Small budget wedding tips and advice

Oh! And for some beautiful centerpieces-Dollar Tree and youtube work wonders! Youtube dollar tree centerpieces asap!

First of all I will say one of my wedding wire quotes "Don't let anyone steal your wedding joy ". Even though your FiL/Wedding planner may have came off wrong. She has some valid points. I don't think you should have your reception where you are going to be responsible for the decor, set up and break down of a room. Because you might have many people on board now. Oh we will help you with this /that but when your wedding day approaches than it will be a different story. You should be as stress free as possible on your wedding date. Especially the fact you will have a baby under 1 yrs old. If you lock in a community room at a good price. Than maybe you can hire a decorator.(making payments until the wedding.) DYI wedding decor can be a great budget saver. But it is not realistic with a new born. Same with the food I suggest catering start having food tastings and put a deposit down. And many vendors (dj/ photographer etc) are willing to do payment plans. And dollar tree and Amazon are great places to use for a wedding budget. Only you and your FH can plan how your wedding should be.

I would thank them for the gesture but drop her like a hot potato.

From the sounds of it, if you accept her help you will have a wedding extremely out of budget and probably not even your taste. This is very special day and you should make sure it is what will make you and your FH happy!

I set a budget and I have been staying under it - there are some sacrifices you have to make along the way but some great alternatives.

My wedding is just under $6000 (which includes our honeymoon for about $1000 of that). I'm in the midwest but I think I could have cut down on a few more things if I had more time. Our engagement was only 5 months and there was lots of life happening in that time so I couldn't work on diy's as much as I would have liked. We are getting married at a shelter house by a lake that is an old stone one that is beautiful so we don't have to spend as much on decorations. Our guest list is about 50 and we are doing a reception for everyone else at a later date (asked for potluck instead of gifts for that). The other reception is included in our budget also. I am doing my own flowers and just using Baby's Breath. If you search Pinterest, there are a ton of beautiful ideas on there for decorations. A friend of mine will be grilling up burgers for food and I have friends doing my hair and makeup. We found that doing a small 6" cutting cake and cupcakes made the cake cost less and we are doing our own music on Spotify and just borrowing a good speaker from a friend. As far as our wedding party, we are just having my dad walk me down the aisle and my son along with my fh's son and daughter in the wedding. I love that it will be a smaller, intimate wedding but that we can celebrate with everyone later still also.

View Quoted Comment Can I ask where you had the ceremony and reception? My budget is around $10k too

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Yes of course! My ceremony and reception is at the Wyman center in Eureka, Mo. It is a rustic chic look. It took a looooot of researching to find it though, so don't give up! Feel free to message me with any other questions too.

A microwedding will save you big bucks. I’m having a microwedding and I think in total we spent 7000 (including our honeymoon). It’s definitely doable. I bought lots of decor from dollar tree (vases), Amazon (candles and things), etsy for bridal accessories, and afloral/hobby lobby for flowers. Hope that helps!

Keep your guest list down! You can still have a beautiful wedding within in your budget. Look into Firehalls, VFW'S and American Legion's to have your reception. A lot of them will either supply your food or alcohol or allow you to bring in your own food and Alcohol. And you get t decorate the hall to your liking.

I think you need to listen to your gut. if you know that you can plan the wedding comfortably in your budget you should tell them that and ask if they can help you plan but not totally be in charge of everything. ultimately its about you and your hubby to be so you guys just need to talk about which aspect(s) of the big day are most important to you and put most of your money there and then figure it out from there. don't let it stress you out because planning should be fun and not as stressful as other people help make it to be. good luck!

Do you have any art galleries around? My FBIL was able to book an art gallery for his wedding and because they usually don’t host weddings and it was off season for them. He got 50% off! His total wedding budget was $8000 and they went over by 500 in the end, their wedding was in NYC (average wedding is $38,000 in NYC). So I think your budget is doable! Also try to get as much help from family and friends as possible! One thing he saved on is DJ, they had a friend announce all dances and toasts and another friend brought karaoke equipment so they had karaoke for the rest of the night. For the tables they used plants like pothos In cute skinny vases.

There are a lot of good ways to cut costs for a wedding, if you’re willing to do the DIY work.
A family style dinner simplifies things, costs less because you can just get trays of food catered and have a serving service plate it.
You can easily save money on your paper things like invites and such by using vistaprint or just by printing it on your own on card stock.
Saving costs on a wedding cake is easier bc you can just order a nice smaller cake, and then pay nothing for a sheet cake you keep in the back that that actually gets given out. Many bakers charge less for sheet cakes so you can save money there.
You can also also save money by premaking your wedding playlist and just having your MC control the playlist while doing his roles.
Also, you save money on flowers easily too by not using a florist. Do some research and find out where the flower wholesale district is in your city and you can pay almost nothing for flowers. The other option is if there’s a Trader Joe’s near you. Let them know a week in advance what flowers you want and they’ll order extra and keep them aside for you. They have the cheapest flower prices. Also, for a dress or veil try Poshmark. So many beautiful veils that were only ever used once and basically for nothing.
For your wedding party,try Azazie. They provide swatches and samples for dirt cheap and have amazing options.

I’ve been trying to cut costs too in the planning of our wedding. I wish you all the best.

Our wedding budget is $5-$6k. We have a huge gorgeous banquet hall rented out for 8 hours (they said we could stay later at no extra cost) for $1,100. The current caterer total for 80 guests is right under $1k with appetizers, salads, entrees and desserts. The decorations and venue for the ceremony is $999. The photographer for all day is only $995 (special price!!!). The DJ is my cousin in law (so that's free). Decorations for the reception were $150 with free shipping from TableClothsFactory.com (linen table cloths, banquet chair covers, chair sashes and table decorations). The plates, setups, utensils, tumblers, champagne cups, napkins are from Amazon for $200. The quality is great and very sturdy. They look very fancy. Each set comes with a dinner plate, salad/dessert plate, 2 forks, 1 knife, 1 spoon, tumbler (10 oz), champagne cup and napkin with the napkin rings!! Our kids dresses were $15 each on amazon (x5). My dress is $85 from Amazon and the tuxedo is $200. All that's left are the wedding rings.

Pick a location where you can get married and have the reception that will help with some savings. What state are you in? what's your vision for the day? $7-10K is doable but you will need to make sure that you are getting your bang for the buck in everything that you do. How many people are you planning for? I'm a Sigma Gamma Rho and I have my sorority sister as my wedding planner and I didnt discuss my budget with her, just told her what we wanted and we started to pay people what we could afford, there were just some things that were non negotiable

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If you can get it for the night before and have friends that are willing to decorate it with you and break it down afterwards then this sounds like a good deal. Breakout a tablet and start to budget out how much you think you would spend on decorations,etc...she doesnt sound like a wedding planner

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Have you looked into Wedgewood Weddings? They have locations all over CA and are all-inclusive with the exception of a photographer? We were initially looking at them for a Saturday evening wedding but the revenue minimum was too much (18k) but the revenue minimum for a Sunday day time wedding is I believe 5k. I'm sure the prices differ by location but if you're flexible with your time of day it's worth taking a look. The reviews are amazing. FH and I are touring the San Clemente location this weekend

Ignore her please, and have the wedding you want. It sounds like she doesn't actually want to do any work.

We set a budget of $7,000. Our ceremony will be at a nature preserve (free) and the reception will be at our community center (free because we live in the town). Yes, we have to find all the vendors and diy a lot, but it's worth it, and I am a crafty person. I admit, decorating the center has been one of the biggest challenges, but once we set a theme/look, it's all coming together. I'm making backdrops out of pvc pipe, fabric, and string lights to cover the blank walls, I'm making our centerpiece floral arrangements (Hobby Lobby 50% off days woo!), and we're buying a lot of things from thrift shops and Dollar Tree.

A wonderful and beautiful wedding can be done without going broke.

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Your caterer will provide the linens. If not you can buy them for cheap from smartyhadaparty.com or ebay/amazon you can get real tablecloths for under $5 per table. you just have to research. Ask the caterer if you provide the linens will they put them on the tables. Also do the plastic china it's cheap and it looks good.

$1600 venue, 3 tier cake Walmart $140 but you'r only having 80 people get the two tier for $70.

I'm pretty sure you can find catering for $10-$15 per person even at $20 per person that would only be $1600. but caterers do have fees for setup/clean up serving etc so just add on another $500-$1000 to give yourself a cushion. And you still have plenty left over for your photographer alcohol and DJ or just make a playlist on your phone.

But you need to get busy and book your venue. Once you do that everything will fall into place. Good Luck!! You can do it!!

I can answer this question is a number of ways. But first what City and State are you getting married in because there are a number of great venues at responsible rates. There are a number of ways to have a great wedding and reception - I know because I assisted my cousin with her wedding with a budget of $4,000 and that included the reception (sit down)

You can absolutely throw a beautiful wedding for 7K! I'm not sure what area you live in, but we are in NM and are throwing an intimate wedding for under 6K. I'd be happy to share tips and thoughts on planning a wedding on a small budget.

I’m in Sarasota, FL