How to Plan a Wedding Without Losing Your Mind

Heidi Kurpiela was never big on weddings. “I never paged through bridal magazines in line at the grocery store. I never ached to be a bride.” But even a no-frills attitude didn't save her from the maelstrom of wedding planning, she writes on The Stimulist. Herewith some lessons learned as she saw herself turning into the obsessive bride she was sure she would never be be:

You can buy the dress alone: it doesn’t have to be a weepy or expensive undertaking. It can be as simple as running to the supermarket for a half-gallon of milk.”
You will be intimidated into hand writing your guests’ addresses: Get over it. Apparently easy-to-read computer generated ones are in bad taste.
You must buy a cake serving set: Kurpiela suggests whatever you find marked down at Pier 1.
CC your bridesmaids on all shoe-related e-mails: Kurpiela accidentally told one bridesmaid to buy gold, another to buy brown. Whoops.
You will register for things you will regret. Going through the store with the scanner sent "cold chills of gluttonous consumerism" down her spine. You can edit the next day.
You can break tradition: The internet is brimming with good ideas for DIY touches. There need be no rules.