It's wedding season and couples across the country are spending all their time planning expensive weddings and honeymoons. That's all well and good, but once you get home, it's time to put the lavish spending aside and figure out a plan for your financial health as a couple.

Here's my five step plan for how newlyweds can get their finances on track right from the start:

First, figure out how you're going to pay the bills (both where the money is going to come from and who will actually do it). It may make sense for one person to take it over (whoever is best at dealing with paperwork) and the other to contribute funds to a joint checking account.

This post is part of a series about real-life signs we're in a recession.

The good news about the recession is that there are bargains to be had for the adventurous shopper. The bad news is that many people are not able to afford them.

Times are tough and the economy is slowing. The National Bureau of Economic Research has not officially pronounced that the U.S. is in a recession -- technically two consecutive quarters of negative Gross Domestic Product Growth. GDP rose 1.9 percent last year and is expected to decline in the first quarter by 0.1%, according to Morgan Stanley.

Yet some economists, including David Wyss of Standard & Poor's, argue that a recession is already in progress. He believes that the economy is half-way through the slowdown, which he expects to be mild as recessions go. "It's still going to hurt," he said in an interview. "Recessions always do."

Indeed, signs of a recession are all around us. People are doing without a full tank of gas. They are watching their pennies at the grocery store. They are learning to do without things that they thought, until recently, they could not do without -- including $10,000 summer camps. Many are watching their homes decrease in value at an alarming rate and foreclosures have hit records.

In WalletPop's Recession Watch series, bloggers documented some of the new trends brought about by the economic slowdown. For example, some young adults are moving in with their grandparents. Businesses of all sizes are merging to save money. Others, such as a karate dojo, are adding quirky new side businesses, such as selling balloons.

Here are some other additional signs of looming recession:

When I was 10 or so, I became an altar boy. There was something about the polished wood of the pews, the smell of incense, the kneeling...even though I got to know every nook and cranny of the church, it never stopped being mysterious for me, and I never stopped loving the feel of hallowed spaces. In fact, when it came time to propose to my girlfriend, I did it in the snow outside a cathedral in Poland while listening to a trumpeter sound out the hours. For me, churches are magical, wonderful places, and I make a point of visiting as many of them as possible.

That having been said, I am not a churchgoer, and neither is my wife. I was touched and honored when she offered to convert to my religion, but I also understood the look of relief in her eyes when I told her that it was unnecessary. While some of my favorite weddings have happened in churches, I wasn't really eager to get married in one. Given that my wife's flesh starts to smoke when it comes into contact with holy water, she also was interested in pursuing other options.

Of course, this put us in kind of a bind. Churches often host weddings, and generally have planners and guides on staff, which makes things a lot easier. Better yet, they are usually attached to social halls or gymnasiums, which provide convenient venues for receptions. In the absence of this easy solution, we decided to get creative.

Talk about unusual and disturbing marketing campaigns! Charmin is doing a promotion in New York City, featuring "Charmin Restrooms." These are "20 clean and comfortable" restrooms in Times Square for the holiday season.

And as part of the promotion.... A couple is going to get married in the Charmin Restroom. Jennifer Cannon will be wearing a wedding gown made of toilet paper when she weds Doy Nicols in the potty.

Procter & Gamble, the maker of Charmin, is paying for the ceremony (how much does it cost to get married in a bathroom anyway?), travel expenses, a hotel room, and a honeymoon for the happy couple.

Corporate sponsorship is one way, I suppose, to cut your wedding costs. But this is just tacky (no matter how soft the toilet roll is!). And also a little bit icky. But congratulations, I guess, to the happy couple. I hope they get a lifetime supply of toilet paper as part of the wedding package.

Forensic accountant Tracy L. Coenen, CPA, MBA, CFE performs fraud examinations and financial investigations through her company, Sequence Inc. Forensic Accounting. The Association of Certified Fraud Examiners honored Tracy as the 2007 winner of the prestigious Hubbard Award and her first book, Essentials of Corporate Fraud, will be on bookshelves in March 2008.