To Rehearse or Not To Rehearse?

First, before anything gets written here, let's just mention that today is National Ice Cream Sandwich day. Go and eat one, its your civic duty!

Since I am a planner by nature, I am inclined to rehearse or at least do a walk through of most major milestones in my life. My inner perfectionist can't rest if I don't have a chance to practice. But, others prefer to just be organized and "wing it" so to speak.

So where does yours wedding fall on that spectrum? Are you definitely having a rehearsal so that everything runs smoothly with no surprises during your ceremony? Or are you sure that by telling people what to do, they will just do it and it will be smooth?

In my experience, the latter almost never happens since your words inevitably always get lost in translation from your lips to someone's ears. When you say move to the left of the officiant, they hear go stand in front of the officiant. Its uncanny, but every wedding I've done that doesn't have a rehearsal prior to the ceremony, things have not gone smoothly.

So here are some pros / cons to doing a rehearsal:

Pros: Not a guarantee for perfection, but pretty close. At least your bridal party will have a vague idea of what the space looks like and where they should go. Everyone will feel a bit more comfortable about the ceremony and what will be happening. If you make a 'mistake' during the rehearsal, it can be corrected - not so much during the ceremony itself.

Cons: Takes time. True, the rehearsal can take ages if people are late or the officiant is long winded or the bridal party is huge. Its a wedding ceremony, almost every single person you've ever met has been to one, so they get it, right? We're easy going people, we don't care what happens during the ceremony - its natural.

For all the cons, here's what a wedding planner will tell you: if you think you won't get upset that your bridesmaids all sat down when they were supposed to stand or that the groomsmen were in the wrong order - um, yes, you will. Those mistakes will be a facet of your wedding day that will stay with you. And for every wedding that your bridal party or ceremony participants have attended or been in - this is YOUR wedding ceremony. It may be .0000001% different to what everyone else has been to and that minute difference can mean the difference between a smooth ceremony and a not so smooth one. So please, build a rehearsal into your wedding weekend.

Are you planning or not planning on doing a rehearsal? What are your thoughts?