Wedding

I took up a second side job to make money specifically for the wedding. i always tell people too not to be afraid of borrowing things from people so you don't have to spend money to get it.

View Quoted Comment Been trying to find a better job so I can help out (I’m a babysitter) but it’s so hard to find jobs that don’t require experience and isn’t fast food or waitressing and that I can do without quitting what I’m doing now.

We are having a two year engagement so that we can spread out the expenses. It has worked great for us. Everything not coming all at one time has been a life saver. We also have been putting money aside each month instead of buying a bunch of dinners out or things we really want.

One of the biggest money savers for us has been booking a park for our ceremony ($20 an hour). FH's parents are graciously letting us do the reception in their backyard. Another money saver you could look at is having a mid afternoon ceremony and having just appetizers for food. Fake flowers from Michael's or a store similar also saves in the money department. Good luck!

Sometimes having a long engagement helps to build up funds. My fiance and I will have been engaged for a little over 2 years before we get married. I know it's not the most ideal. Also if you have a savings account start by putting away an X amount of money a week and don't touch it unless it's something for the wedding in general.

I agree with spreading out the purchases. I also took a bit of money from each paycheck which was automatically transferred to another account that was wedding stuff only. My FW used her CC a lot on the smaller purchases which gave us Amazon gift cards pretty often as a reward. We bought a lot of our supplies from Amazon. We skipped the interest rate by paying the card off right away.

We opened a separate bank account and started having a portion of our paychecks put directly there. We don't touch that bank account except for wedding stuff. We also decided to have a smaller, less expensive wedding. FH also took some temp work on the side and is picking up one extra shift a week, God bless him.

One of the most expensive things at a wedding is the food and venue. Try to cut cost on both

We opened a separate savings account and had a percentage of our checks go to it for the wedding. We are keeping the wedding small with only 46 guest total. Our ceremony and reception it being held in the same place to help save money(they also had a food and beverage package we purchased for a cheaper price since we didn't have many guest). Once you have a theme or color scheme you can start to purchase decoration, linens and ect. I purchased all the linen, table decorations and addition wedding items off Efavormart.com(they always have 10-20% off codes!). They have reasonable priced items! and the linens are very high quality! We are having a intimate dinner with no dj to help on cost. I kept flowers to a bare min with just corsages for my maid of honor,boutonnieres for the groomsman and two small flower arrangements for the ceremony that will be used in the reception room. I got a part time second job at a hotel to get a little extra money and I sold a lot of my purse collection and unused makeup to help with the cost. I bought my dress of cocomelody for around $300, look up the website they have very reasonable priced dresses! I was nervous on the purchase but my dress is exactly like the pictures and their costumer service was amazing the whole time they made my dress. I bought about of other decoration off ebay or selling apps, I'm making alot of the decorations as well. We got engaged in December 2018 and decided to we didn't want to wait and are getting married this December. Maybe start off with guest list and see what your willing to pay towards vendors. Good luck! It's a lot of work but do able for a good price!

How to save money: small guest list, appetizers or cake only, no booze or very limited booze, and seriously delete pinterest, instagram, ect. if you can. So many images of beautiful weddings everyday can mess with your head and make you feel like you "need" SO much more than you do. You really don't need a lot to pull off a nice wedding. A place for your guest to sit, yes. A gorgeous fruitwood chair with chiffon sash at a satin draped table with candles, flowers, and a gorgeous place setting, NO! lol It's hard to resist getting caught up. I also recommend the Mindy Weiss wedding book. She explains so many traditions and why we have them. Once you read why flowers became a thing at weddings, you can decide for yourself if they are really necessary. Good luck to you! Budget bride here so if you ever need help or just a place to vent I'm here for ya!

Designate people for jobs. Example: My mom is doing the bouquets (fake flowers), my MOH and Aunt are doing the cooking (no money for caterers), brother is the DJ (with a karaoke machine and pre-set playlist), an uncle will be our photgrapher, etc.

Keep your guest list small. And research DIY projects

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Award for best advice goes to you! 'delete pinterest" this site has caused me so must stress! Too many options and people with waaaaay bigger budgets than mine.

My FH and I are also paying for our own wedding, we found having a longer engagement very helpful! We got engaged November 2017 and will be getting married April 2020.

I agree with a previous poster about looking into parks! Parks are super affordable, and some include tables or a covered area for a reception.

Depending on your wedding size it is fairly easy to cater your own wedding. One of my best friends got married at a community center (also look into these! They typically include tables, chairs, venue & a kitchen) and for food her mom baked a cake & they bought a bunch of deli platters from a local sub shop. Everything was tastey & still looked cute! (She used a lot of crates & pallets for decor).

You can also easily do your own flowers, buy them at the grocery store and make small centerpieces or bouquets.

I think your first few steps should be to sit down and put a guest list together and then a reasonable budget. From there you can figure out more on if you need to cut people, get a second job etc.

Find a place you can bring food in, like a beautiful park. Go for a cheaper food option like pizza (it goes over really well!) or Italian pasta, Mexican buffet, sandwiches, etc. You can do soda can stations, a bottle of water and a bottle of wine at each table. Set a table decor budget of $10 per table. Look at places like still white or Amazon or cocomelody for a wedding dress.

View Quoted Comment Make fun of waitressing all you want but I make $40/hr on average and work only 7am-3pm

I'm not sure if your asking for tips on like physically saving money or how to save on things for ur wedding.. I'm thinking the first one so here are some of my tips:

We have an online savings account thru allied Bank that we dump money into that has a bit of a higher interest rate then a normal bank. I treat our savings like a bill. When I do our budget the savings is a monthly bill... We have to pay allied x amount every month. Also, I have my own separate savings account that I have part of my paycheck going into. I never see that money and also the only way I can take money out of it is to go to the bank during business hours. I can set it up for transfers to another bank, but I don't because then it would be available. Everytime I increase my savings amount I do it little by little. So if I want to save 50 a month I start by saving 10 a pay then when that feels comfortable I increase a little more. I also try not to beat myself up for dipping into my savings bc stuff happens. I do try and replace what I took out while also still saving my regular amount. I also got a second Saturday job as a cashier at a lingre store in my town. I am highly educated and have a pretty decent full time job, but I'm able to make an extra like $75 a week so I'll take it. This job also got me a crazy discount on my wedding dress bc the shop I work at is next door to the bridal shop so if ur looking for a second job try and think what will help with the wedding. If ur doing a lot of diy try for like a Moore or Michael's. Also it's helpful to just track ur spending. The minute I saw I was spending $80 a month a dunkin on coffee and crap I went out and bought travel mugs, nice ground coffee, and a pot. Bam and extra $80 in my pocket.

Our engagement is 1.5 years long so we could spread out payments.

We are stocking our own bar.

Hiring a Taco guy to cook at our venue (Mexican food is such a bargain)

No favors, minimal decoration (our venue is rustic/modern so it really does not need much)

View Quoted Comment She didn't make fun of it......

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You might talk to an employment agency. A lot of times they have jobs available that you wouldn't know about otherwise, many of which don't require a ton of experience. You know, like a receptionist, or some other kind of entry-level office job. Those usually pay more than waitressing/fast food.

Also, my niece has started doing Door Dash for extra money for her wedding. She makes deliveries 3 or 4 nights a week. She even does it with her toddler, on nights when her FH works late. She puts him in the carseat with a tablet, and he's more than happy to ride around with her for a few hours. That's something you could do in addition to your babysitting. Driving for Uber or Lyft too.

My future husband and I got engaged 5/2018 and we have aimed for our wedding to be 2 years out. We wanted to A. enjoy our engagement thoroughly and B. save up our money and it has helped us tremendously.