Here we are, nearing mid-May, the weather is warming up nicely and people are getting married like crazy! You have three bachelorette parties, four showers, and six weddings to attend between now and October, and you’re a bridesmaid in two of them. Looks like your life this summer will revolve around the nuptials of your friends and family and all of the wedding-related events surrounding them.

Sound familiar?

Hopefully your summer isn’t shaping up to be quite so booked up, but that kind of social calendar is a reality for some.

Most weddings, showers and bachelorette parties are a good time, but when you have two college roommates, a cousin, a co-worker, a highschool friend and your husband’s best friend all getting married in one summer, the commitments start piling up. Add buying shower gifts, wedding gifts and appropriate wedding attire to your rapidly growing to-do list. And if you’re a bridesmaid or maid of honor in some of the weddings – well then that list really starts to get out of control.

Of course we all want to be supportive and enjoy celebrating our loved ones getting hitched, but we also want to keep our sanity and not go broke. Sometimes this can be a fine line.

Lucky for us, there are people out there whose job it is to make weddings hassle-free for everyone involved. One of those people is Tiffany Bentley, Owner and Event Designer for Events Luxe, a local event planning company.

Bentley has some great tips for those of us who might be in danger of being spread too thin (financially and otherwise) when it comes to weddings this summer:

• Plan ahead. To make each bride feel special, think ahead of time which weddings you will attend, and consider your gifts from the start. You don’t want bride #1 to get a very thoughtful and nice gift, but by the time you get to bride #8, she ends up with a $10 Target gift card. Try to allocate funds equally across all friends getting married as best as possible. Obviously, your best friend gets something perhaps even more special than the others, but generally speaking, try to give yourself a gift cap, the most you are able to spend.
• Get creative. Search the gift registries and find several of the less expensive items. Look for a theme and pair the items with something special that ties in, and make sure you wrap it in a nice way. Here’s an example: A lot of couples register for things for their kitchen – stainless pots and pans, china, but also there will be wooden spoons, spatulas, mixing bowls, measuring cups, etc. that are all under $10 each. Buy the wooden spoon, the spatula, and one of the nicer-looking mixing bowls. Then add a nice touch by purchasing a cake mix in their favorite flavor from Williams-Sonoma or Whole Foods (something that looks nice and gourmet) and add it to the package. You might want to take everything out its packaging and tie it up with a nice ribbon. (They won’t be able to return it, but who returns a wooden spoon that they asked for?) Then put it in a box and wrap it up with a stand-out ribbon. They will think you were very thoughtful and it will look more expensive than it was.
• Give the gift that keeps on giving (at least for 1 year). A surprisingly cheap-yet-thoughtful shower gift is a 1-year magazine subscription. People don’t always think of this as an idea, but your gift may end up being the hit of the shower! Get her a subscription to The Nest, Dwell, or Martha Stewart Living – something that she would like and that speaks to her as a newlywed. Buy the current issue from the newsstand and roll it up into a tube shape. Tie a pretty satin ribbon around it and hang a gift tag from it that you made on your computer. You don’t even need to wrap it any more than that! It is more thoughtful than a registry gift, and something she will enjoy.  Also, she will think of you every month her magazine arrives, so it’s like getting her 12 gifts instead of one! You can get subscriptions to most major magazines online for very cheap, sometimes only $5.
• Recycle your wedding wardrobe. If the weddings you’re attending are with different circles of friends – WEAR THE SAME DRESS! You would be amazed at how many times you can re-wear a dress without being obvious when you change the shoes and accessories. You can find a floral pin or brooch and add it to the dress one time. The next time, add a belt, wear a different colored shoe, wear you hair differently, or wear a long necklace or a short pendant. If you are going to be with the same group of friends for several of the weddings, try recycling something, maybe the shoes, and find inexpensive dresses that go with the shoes. Also, a chic combo that you might already have is a long fitted tank tucked into a cute skirt. Add a belt, shoes, and accessories. Don’t ever stress out about buying a new dress for each occasion. If you wear something from last year or wear something twice, nobody will know except for you.

Sara McCarty, a local blogger who is a seasoned wedding attendee and a recent bride herself, also has some wise tips for how to help out the bride and be a supportive guest or member of the wedding party (the last thing anyone wants is to face the wrath of a bridezilla!).

She recommends responding with your RSVP promptly so you don’t forget about it and make the bride track you down. Also, don’t wear white or any similar shade (ivory, cream, etc.) to the wedding – that color is reserved for the bride! These tips may seem obvious, but there are some clueless wedding guests out there – hopefully now you’re not one of them.

“Don’t call, text or email the bride at any time during the days leading up to the wedding with stupid questions about the events, timing, parking, transportation, dress, etc.” McCarty also suggests. “She does not have time to deal with that. Ask a bridesmaid instead or check their wedding website.”

According to McCarty, another bride-pleaser is to “take tons of pictures of the wedding and email them to her after the wedding. She’ll love getting pictures of the event immediately, especially since photographers can take months after the wedding to get the pictures ready.”

McCarty’s final tip, and perhaps the most important one is, “Dance at the reception. And have fun!”

So grab that net and catch that beautiful butterfly, love is in the air, and all that jazz – it’s wedding season!

Carlie is the Food and Drink Editor for Girls Guide, and also blogs at carliecrash.com. By day she is an educational textbook editor, and she moonlights as a foodie and barfly.  You can email her at carlie [at] girlsguidetothegalaxy [dot] com, and you can follow her on Twitter – @carbirwin.

Image Credit: Timothy Whaley & Associates