How I Had My Dream Wedding for Under $5,000!
For those of you who have followed my blog for a while, you know that I have been wed before. I had the big wedding with a ton of family, the white dress, the whole nine yards when it came to traditional. And to be brutally honest with you, I hated it. The only memorable thing about that wedding was how ungodly hot it was that day, and how delicious my cake was. That’s about it. The entire event was so far off from what I wanted my big day to be, and I spent way more that I had intended to. The goal was to stay between $10,000 and $15,000; We went well over $20K!!! Everything added up so quickly it was insane!
So when the time was right and I found my “Mr.Right,” I knew I wanted to do our wedding very differently. The first month we were engaged we had started planning on having the traditional wedding, but as we got into the nitty-gritty of planning, the dollar signs kept going up. The thought of going into debt because of our wedding was not a debt we wanted to take on. A conversation about starting our family came about, and instead of spending $10k on a wedding, we’d rather spend that money on starting our family (which happened much faster than we expected!).
To give you the rundown, we had a small, intimate wedding with our immediate family and a few close friends at the family bar. I had the dress I wanted, the photographer I wanted, and the people I cared about most at my wedding.
It was perfect.
I’ll break this into sections, and how we saved money in each one.
1.) The Venue
I know that not everyone’s family owns a restaurant or a bar, so get creative! Backyard weddings are on the trend, and it will save you SO much money. On the average, Wedding Venues can cost $5,000 and upwards depending on the package and what’s included. Already we have gone over our budget and we haven’t even gotten to the good stuff! I feel very fortunate that we were able to have our wedding at the family bar. There was a back room that could be closed off, and had just enough room for the people we wanted to share that special day with.
2) The Invitations
This is another part of weddings that can add up so quickly! Professionally made invitations can cost between $400 and $600! I had hand-made my invitations before, and I was more than happy to go that route again. This time, however, we didn’t do anything fancy, but put together some clip art, a photo from our Engagement session and the date and time. It was printed on basic printing paper, but to us it served it’s purpose. Again, we had 21 people at our wedding, so fancy invitations were not necessary.
3.) The Flowers
I can tell you from prior experience that I wasted thousands of dollars on flowers (video here). I would say this part of a wedding is so overrated and expensive as hell, especially for a bouquet you only get to enjoy once. I built my bouquet with fake flowers from Joann Fabrics, and I LOVED it! It only cost me $50, it was the exact shape and color I wanted it to be, and it matched my dress perfectly (I’ll get to the dress next!) I also get to keep this bouquet for the rest of my life. So much cheaper than real flowers, and so much more worth the effort I put in to make it mine.
4.) The Dress
The dress you wear on your wedding day is so important and so special for each and every bride. And every bride has a completely different idea on what they want to look like on their wedding day. I had done the semi-traditional white wedding dress before, and honestly, white washes me out bad. Couple that with our intimate style wedding, I decided that the white needed to go. I had gone to the traditional stores to find a different colored dress, but ultimately I wound up at a local dress shop in my city. This offered me so many other options than I could have thought of. I first went by myself, so I could really hone in on what I wanted to look like on my big day. While picking out dresses, I spotted a black floral a-line ball gown. The floral caught my eye, and I decided to try it on. It was the dress. Who would have thought that I would walk down the isle in a black wedding dress?? And it also only cost me $300! WAY better than spending thousands of dollars on a white dress I can only wear once. I can say without a doubt, I have never felt more beautiful that I did wearing that black dress on my wedding day.
I think out of everything, we spent under $3,000 on our wedding. There were a number of things that were gifted to us like my husband’s suit, the food, the decorations. Our family chipped in and we are so grateful they where in a position to do that for us.
I hope this gives you some ideas on where you can budget and save money when it comes to planning your wedding! Don’t settle for anything, and don’t be afraid to stand your ground on what you want.
This is all for now!
Tootles,
~ Izzy