As per natural progression, you get engaged and then you get married.
To get married you have a couple of choices:
Elope – definitely cheaper and easier, sure you don’t get to wear the nice white dress or have the photos… and you don’t get to say vows, have a celebration, share it friends, make a public commitment etc…
Have a wedding – which, like it or not, simple or plain, budget or costly. Takes planning.
So I have ideas, I have contacts, infact I’ve scored it pretty well in who I know. I can strike off the ‘have to scout for’ list:
- Photography because I know James and James is good
- Cars because my of Uncle – a very sweet hook-in!
- Church because the one I go to is fine and fits lots of people
and potentially
- Venue (None of which is finalised)
- Flowers, well there’s this son/florist of family friends that we haven’t seen in a while and those people we know that own a rose farm…
If you have been married before please, please, please, please, please share any money saving tips or creative ideas. Particularly about, dresses, caterers, flowers in January, marquee hire and all that goes with that.
I want things to be interesting/creative. I want things to be both Geoff and Bec’ish. I don’t want it overly showy. I want it to be fun but classy. I want it to be relatively simple. I don’t want to spend more of other people’s money than I have to. As to spending my own, I don’t have any so that’s easy.
While I’m talking weddings… Favors/bombardire or whatever the heck they’re called are stupid, along with garters, card boxes, large floral centrepieces, frumpy cakes, high-heeled shoes, fussy dresses, frills, bows, skank, designer invitations (Do you know how EASY it is to make your own!!!!), $99p/p for nice venues (*cough, a specific venue), tacky, dance floors, DJ’s, the bridal dance, something old/blue/new…., makeup, the goodbye bridal circle.
Here’s to: Geoff and I doing this together, fun colours, beautiful flowers, simplicity, live music, lunchtime receptions, diy invitations, creative tables, fantastic photos, personalised vows, lots of friends, a few ignored traditions, a little vintage, as few strangers (including waiters) as possible, non stressed mothers, looking hot and laughing…
As you might have worked out, weddings are on my brain, along with a headache, sleep and some undone homework.
I haven’t been married before, but I’ve been engaged for a couple of months now and my only tip is to set a date and book your venues early and the rest will just fall into place (at least that’s what I’m hoping 😉 ). As for money-saving it seems to me to be dependent on how much time you have (diy is cheaper but takes longer and involves more stress/conflict), how many appropriately able friends you have (and as you live in the same city as your parents, don’t forget to make use of the endless supply of family friends), and how well you actually count how much things cost. Despite all this, weddings are fun and I’m definitely looking forward to yours 😀
Gillian
Burkie’s link is wrong.
If you elope, Ana and I will kill you!….Bridesmaids can get rather zealous : )
You know I’m around to help in whatever way you and Geoff need, just ask. Deligate to all the people who offer to help out, that’s my suggestion.
And I know you won’t probably take up the offer, but I should have my henna supplies later on in the year and I’m happy to do some henna art if us girls get together and have a bit of a celebration. (The word ‘Hen’s Night’ just about makes me want to vomit… but if you want we will do something nice and classy to celebrate you getting married!)
Hey Becca,
heres my tip. I managed to score my bridesmaids dresses from Jeans West, I’ve always loved the store because we’re talking good quality, for not a huge price. I never would have expected to pick them up from there, I actually originally bought the dress for myself and had it hanging on a coathanger from the cupboard. I was laying on my bed thinking about wedding stuff, vagualy looking at it when Tim says “If you bought a whole heap of those they’d actually make really nice Bridesmaids dresses, they’re a heck nicer than some of the ones you’ve seen” I don’t know why it hadn’t clicked but it suddenly did. So I definitely am a part of the Jeans West cheer squad [not sure whats in there now though] they were originally 60 a pop, we picked them up under a “buy 2, get the 3rd free” deal. So my big tip would be, if your not going the whole formal bridesmaids shebang, then opting for cocktail dresses instead definitely worked out cheaper for me. There are alot of options out there, and big tip, don’t sell a store short. You’ll be surprised what a lot of the well known brands can actually offer you if you take the time to squiz and consider the one look x2 or 3 or however many bridemaids your having [when the same simple dress is lined up a few times it definitely ups the cute factor.
Other tip; if your artsy or know artsy people then enlist them. My gorgeous sister/maid of honour has made all the jewelry for myself and the bridesmaids, it looks beautiful and cost, in total about $50 for everything. Also my bridesmaids are wearing peacock feather hairpieces, which using feathers, gold wire and a hot glue gun, I’ve been able to make myself. They look good, in fact I think they look gorgeous [truth is theres no way I’d include them if I thought they looked tacky]
You’ve got so many sisters and family Bec, surely some of them have to have arty tendencies, in fact as much as you’ll try to deny it, you’ve got style and artsie flair, embrace it and fiddle around with some different things…whats the worst that can happen? it doesn’t work out and you have to try something else…well thats entirely handleable [is that even a word?!!]
Have fun Bec and don’t stress, enjoy everything your doing, be flexible and you won’t find yourself stressed…
Have a blast Beccy
Jess xoxo
P.s. I just thought of something else. Tim and I wanted something more casual too. Our reception offered full courses under the $?/person. We didn’t want people to feel restricted to whatever was being served and food being wasted, not to mention the stresses of fussy eaters and so on. We chatted with our reception manager and were able to create a buffet option instead. Complete with roast lamb, beef, chicken, vegies, hot and cold salads and bread roles for $25/person [which worked out $40/person cheaper than anything else they were offering] while also adding to a more casual sort of vibe as people wander up and get their food themselves [though the restaurant did throw in the chef and waitresses free to dish up the hots, leaving the guests to get their own salads]
Oh and ask for jugs of water on the tables. they should give this to you free and that will offer more options to drink without adding to the costs one cent!! [As I’m sure you can appreciate when planning a wedding, anything free is as good as gold]
Oh other Tip. We’re starting our reception with fingerfood, which we’re buying in platters. works out a tonne cheaper than buying fingerfood from the reception itself.
Oh and one more tip for the road [I’m giving you tip overload here, but check out independant cake decorators. I managed to find mine because she had a sign out the front of her house, she works from home, not with a bakery or company. They’ll always have piccies and costs to check out, plus they tend to be more willing to design the cake to suit you. Tim and I ended up choosing different elements of about 4 of her designs and asking her to use them to create our cake, and even after that and with the personalised mini-us on the top came in less than $400 of any other options we looked at. Her work is beautiful too!!
Squiz the yellow pages for independent cake decorators and pop round and take a squiz. You may be very surprised!
anywhoo thats my $12 and a half!!!
I just hope that I helped. I definitely have more tips if your interested, but I’ll spare you for now. Let me know if you want more. In fact, I offered the same to Burks, but I can pop you a copy of our budgeting costs, I’ve included on there anything we were able to cut costs with and even get free. But let me know if you want that. Infact, even better, we should organise coffee at some point and you can utterly pick my brain and I’ll share whatever I can! It would be cool to catch up with you Becs