How to justify spending so much money on one day

View Quoted Comment This is exactly where we stand. We are spending a lot & have considered eloping but at the end of the day, we don’t plan on doing this again..this is something we’ll never forget & the start of our new life so it’s already worth it for us!

View Quoted Comment Oh man, that’s a huge guest list! That’s great that your parents are helping you pay. It is a really great opportunity to get everyone together

View Quoted Comment Those are some great suggestions!

View Quoted Comment This is exactly how I feel! Even when our budget was 10k (it has since gone up 🙄) I still felt so *wrong* about spending that much on one day. But you’re so right, it’s better to look at it as spending the $ on a lifetime of memories rather than spending it on “one day”

View Quoted Comment Yeah that’s exactly how I feel. Like it seems wasteful even though I KNOW it is worth it. Those are great ideas!

View Quoted Comment That’s a great way to look at it!

I understand completely! I tend to want to save money in general, so even though we can afford to go all out, I was trying to do some things in the beginning ourselves. FH finally said "Why don't we just hire someone?" and it was like a weight was lifted. We really, really want to enjoy our day and have everything taken care of. That is how I am justifying it. These are memories to last a lifetime. We are worth every penny we are going to spend.

View Quoted Comment You’re so right. I’m glad you are feeling less stressed now that you have some help! It will definitely all be worth it

Find out what you can do within your budget. There is nothing wrong with having a backyard ceremony and reception to save money. Often, people confess that they wish they had a smaller, more intimate wedding. Just because you're getting married doesn't mean you have to spend a lot of money.

Our wedding was worth the expense. Honestly we saved that money once, and we can do it again for something else in the future. We gained awesome financial skills which are super important because a lot of marriages end over money. We made so many fun memories before the wedding with our bridal party, we got closer with our families, which was huge because my husband didn't have much of a relationship with his relatives due to some actions on his mom's part. My Father in law and Sister in Law from France had an excuse to come to America and we got to spend time with them. And then there's just the little things that happened on our special day that were truly special and I'll remember forever. I really couldn't imagine not having the wedding, it brought us closer with so many people and even with each other. We also ended up receiving a little more than half the money we spent on the wedding back in gifts so the wedding truly wasn't a financial setback at all

View Quoted Comment Thank you for sharing!! This really makes me feel better about it

Try to remember that it's not "just" one day, it's one of the best and most memorable days of your life. When you look back on your life in a few decades, what will stand out the most? Probably your wedding day, the births of your children if you have them, maybe a big graduation or job promotion.

For us, this will almost certainly be the only time in our lives that we have this many friends and family members in one place. Our guests are coming from all over (18 states and 2 countries, thanks yesterday's thread!). There are groomsmen and important family members I have never met from his side, same for a few people on my side. Aside from the actual marriage, the thing I'm looking forward to the most is just standing at our reception and looking at all the people who have come to celebrate with us. It's why I wouldn't trade this for anything -- a new car, a down payment, a vacation. All the people who have told us how excited they are for the wedding has already made it worth it.

Look at it this way. Only one time in your life will you have the chance to have every one of your most loved family and friends all in the same room. Yes it is a lot of money, but you will have the memories (and photos) from that day for the rest of your lives.

View Quoted Comment I know, we tried lower budget options but the only way any of those would have worked would have been if we had cut our guest list which we weren’t willing to do since we felt like having all the people we love surrounding us is the most important part of the day.

We actually originally planned a backyard wedding but with the number of people and the unpredictable New Jersey weather, it ended up being way too complicated. Sure you can get a tent for if it rains, but what do you do if it’s 90 degrees and so humid that you feel sticky and it’s hard to breathe? We didn’t want to subject ourselves or our guests to potentially gross weather, and with 100 people, the house is definitely not big enough for everyone to fit inside.

I do feel like we are doing the right thing by having this wedding and by spending the amount that we are... honestly even when we were planning a smaller, simpler wedding and it was about 7k, my logic then was “wait, I’m still spending this much? May as well spend a little more and actually get the day we want.” We CAN afford it, it’s just hard for me to wrap my head around such a huge expense. But I know it will be worth it

View Quoted Comment Yessss this is exactly what I keep telling myself. We’ll never have this opportunity again, and I would definitely regret missing the opportunity more than I’d regret spending the money!

View Quoted Comment This is so true! Thank you for sharing, this made me smile thinking about standing at our reception and seeing everyone that came to celebrate with us too. It’s honestly such a great opportunity to get everyone together, and I feel like that’s the best way to look at it

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You and my FH think alike! lol

He's felt the same way about the expenses, but I had many sit-downs with him to show him a range of budgets and what you get for it, and that helped a lot. I did an awful lot of research and planning for this wedding, and believe me, I wanted to spend as little as possible, too.

When I showed my FH examples and how much they cost, I think he either came to accept that if you want something of quality, sometimes you can't get it cheaply, and that unfortunately, sometimes that's just the way is it. I know that's not a very optimistic way of thinking, but we are both more "realists" than anything.

Plain and simple, he liked the things that costs a little more, so that's how we compromised on pricing.

I struggled a little in the beginning too, but here’s what I’m now telling myself::

You have said this is the wedding you want - with friends there, and I’m guessing you don’t want a Rinky-dink event that is cheap and feels cheap to you at the end of the day. Make peace with it and move on!!! feeling excited about the best party you’lol ever throw. Can’t take it with you.

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Yeah I very much relate to this haha. I definitely feel like months ago when we first started planning and we were planning a "less expensive" wedding, I felt worse about it than I do now. Now we are spending more, but I at least feel like we are getting more for our money. If we're spending this much, I don't want to have any regrets about what we spent it on... and honestly I feel way less wasteful about having a 17k wedding where we feel like we're getting what we want, rather than a 10k wedding where we feel like we had to cut too many things that were important to us.

Like I said I know it will be worth it, but I think it'd be difficult for me to wrap my head around spending even 5k on one day lol. It's hard to get used to how much everything costs and how all the expenses add up... I'm generally very financially practical and it's hard for me to think about spending $500 on flowers without cringing

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Totally. That's a great attitude! Best not to waste time stressing about it if I'm sure that it's what I want (which I am). Thank you!