Eventistry

There are plenty of places that claim to be LGBT-friendly, but more mean “we won’t judge you or turn away your business” or “as long as you seem mainstream enough, we’re good!” There’s a huge difference between a corporation adding a rainbow logo during Pride for extra sales and the kind of ally Diana was during our time together. She introduced herself with her pronouns, used they/them as effortlessly as he/she, bugged other vendors about the somewhat exclusive language in their contracts, and was even asked to write a guest blog on what hurdles LGBT couples go through during the wedding process and asked for our input. And that barely scratches the surface of how unbelievably amazing and helpful Diana was. Both my wife and I are researchers and planners and we didn’t originally think we needed a coordinator. We didn’t even reach out to her until four or five months beforehand when (we thought) most everything was decided, planned, and settled. After all, we started planning a year and a half in advance, everything was locked in, and even the centerpieces were already made. As we got closer to the date and fatigue set in, though, we began to worry about our ability to handle everything alone. Enter Diana, the superheroine. Calm and kind, but firm and meticulous without being overbearing - towards the couple, anyhow. Sometimes you need to be a little tough with vendors! We really did have a lot of astounding vendors who were all a treasure to work with, but Diana was our saving grace. Her website has a variety of planning tools for budgeting, timelines, checklists, seating charts, recommended vendors, thoughts on a number of topics like tipping, and more. Even though we couldn’t have been the only couple she was working with, we certainly felt like it. She always had time for us, got back to us quickly, and calmed our fears. Early on, she told us, “Maybe a month or two weeks out, you’ll get to the point where you can’t decide anything else because you just don’t care anymore. When that time comes, let me know, and I’ll take care of it.” She did and so much more. Neither of us really likes to be on the phone or harassing people and Diana handled everything from re-reading the contracts, to speaking with vendors about questions and solving last minute snafus, to reminding us when payments were due or something wasn’t taken care of. She and her assistant helped set up decorations on the day of and had boxes of food and cake ready for us when we tore down. If you’ve gotten all the way through this and you’re still dead set on handling everything yourself, congrats and good luck! For anyone else even remotely on the fence, there’s Diana. Wherever in the wedding process you involve her, she’s worth far more than you’ll pay for her and you’ll be so glad you did.