Northern California Military Wedding with a budget! Help!

I have the same budget, I hand made alot of things for my wedding such as escort cards, place cards, invitations ,centerpieces.. the list goes on. I saved my self hundreds of dollars making everything myself. I cut alot of coupons and waited for sales. I used oriental trading and efavormart to buy alot of things.. good luck

Same budget and we are in the military and are having a firm 10,000 dollar budget in Southern California. I've got the majority of it planned for around 8K. there are a few things we did: made the date for 2014...to give us enough time to comfortably budget, putting away 100$/each/paycheck = 400$/mo in savings. limitted guest count to 120. planned my wedding for morn/afternoon, which can cut costs in half. you can also have it on a week day instead of a weekend, which I wasn't willing to do but it still can cut your prices tremendously. put your name for every wedding contest their is (you can win free wedding stuff), make your own stationary. it can cost hundreds ordering save the date cards, etc.using a free smartphone app, i was able to make my own save the date cards and print all 100 of them for 10$ and send them off. and you can view them in my pics and my profile do some of your own things! i.e floral, music... now i plan on hiring a DJ but you can cut that cost by having

Your own music on a playlistand hooking it up to speakers. i have a beautiful $1000 dollar looking dress for 250$ because i shop online and speaking of which, if you do shop online for ANYTHING...use PROMO CODES!!!! I almost guarantee there are promo codes for almost everything! if you need help, i can help you well, if i think of other tips ill be sure to let you know

Look at Retailmenot.com for some of those promo codes. I bought my wedding gown right after it was discontinued and it went from $1100 to $199. It is beautiful and will only need minor alterations. Don't forget if you are going to DIY your invites, you can buy a lot of the wedding stationary at Michaels. I have the app on my iPhone and there is always a 40% off coupon on it. Finally, take advantage of the military aspect. I am retired/he is active...Check into a reception at the local base club. It's saving us at least half of what caterers are charging and we are using the base chapel for our ceremony. Just need to be organized to get the base access list together to include vendors. Good luck!

Always remember that a wedding is bringing your families and friends together to celebrate your marriage. You do not have to have a wedding on par with what the wedding magazines show you ($20k + weddings). I have delivered flowers to brides with lovely backyard weddings, they had a local restaurant deliver hot trays of food, and they limited the guest list to about 40.

Similarly, I recently planned a holiday party for a company - 75 people, and they were paying for it themselves. They got a very popular winery site in Sacramento for about $750, off-season. I narrowed down caterers to ones that could serve special diet needs (vegan and gluten free), and asked what they could do for $20/person. Every single one of them was able to provide a great bid. Some included beverages; some did not (understandably, because the price was low). We ended up with one that did a GREAT buffet, infused waters and spritzers for beverages, and we potlucked the desserts, and we had two servers. $2250.

You could do that for even less, by choosing a park (one with a building; weather is iffy in May!!!) or community center.

How about Crawford's Barn? http://www.crawfordsbarn.com/

How about Bayley House Barn? Cheap, cheap!! http://www.gdrd.org/Wedding%20photos.pdf

Here is the link to get Bayley House Barn rates:

http://www.gdrd.org/2222/index.html

Capitol Park in downtown Sacramento is gorgeous in May, in the rose garden particularly (also McKinley Park rose garden): http://www.sacramentopress.com/headline/53681/Weddings_at_the_rose_gardens#comment-53788

Or someplace closer to you, but you get the idea.

For catering, you can always check prices on "drop-off" catering, where they deliver trays of food, but you'll need a couple of people to attend to the food - setting up buffet tray holders with liquid Sterno to keep the food hot, if you serve hot food. Or keeping food cold, if you serve cold food.

Choose a pro photographer, but minimal hours - rather than the entire day.

For flowers, I do small weddings all the time, and love them! Find a florist willing to work with you. Most have minimums, so find one that has a low minimum. A lower budget for flowers does NOT mean you have to settle for carnations and daisies. I do lovely weddings all the time with contemporary, up to date styles (although I love carns massed - all those ruffles - and love daisies mixed with other flowers for a rustic wildflower look).

Here's an idea of pricing for flowers, and packages: http://sacramentoweddingflowers.com/blog3/pricing/

Make sure that if you try to contact a vendor, go directly to their website's contact form. If you try to contact them here in a thread or via messaging here, they won't always get the message.

Best wishes! I'm sure you'll have a lovely wedding!