Are you available 08/21/21?!?

Do you get a little nervous when that message hits your inbox? I mean, maybe I'm free in August 2 years from now but maybe I'm not? Can I check in with you later, bride-to-be?

Probably not. These days, brides are planning their weddings earlier and earlier. In the midwest, its risky to get married in the winter and so I've found there's a handful of dates that book up SUPER fast and then I start getting all the emails for the same dates. Brides are catching on to this, and so they're booking far in advance to get the venues they want and the vendors they love.

So how do you plan your bookings around this and not feel like your life revolves around weddings? Honesty? There's no cookie-cutter answer. When I was first starting out, I was so overwhelmed by accepting a wedding more than a year in advance that I simply told brides that I wasn't booking that far out. The more established I became, I realized that it was okay for me to say yes to a wedding that was a year or two away because I knew that wedding hair was my career path.

Here's what's helpful to ask yourself: is doing wedding hair your dream job, do you want to be doing it as a career, and do you want to be as booked as you can in the future? Then book those brides! (Just make sure you have a contract and take a deposit!)

On the other hand, are you unsure of your career path in the next year or two? Is wedding hair more of a hobby and you're not at the place where you can say it's a career yet? Well then, my friend, it's perfectly okay to decline that bride and refer her somewhere else.

The challenge in this job is that you are working most weekends, and that can be hard sometimes. However, being proactive rather than reactive has really helped me create a life I love. Doing some planning in advance as been SO helpful for my family. Since where I live the summer and fall are the busiest, my husband and I try to make our plans for the following year in the summertime, rather than January 1st. (Often by January 1st my summer is already full of weddings!) We talk about the places we'd like to travel, or events we want to attend, and start to fill out our calendar for the following summer. If I know we want to take a vacation next year, we make it a priority to choose the dates far in advance to make sure it happens. This way I am proactively planning out my year with my family and friends, rather than just trying to squeeze something in if I happen to have a weekend that doesn't get booked (which is what I used to do.)

Planning with your family and friends in advance can actually make more quality time happen for you in the long run. Goal setting and actually putting dates on the calendar really help to keep you committed-rather than just hoping you will as the days go by and you find you've not actually planned the things you've wanted to do!

So, I encourage you to think about what will work for your life and your career, and then to see this crazy wedding industry as a positive thing to help you make your life plans actually happen!