This is W’s Grandma’s – Where we are having our wedding.
Hey everyone! Happy Friday. I’m out enjoying #FinCon13 and it’s a lot of fun. If you are here and want to meet, just send me a quick tweet 🙂
It has been awhile since my last Friday Question post. The last one was What’s Stopping You From Living Your Dream? Today’s question is wedding related.
This year must be the year of personal finance blog weddings and proposals, because there are so many of us! It’s an exciting time. I love all of the wedding posts that I’ve been seeing, and it’s interesting to see everyone’s different ideas.
Since I am a personal finance blogger, the topic of a wedding budget comes up a lot. At times I think about eloping, but then the next day I think about how much I want a really huge wedding. It probably drives W crazy that I am always changing my mind!
In January of this year, I published our wedding budget. I stated that I didn’t want to spend more than $20,000 and that it was very possible even though we will have over 250 guests.
I have already paid for my wedding dress, which was a little over $1,600. It arrived a couple of weeks ago and it definitely made me excited about the wedding. We also paid for half of our photographer’s fee, which is less than $2,000 (we got her at a STEAL and managed to book her before she became probably the most popular photographer in the STL area).
I think that we will be spending around $10,000 more for our wedding, so I definitely think that we will be able to come in under $20,000. I’m thinking about $3,000 for a tent and other rentals, $4,000 for food and alcohol (luckily we get to choose our own caterers and save money since we have our own venue), and then a bunch of extras that most likely won’t cost more than $3,000.
We plan on doing a lot of things ourselves, and thankfully we have been given some things for free (such as our venue, Save the Dates and invitations).
Related post: Jordann spent $4,500 on her wedding.
How much was your wedding? What do you regret spending money on?
Would you go back and elope? Or if you eloped, would you go back and have a big wedding?
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moneystepper says
We are about to start planning our wedding soon and will be looking at a very similar budget to you. Looking forward to reading more about what you do and any ideas from other readers!
Michelle says
Thanks! Have fun planning yours 🙂
Kasey @ Debt Perception says
My husband and I eloped. We spent about $65, including the dress my mom bought me on clearance. I never wanted a big wedding. I always imagined I’d skip the ceremony and just do a reception to celebrate but since my husband and I don’t like being the center of attention, I wouldn’t go back and have a big wedding.
Michelle says
That is awesome!
Tasmanian Minimalist says
We spent $300 for our celebrant, my dress was one out of my wardrobe, we had a cheap all you can eat buffet, everyone paid for self, husband wore clothes he already had, no honeymoon, rings cost$300 for both and no engagement ring. My perfect wedding,
Michelle says
Wow that is awesome!
dojo says
We didn’t have a wedding per se, we did the civil ceremony (or how it’s called in your country) and then got 25 of our closest friends/relatives to a nearby restaurant. It all cost us 700 bucks (and we actually got 400 back from some of our guests, even if it’s not customary for them to pay for anything. Anyway, they did want us to not ‘spend’ this much, so the money was put to good use). Our wedding bands cost us 70 bucks (the work, we did give them 2 old rings we had in the house and no one used them). That was all 🙂
Michelle says
Great job!
Laura says
our wedding in March 2010 came in around 8,500. we scored big time as our reception venue was a new start up so we got it for a steal. the one thing we didn’t skimp on was photography since those photos last a lifetime. we lucked up having our photographer’s mother cater (she had semi-retired from catering) so her pricing was reasonable. we also had a mid-afternoon wedding so a full meal wasn’t expected. we had a buffet of ham, rolls, fruit, veggies and dip, and 5 or 6 different hot appetizers. my dress was found at david’s bridal and happened to be on sale for $400. i splurged on my veil because i felt like it was my one wedding of my life, i should have what i really loved – it was $200 and so worth it. i got so many comments and still love it to this day. our wedding planner was a friend who had recently started her business so she did my wedding for free as long as i provided photos for her website showing the details of the day. and the church for the ceremony was free. we tried to save where we could but also went in to it knowing (hoping) this is going to be the one and only wedding so let’s choose things that we really love.
we were lucky as we didn’t have to pay for the wedding. my grandparents bought my sister and i each a $10,000 savings bond when we were born to use for our wedding – it was a little over $10,000 when we cashed it so we knew that was our budget whether we liked it or not – we didn’t want to go in debt for our big day!
Michelle says
Wow that is so nice what your grandparent’s did for you!
FI Pilgrim says
Ours was pretty frugal, considering we paid around $3,000 total and had around 300 guests in a beautiful church. We have musicians on both sides of the family, a friend who was an amateur photographer at the time (but runs her own business now), and we had TONS of family and friends who contributed fancy desserts for our dessert reception. It was a beautiful day and we didn’t feel like we missed out on anything.
Michelle says
That is great!
Brian says
We spent $13k and most of that was on food/venue for 275ish people. My father in law had offered me $8K to elope I said sure and then he changed his mind.
I don’t think I would change anything. In fact our wedding got really fun once the band started playing and random people started to come in to listen to them since the venue we chose only had one women’s restroom and it was located in the hall we rented. The major plus for us was some free drinks the next couple times we went and saw the band play again since they were able to score some gigs at that venue because the manager heard them during our wedding!
Michelle says
Wow that is great!
Morgaine says
We spent about $12K on our wedding for 70 people. I did a lot myself (invites, bouquets, centrepieces, etc) but our venue with food and alcohol came to $7500 which was a huge bulk of the cost. However, it was a great time, we still get compliments on the venue, food, and band. We saved up for over 2 years and paid for everything entirely in cash so I don’t regret anything. Good luck with your wedding planning Michelle! 🙂
Michelle says
Thanks!
Danielle @ The-Lifestyle-Project says
Hey Michelle! That sounds like an ambitious budget but what a good deal finding a photographer you love for that price! W’s Grandma’s yard looks like such a pretty space too. I can just imagine twinkle lights strung up around the trees to add to the atmosphere. Our wedding for 100 ppl cost $20k and I don’t regret spending money on anything. The area that you live in drastically affects how much things cost, and life in metropolitan Canada is unfortunately quite expensive, so I think I did the best with what I could. A few months ago I wrote this post, 10 Things I Learned From Planning My Wedding — check it out if you have a couple of minutes and hopefully it helps with your planning experience! http://bit.ly/15W0v31
Michelle says
Thank you Danielle! And yes, his grandma’s is beautiful and definitely one of the most beautiful places that I have ever been to.
Ashlee says
I’m going to guesstimate that we spent between $2000-$2500 on our wedding in August. I really need to sit down and write it all down and maybe make a post about that. Thanks for the idea, Michelle!!
Right now I can’t think of anything that I would change from our special day. It was definitely “us”!
Fincon sounds like a fun time!! 🙂
Michelle says
Yes, make a post!
Emily @ evolvingPF says
I think we spent around $30k – it’s upsetting that I don’t even know exactly! Our wedding was not upscale or anything so it’s a bit surprising the expenditures got so high, but we did have 2 receptions for about 250 people total.
Michelle says
Wow! Did you two pay for it?
Annie says
We are in debt largely due to our wedding. We were naive at the time and in well-paying jobs. We thought we could handle the amount. The debt coupled with job loss/change led to us having difficulty buying a house. But we made sacrifices and finally have our own home. I wouldn’t change a thing about our wedding (except maybe hire a different photographer); the memories sure make it less painful when I go to pay the bills!
Michelle says
Glad that your story has a good ending 🙂
Jaclyn says
We spent around 18k and in addition my mom helped cover around $2500 and my dad covered $500. My father in law covered about $1100 for the rehearsal dinner. Fortunately we CASH FLOWED the whole wedding so we didn’t take on any debt. My biggest regret about the wedding is the damn photographers we chose. They ended up being more talk than they were action and they cause the whole wedding reception to run behind by like an hour and a half. I was mortified!
Michelle says
Wow that sounds horrible about the photographer!
Danielle says
I’m going through the exact same thing with the idea of a “real” wedding and eloping! My fiance fortunately has money saved for a down payment on a house and I’m using my savings for the wedding, so I don’t feel as guilty spending a lot on a wedding, but on principle alone I don’t want to spend more than $100 a head (for everything). Living in southern California it’s almost impossible to do a wedding on a budget, but I’m on a mission to make it happen around $10k (which realistically means $12k-15k) for about 150 guests. I feel like based on our guest counts, our goals are pretty similar! Best of luck to you, if anyone can pull it off I know you can! 😀
Michelle says
Good luck to you Danielle! 🙂
getrichwithme says
We spent £4k (about $6500) on our wedding – and £6k ($10,000) on our honeymoon.
I fed them, water and wined them, got them a DJ, transport – and we spent the rest on an amazing holiday 8 week holiday in India.
My advice is don’t go blowing your budget on people who only come to your wedding because they feel as though they have to. Keep the money and run.
Michelle says
Wow that is an awesome budget!
Nick (@ayoungpro) says
Our actual wedding was pretty cheap. We spend ~$1,500 on the wedding. The honeymoon was more expensive though at ~$2,500.
Michelle says
That’s really good!
Carrie says
Our parents spent about $25,000. $20,000 came from my parents who offered it up because they saved for my college and I ended up getting scholarships and paid for many of my college expenses by working (my siblings did not). My husband’s parents gave the other $5,000 to cover rehearsal dinner and other things. We were very fortunate that our parents had set aside this money for us without us knowing. We got married in our 30s, so we really didn’t expect it. Fortunately, this covered everything. We both had good jobs and I already owned a home, so we didn’t think too much about spending the money at that time. It was a church wedding with a reception at a historic hotel for almost 300 people. We had a blast! This was all before we starting having goals to retire early, but I don’t regret it.
Michelle says
Wow that is so awesome!
Paige says
We are just in the beginning stages of planning, we decided we don’t want to break the bank, we refuse to do anything on credit, so it’s completely become a team effort. My semi-retired parents have volunteered about $5000 for about 100 guests. Everything else is on FI and I, so my hope is to keep costs around $7,000. FI and his fam are not particularly religious and all of his family are from out of state, so we decided that a destination beach wedding will be the best fit for us. We’ve booked a great spot along the Texas coast that has a wall-to-wall windowed covered pavilion for reception and we can get married right on the beach and then have the view for our reception. Total cost for the entire day is $600. That alone was a big savings compared to the $3000+ venue price tag we were seeing here in Houston. My two best friends are artists who have volunteered to DIY decor and my brother’s friend is a preacher who is marrying us at no cost., so the biggest chunk of money is going to food and a DJ.
We had already booked/paid for most of a trip to Costa Rica for next year and just decided to change the date of that from spring to fall and will consider that our honeymoon 🙂
Michelle says
Costa Rica sounds amazing!
C. the Romanian says
Our wedding costs were around $6,000 but we had a pretty small wedding, with just 50 of our closest friends and family invited. It was a great party and everybody loved it, and that is all that matters, in the end.
Michelle says
That’s awesome! We have tons of close family members and friends, and that’s all we are inviting, but our number is still over 200. haha
Mrs. 1500 says
We got married later than many of our friends. After listening to every single bride say she wished she eloped, that she didn’t enjoy the day at all, that it rushed past in a blur, we decided to do it small. We got married 2 hours away from our house. We invited 15 people, immediate family and 1 friend each. We paid for all the hotel rooms, dinner that night, my dress, his tux rental, the cake, flowers and our honeymoon to Hawaii. We spent less than $5,000 for all of it.
We held a party for all our friends and family that summer (we got married in January in Wisconsin) and probably spent another $500.
I would recommend this to anyone. I spent my wedding day with the people who are most important to me, with little stress.
Michelle says
Sounds wonderful! We have so many people that we are close to, so it would be very hard to have a small wedding. That’s what makes it so difficult!
Shannon @Financially Blonde says
It’s funny that you posted about weddings today because today is my 10 year wedding anniversary. Between the wedding, bridesmaid’s luncheon, post wedding brunch and honeymoon, we spent a total of $50,000 for 200 people. The thing I regret the most was paying hourly for drinks. I assumed that all of my guests would be drinking and drinking a lot so paying by the hour vs per drink sounded like a good strategy. However, we had a great DJ and everyone ended up dancing most of the night and not drinking. I think I could have saved $5,000+ if I had chosen a different drink package.
Michelle says
Congrats on 10 years! And wow your wedding must have been awesome at $50,000 🙂
Kali @ CommonSenseMillennial says
I definitely understand the urge to elope! I was the same way – every other day I was thinking, “you know what? Screw this, let’s just go to the courthouse and get this thing done!” Of course, I am glad I didn’t (even though it would have saved a whole lot). We spent about $15,000 on ours, but both sets of parents helped out financially, because both sets of parents wanted certain things to be a part of the big day! My mom wanted a real venue for the wedding (as opposed to having it on her and my dad’s property) and my husband’s parents wanted to invite a lot of people. Still, I think we spent too much and could have been smarter about finding ways to spend less. I wish I had looked harder for my dress to find a cheaper option, and we should have done a better job in picking a photographer. But all in all, it was a wonderful day and I wouldn’t change a thing about the wedding itself 🙂
From that picture it looks like your wedding is going to have a gorgeous setting! Not to mention, you’re doing awesome on your budget. Hope you’re having a blast at FinCon!
Michelle says
Thank you Kali!
Tanya says
Including the honeymoon we spent 3,000. Most of my family made all the food. My grandmother made my cake and my grandfather did the ceramony. We had to buy plane tickets to North Caralina for our honeymoon but stayed for free at my husbands aunts beach house.
Michelle says
Wow sounds like you did really good.
CeCe @Pink Sunshine says
75 guest, $11,200 total (not including wardrobe & our inexpensive invitations. His tux was free and my dress was $600 or so AFTER alterations). No regrets because we stayed close to our 10k budget. I loved planning it and it was the happiest, funnest, most wonderful day of my life. Thank goodness I didn’t miss out on that. I’m so glad we didn’t take the “cheaper” way out. I had the wedding of my dreams but very inexpensively.
Michelle says
So good to hear! I definitely want a big wedding, I just need to stop whining about it.
Roc Away Debt says
DH and I spent just under $8,700 for EVERYTHING. I kept track of everything little thing right down to the thank you cards and the postage for the invites. We had a fairly traditional wedding for 90 people. The venue was a steal – this included open bar for the entire night (we paid per drink not by the hour which saved A TON of money).
My dress was $350 on super sale at David’s Bridal. I did my own nails/make up. I splurged on fake hair extensions (they were pricey) but I have the most baby fine hair in the world so to have my hair look great was worth it. We saved a lot of money because DH works in the arts industry and knew a lot of people… We got crazy deals on our letterpress invitations and photography.
Sometimes I think if we didn’t have the wedding then we would be further ahead with our debt repayment since DH and I paid for 90% of it. But then I think back and it was worth it. I’ve never felt more loved then I did on my wedding day. We didn’t take out loans or touch our savings to pay for it – I think that was a good compromise. Our goals got put on hold for awhile but now we are back in full debt repayment mode!
Michelle says
I love good wedding budget stories like this. Sounds great 🙂
krantcents says
Since I did not pay for it, I can only estimate it was less than $5,000 (1968). It was at a country club in New York for 150 guests.
Michelle says
Haha awesome 🙂
Latoya @ Sisters' With Bank says
Our wedding and honeymoon all came in under $8,000. We were very grateful that my deceased father in law was an army vet so we were able to get a very awesome deal on our venue and catering for 200 guest all for $1600. I think this definitely help us keep things under budget. Our second largest expense was the photographer. The only thing I regret is going with the photographer that we did because I didn’t feel like the final product was worth it and we spent so much money on him that we skimped on video and had someone to video it for us that we knew. Every time we watch our wedding video we cringe. I would definitely want to do that one over:)
Michelle says
We are thinking about paying for video. I ned to look into that!
Chris @ Stumble Forward says
My wife and I spent around $10,000 for our wedding when it was all said and done and that was on top of a 650 person invite list. I never thought a weddings could cost so much but even the flower for our wedding were a $1000 alone. Luckily out parents helped out with a lot of the cost and planning.
Michelle says
Wow you had 650 people at your wedding!?
Tara @ Streets Ahead Living says
I think ours was about $13,000 with everything.
I wish we could have done a backyard wedding but no backyard was near! I do recommend if you go that route to have plenty of lights when it gets dark, especially if you have tables under tents. Also, if you are using port-a-potties to avoid people trampling inside the house to go to the bathr0om, don’t forget lights inside those as well! I was at a wedding where we had to use a port-a-potty in the dark which was a bit unsettling. They were super clean of course but still weird.
Michelle says
I love outdoor weddings! It’s not really a backyard wedding that we are having, but they are both great 🙂
Carla says
Cost didn’t come into play until afterwards and then we decided to just have the wedding on a Monday so it would be less expensive. Don’t let a small budget or fear of being too frilly deter your retreat. Every woman needs some indulgence to balance her life. Begin self nourishment and a sense of personal luxury with these easy tips: Define what turns you on your personal space.
Michelle says
Thanks Carla!
Chris & Angela Tieland to Thailand says
We actually spent around 15K on our wedding.
We had hoped to come in around 10K, but some things you just forget to include in the initial stages of planning. We had about 60 guests, and to save money on the venue we booked a small historic mill in Fairfax, VA.
We should mention that during this time we were paying off all of our debt and selling everything with the intention of quitting our corporate day jobs to move to Chiang Mai, Thailand. With that said our wedding also served as sort of a going away. Our $5,000 honeymoon to Thailand was paid for through contributions through honeyfund (site were fam and friends can pay for portions of your trip) as we did not need any physical gifts.
Our wedding expenses breakdown is below.
Cake: $350
Hotel: $800
Dress: $1,200
Photos: $1,300
DJ: $1,720
DIY: $2,000
Venue: $2,100
Catering: $5,500
Alcohol : Bride’s Parents
TOTAL: $14,970
Great topic, Michelle!
Best of luck,
Chris & Angela
Michelle says
Thank you! Thanks for sharing your budget also. I love hearing about wedding budgets.
KK @ Student Debt Survivor says
I’m not married, so we haven’t done the wedding yet. When we do I’d want to keep the cost as low as possible. Food and drink are really the most important part of the event for us (well aside from the whole getting committed to each other part ;-)) We love to eat and drink so wouldn’t want to skimp in those areas. The rest isn’t really as important to us.
Michelle says
Yes, same here! I definitely want good food and drinks.
Jon Haver @ PayMyStudentLoans.com says
My wedding cost almost $2K. It was a small get together with our close relatives and friends. One thing I regret is that not hiring a good photographer. I wish my wedding photos were more artistic.
Michelle says
Yes, I am so happy that we found an awesome photographer.
eemusings says
Ours was $5k. Nothing I regret spending on and nothing I regret not spending on. In hindsight I should have reminded everyone it was BYO closer to the day, because I think a few of them forgot (though it was on our wedding website).
Michelle says
$5K sounds great 🙂
femmefrugality says
My first wedding was between $3-4k. The celebration itself was actually pretty beautiful. Outdoors. 150ish people. Probably the biggest thing we spent money on was the tent, but it was only like $600. And we had a lot of people contribute services for almost nothing. This time around I think the pricetag is going to be about the same, maybe closer to $2.5 k. But it’s going to be a lot smaller. The biggest difference will be the food….cooked by a restaurant and not volunteers. And I’m actually buying a dress this time and not just taking a hand-me-down.
Michelle says
Sounds great!
Betsy @ ConsumerFu says
Well…I wasn’t in control of my wedding. My mother planned and paid for the wedding she had always wanted and couldn’t afford. My parents are wealthy….I’m not. I designed my dress and it was custom made. The dress alone was $9k. There were 400 people at the reception….not sure what it cost, but I’d say low end estimate around $24k for food alone. Then there’s the band, limo, flowers, cake, etc. etc. etc.
We would have been happy with close friends and family gathered at mom and dad’s in the back garden then served burgers and dogs afterward. We live a pretty simple lifestyle…been married 21 years, but it has nothing to do with a big fancy wedding.
Michelle says
Wow that sounds crazy! But so nice. I see no problem with spending money on a wedding if you can afford it 🙂
Stefanie @ The Broke and Beautiful Life says
What a stunning location for a wedding. I love the idea of being married outdoors, but the risk of bad weather stresses me out. Will you have a rain date?
Michelle says
Yes, the bad weather definitely scares me! We will have a tent just in case, but if it rains really hard then we would just be screwed. It definitely makes it scared to think about!
Michelle says
That is so nice of them to pay. We don’t have anyone paying for ours, so we definitely need to find ways to save.
SuburbanFinance says
I haven’t tied the knot yet, but our wedding will be under $10,000 hopefully.
Michelle says
Good luck! 🙂
Glen @ Monster Piggy Bank says
Shame fincon is so far away. I would love to make it one day 🙁
Our wedding cost us around 20K for 100 guests. It was more expensive than I wanted, but then again, I only want to get married once.
Michelle says
You should definitely try to come one day!
DC @ Young Adult Money says
I can’t believe I just had a four day weekend at home and I didn’t see your Friday post until now! But we spent about the same as you and there was little we would change besides maybe invite a few people who we look back now two years later and think “man, I wish we would have invited them. It’s weird to think they weren’t at our wedding.” Besides that, no regrets! It truly was the best day of my life.
Michelle says
So good to hear DC!
Holly@ClubThrifty says
Our wedding was fairly cheap….maybe $2500. That was eight years ago. We basically eloped and had two receptions. I just wanted to get it over with!
Michelle says
$2500 is awesome!
Deacon Hayes says
I want to say that our wedding was about $10k, however, we didn’t pay for it, my wife’s parents did. That was a huge blessing.
Michelle says
That is definitely a blessing.
Kelly says
We just got married a little over a month ago. We had 260 guests and spent close to $30,000 including our honeymoon to Aruba. We had a formal plated dinner that ate up the majority of our budget. The food alone was close to $12,000. I don’t have any regrets. We are lucky to both have good jobs, we already have a house, we did have some help from our parents, but everything is paid for and we haven’t touched any of our wedding money.
Michelle says
Sounds awesome. How was Aruba? 🙂
Hayley @ A Disease Called Debt says
Love the pic of W’s Grandma’s garden! Stunning! We spent around £10K on our wedding which was lower than the average. We did a lot ourselves and our main costs were the venue, catering, photos and dress!
Michelle says
Thank you!
Michelle says
We would love to have a small wedding, but we have so many people who we are close to, so it would defeat the purpose anyways haha. We have 20 groomsmen and bridesmaids alone.
Michelle's Finance Journal says
We spend just under 20k for 100 people. Little things that I regret didn’t cost much. So no, I’m happy with my wedding over all. We had a few thousand in cash to start the planning process, a few thousand in credit card that we paid off as soon we got married. The bulk of the wedding cost was covered by our 401k loan we took out that we paid off about a month ago. yippy~
Michelle says
Awesome Michelle!
Whitney @ EHFAR says
Our wedding was about $10,000 (not including our honeymoon). Our most expensive purchase was the photographer at around $2500 to $3000. I definitely wasn’t going to skimp on that. The venue was around the cheapest at $500-800. It was mansion in the historic district. One of the most expensive purchases besides the photographer were the chair and linen rentals. We had 100 chairs outside where the ceremony was and additional chairs in the garden for the cocktail hour and 100 chairs inside for the reception. The full stocked bar and food wasn’t that expensive. The food was catered by one our local restaurants and was only around $1000, and same goes for the bar. We didn’t have a cake, but instead had cupcakes. My dress was probably the cheapest purchase of the whole thing, besides the cake.
Michelle says
Sounds like you guys did great!
Brock @CleverDude says
My wife and I spent about $10K on our wedding for about 180 guests, but that was in 1996. I’m just a little older than you 🙂 Price adjusted for time, that’s equal to just under $15K in today’s money.
Michelle says
That sounds great, especially for how many people you had.
Clarrise @ Make Money Your Way says
We had a civil wedding but after that in the same day we also had a garden wedding. We had two kinds of weddings in just one day. hahah! It’s not a big wedding but the memory was unforgettable.
Michelle says
Sounds awesome Clarrise!
Andrew@LivingRichCheaply says
I’m in NYC…we spent about $20,000 on a wedding of about 230 people. We had a package deal for photos/videography which included my tux (and my groomsmen) and my wife’s gown. She thought about buying her own, but then opted for the one included in the package (I’m happy about that!). The package was about $4000 or so. The DJ was about $1500. We had some flowers but no centerpiece so that was minimal. The most expensive part was the restaurant. I think we did pretty well on price. When my wife goes to weddings now, she sometimes regrets not have more things (like a photo booth!) I’m glad we’re married already…it was stressful planning it!
Michelle says
Sounds awesome! I think you guys did great.
Tanea says
I’m actually planning my wedding right now. I think we’re going to try to stick to under $2,000, since we plan on having less than 50 people there. There’s a really popular place in Dallas where I’d like to get married, but we’d have to push our date out pretty far to book it. Right now it looks like we will be doing that, which gives us more time to save! If everything goes according to plan, the whole thing should be stress-free.
Jack @ Enwealthen says
I’m not even going to say what we spent on the wedding, as in my book, it’s all too much.
However, I will say that the most important part of it was setting the realistic budget. Once we set it, we were very good at fulfilling our roles – her to drive it higher, and me to rein her in. 🙂
Of course since we already had had the money talk, we knew we were on the same page, so understanding the tradeoffs of thousands of dollars today being hundreds of thousands of dollars come retirement, made the budget wrangling less stressful than you’d think.
Caryl Anne says
Great post! Money well spent isn’t a waste of a money, especially on a moment in your life that will never happen again. Thanks for sharing!
Amanda says
Our wedding was less than $2,000. We had to pay for most of it ourselves, and at the same time, we were planning a big move to a different state.
Breakdown:
– $75 for my dress
– $25 for jewelry
– My shoes ended up getting lost in the mail, so I had to scramble to buy shoes ($10) the night before!
– My husband wore clothing he already had
– My grandma did my hair
– $50 for daises for bouquets
– $10 for flowers for boutineers
– $500 for gifts for wedding party and “reception” (for our reception, we went to a nearby Clippers game and then bar hopping in the arena district of the city we were in)
– Our location was free, as we had a really quick ceremony in our favorite park
– Reception was a breakfast buffet in our favorite little cafe for around $500
– Minister was around $300
– A sister-in-law did the photography as a gift
– A family member videotaped our wedding
– Nature provided us with decorations, and we thought the little cafe was cute as it was
I hate being the center of attention, so having a small, simple wedding was totally my style! 🙂