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Five questions with Canada’s top wedding planner

The month of December is just around the corner. But it's not just for jingle bells and making merry -- the festive month is prime time for wedding engagements, with almost a quarter of Canadians opting to pop the question over the holidays.

Once the initial excitement of sharing the big news with friends and family has passed, it's easy to become overwhelmed by the task of planning the most important day of your life (talk about pressure!).

To make planning your special day as stress-free as possible, Yahoo Canada Shine chatted with Danielle Andrews Sunkel, owner of The Wedding Planners in Toronto, Ont. and president of The Wedding Planners Institute of Canada Inc. Here, she shares her insight on the first steps newly engaged couples should take toward planning their wedding.

1) When should couples start planning their wedding? As soon as the ring is on?

If a couple is planning to get married during Canada's wedding season, which is May to October, the ideal amount of time to plan is a year -- that way they will have more options available to them when they go to book the venue and vendors.

2) What's the first wedding detail couples should nail down?

The most important aspect of any wedding is the ceremony. If they're planning to have their wedding at a place of worship, the couple needs to get a few dates from the officiate before they can start planning anything else. After all, there is no wedding without the "I dos." Once you know where and when the ceremony is happening, you can work out the reception venue and then start booking vendors.

3) How long should you wait between the proposal and the wedding? Is there an acceptable time frame?

The typical engagement period used to be just over a year, but now it's just under a year. Couples are waiting a little later in life to get married -- most couples are in their early thirties as opposed to their twenties like a few years ago -- so once they make the decision to marry, they see no need to wait.

4) There's always the problem of how couples are going to pay for everything. Is it tactful to approach your parents for help?

Once the couple announces their engagement to their families, their respective parents will probably speak up. If that doesn't happen, it may be more tactful for each person to speak to their own parents about whether or not they will be willing to contribute to the wedding expenses.

5) Is it normal for couples to fight over planning their wedding?

The biggest point of contention between couples is usually the frills, like décor and flowers. Most men can understand spending money on things like good food and entertainment, but spending a lot of money on things like ribbons, linen, flowers and favours doesn't make sense to them. I really think avoiding sticker shock is key [to preventing fights] -- if the couple does their homework and investigates what things actually cost, they can avoid fights over money.

Danielle Andrews Sunkel is a Toronto-based, WPIC-certified wedding planner who has owned and operated The Wedding Planners since 2000. She is also the co-founder of
The Wedding Planners Institute of Canada Inc.