Stressed out about doing a wedding...

You have plenty of time to plan a 2022 wedding. As far as booking a venue, Wedding Wire and The Knot are great resources for that. You can search for venues in your preferred area and message the venue directly through the app. Once you find a place you like, reach out to the staff for pricing and if it fits your budget and needs, schedule a tour.

View Quoted Comment @Meghan yea that’s the probably I did do all that. I’ve been looking at weddingwire, theknot, herecomestheguide, and Google. I’ve asked for their rates and it just seems so crazy expensive to me. Plus I feel like I have to use the packages they offer to me. Like I’m stressed out looking at venues and seeing the prices and I just never thought that weddings would be this crazy expensive in my area... like maybe my expectations are just so low that everything else I’m seeing is just thousands and thousands of dollars 😔

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Unfortunately, weddings are expensive. A traditional wedding venue will typically be a minimum of $6,000+. There are other options though! You can check out local halls, parks, restaurants with private rooms, etc. Those are non-traditional wedding venues that will save you tons of money. I have seen several brides here on WW that have gone that route.

View Quoted Comment 😭😭 so much!! But I will deff look into that!! Thank you!!!!

I feel your pain! We’re from Massachusetts as well and it became quite apparent we weren’t affording anything in our own state on top of the fact we wanted a smallish wedding and most of the venues had much higher requirements. Well we moved it to New Hampshire! About 2 hours for most of our guest and no one minded. They’re all spending the night and making a weekend out of it. June 26th, right around the corner! I feel like a professional wedding planner now so feel free to let me know if you need any advice!

I am a February 2022 bride and only JUST booked my venue earlier this month. You have time. Don't sweat it!


My advice is to find event venues that don't only market as a wedding venue. Private rooms at a restaurant, VFW and other meeting halls, outdoor pavilions, and other such spaces can sometimes be much more affordable than traditional wedding venues. State/national parks sometimes also have meeting halls that you can rent cheaply (my SIL's wedding was at one in Virgina and it was beautiful).

I felt the same way, my wedding is in 2022. I was super overwhelmed when I got prices for packages from venues. Take a breath. Try to narrow down what you want in a venue and build around that, check country clubs or places that offer buffet options. Sometimes that is more affordable.

I had this reaction too! Though I did realize that weddings were expensive, my fiancé thought $10k would be sufficient 😅
This is what I did: 1st I looked at my own budget VERY closely to see what was coming in and what was going out every month. I cancelled any subscriptions that I could; cut my grocery bill in half (by creating a menu for the week, I purchased less groceries); I cancelled my gym membership & started working out at home; and stopped all frivolous purchases. This sounds awful...but it was actually great! I could not believe how much frivolous spending I was doing!
After I got a solid monthly budget WRITTEN down, I knew exactly how much I could contribute to the wedding fund. (I suggest your FH do this as well & also talk to anyone else who may contribute). Once you have your budget set, you’ll have a much easier time moving forward. And then you tackle your guest list. We decided we wanted a great honeymoon, so we slashed our original guest list in half so that we could rent a smaller venue and entertain (feed) less people. Then, we rented a historical home for our wedding ($1500). So, you may have to decide where you are willing to make sacrifices, but you can totally do this! Don’t panic 😉

View Quoted Comment OMG! I was thinking about doing that but my fiancé’s friends and family will be coming from PA so I’m just worried about their travel time. I know my family will hate it but they wouldn’t miss the world for the wedding. What part of NH did you do?? I started to look but all the places that I saw and liked were towards the mountains and that’s a really far from from RI and PA

View Quoted Comment Girl I will have to take your advice bad because I really don’t have much saved and I really want to be able to have a great wedding. Thank you for the advice! I’ll try to look at other places!

View Quoted Comment Our wedding is in Keene on a farm, but I know there’s actually lovely vineyards in the area as well. It may actually be closer to Pennsylvania since it’s over on the west side of the state.

Don’t feel pressured into having a wedding at a traditional wedding venue ... Those places could be all inclusive but also come w a price tag... I myself have struggled to find a place for a vow renewal we will be doing in September. We never had a wedding (please don’t come out at me for saying it, I don’t consider a courthouse thing a wedding) - so this is our opportunity to have a party=wedding w our loved ones. Once vendors hear anything even remotely resembling a wedding prices instantly become astronomical.
I agree with what others said about looking into places that do other types of events not strictly weddings, they will likely have a different set of packages available to choose from. You can have a ceremony else where so there will be no charges that go with having a ceremony and just have a party there

I was so stressed as well! I still kind of am, but if more than anything I was overwhelmed in the beginning stages. I did not know how much a wedding dress cost, how much it was to get your hair and makeup done, alterations, etc. I was like wait what?? But yes take a deep breath, write everything down on what you want, what your budget is, areas you can save such as DIY, what other options you are open to such as the type of venues. Wedding Wire has definitely helped me in finding so many possible venues that I was able to narrow it down to three Just know that stressing out while planning a wedding is normal.