our pre-wedding checklist for the weeks leading up to your big day. Best wishes for your happiest of happily-ever-afters!