Zizi Sparks: What to know about planning a wedding in a pandemic

After planning a wedding in a pandemic, I didn't even think of Covid on the day. Photo / MelissaKing Photography

OPINION

Planning a wedding should be a time of anticipation, quality time with those who mean most to you and excitement as the day inches closer.

And while mine was all of those things, the Covid-19 global pandemic threw more than a spanner in the works.

After being cool, calm and collected for 11 of the 12 months we were engaged, anxiety hit when Omicron reared its head. By mid-February, two weeks before our planned wedding date of March 5, it looked as if we'd timed things perfectly – our wedding would happen just as the peak of the Omicron outbreak approached.

When we got engaged in March 2021, Covid-19 appeared to be in the rearview mirror. We or should I say I, went into planning mode at full speed. We locked in a date and the major vendors. Then in August things kicked off again.

Three months before the wedding we had to get our heads around a new Covid-19 framework and by the end of the year the first community Omicron case had arrived.

No one told me in March 2021 that Covid would come back to bite us.

No one told me I'd have to contend with ever-changing rules - from alert levels to traffic light systems and mandates. Then the Government would announce a U-turn on the number of restrictions and vaccine passes 18 days after the big day.

No one told me some of the most important people to us wouldn't be able to attend because they were stuck overseas. Then be able to return home however many days later.

No one told me 8* people would drop out after catching Covid in the days leading up.

No one told me I'd have to find a new hairdresser after she got Covid on the ninth day of her husband's isolation period, the Tuesday of our wedding week.

No one told me about the sleepless nights.

I count myself lucky that we didn't have to postpone. We did talk about it but in the end, with no certainty about when a postponement date might be, we went ahead.

There were many times in the lead-up where we thought "if only we'd got married in January or February". I had to stop myself thinking like that and remember that it rained almost every weekend in February so if not Omicron, we would have had to contend with that.

Luckily, thanks to living a hermit lifestyle in the fortnight before the wedding, neither of us caught Covid and no one caught it at the wedding.

Everyone told me it would be the most perfect day. They weren't lying.

On the day, not a single thought of Covid crossed my mind.

So if you're getting married, you need to know all of the above. However, you also need to know that it is true what they say. The day flies past. From getting ready to the ceremony and photos. Blink and you'll miss it. So lap up every minute. Be in the moment. Take some time to just sit and enjoy it.

A pandemic is the least of your worries on the best day of your life.