shall we have a wedding chat thread?

I_am_mad

How are you getting on with planning at that cost, when is your wedding? x

shellsuit

I_am_mad wrote: »

Hi everyone. I have been engaged to my partner of 7 years for 3 years and now is the time I think I should start planning a wedding. I am going to look at venues tomorrow which is exciting. I wanted to ask a question about inviting people to the wedding. See the thing is I have a dilemma. I know it is our big day but we are such people pleasers we are worried about upsetting people. I have a small family so I dont have much to worry about. Just the fact that I dont know what to do about my dad, he left my mom 3 years ago after years of cheating and he now together with some one young enough to be his daughter (I am 23 and she is younger than me). I dont know what to do about inviting him as I feel my whole childhood has been a lie and I dont want him giving me away, instead my brother is, as we are very close! What would you do in this situation, if I invite him I risk upsetting alot of people, my fiance included!!

Anyway that aside, the other problem is my fiance has a very big family and there are some people who I have never met and he hasnt seen for years. Where do you draw the line at inviting people. I feel if we invite one cousin we have to invite them all, but this is getting expensive.

Basically how did everyone else deal with issues like this?

Thank you

Hiya, The only people OH was meant to be having was his brother, his Dad, his stepmum, his nan and grandad and 4 friends. Now we don't even know if his dad and stepmum are comiing.

My family is huuuuuuuuuuuuge, so what we're doing, is having all my aunties and uncles for the ceremony and meal and all my cousins and their families are invited for the evening.

Because my family is so big, I couldn't invite some cousins without the others and there is NO way we could have afforded to feed them all! (I have 40odd cousins and that's without their OH's!)

Obviously some cousins can't come, one is living in South Africa, a couple are pregnant, others probably won't want to come, but if I invite them all, there's no complaining, and I've always been invited to my cousins evening wedding do's even if I haven't seen them in years.

Do YOU want your Dad there? If so that's the most important thing. It's a long story with my OH and his Dad but if OH really wants him there, who am I to say No even though I can't stand him?

Work out your budget, have the most important people to the ceremony and meal (if you're having one) and try to work out the best way to have the most people for the least price for the evening.

Obviously if there are people/cousins/old friends who you don't want there, don't have them!

My excuse is "we're limited to numbers and just can't afford to have everyone with us who we would like to", which is the truth, because if we were loaded, we'd have everyone there for the whole day, partners, kids and all! x

shellsuit

I_am_mad wrote: »

I am thinking of a budget of 5,000 is this reasonable or am I fooling myself?

5K is a really good budget!

I think ours only comes into about £3.5 - £4K? x

Lexxi

We get married on the 27th November this year- the church is £400, the hotel for the wedding breakfast is arond £2000, that should include 2 nights stay as well, we are having an evening reception elsewhere room hire was £100 but we get about £50 of this back, family are doing the bufffet, need to get a price for the DJ, we're also having 2 cars, one to get me to the church and me and OH to the hotel then a super bus to get all the guests to the evening do from the hotel for £500, two photographers all day 395.

We decided on things we wanted, like OH wanted a private function room not a pub/restaurant meal then we looked around at what was available, from there we created a short list of size, cost, what we liked and didn't like and found somewhere.
We are doing quite a few things ourselves, like stationairy, flowers and probably the cake but we will still be able to have the wedding we want.
I'd suggest sitting down with yor OH and getting together a list of definates, for us it was church, private room for meal and function and a photographer then other things you are prepared to compromise on, be flexible with flowers and colours and open to ideas too as this has been quite good for us.
HTH xx

bubbles0169

have to go to work but just wanted to say welcome to i am mad, my fellow county lass

I_am_mad

shellsuit wrote: »

5K is a really good budget!

I think ours only comes into about £3.5 - £4K? x

Wow can you share with me how your budget is this. We dont want to have to spend this much if we dont have too. We have seen a venue we like well 2 actually. One is 4300 for ceremony and reception hire and then a 3 night stay in their room which is for 4 people. Just doesnt include food or registra. The other is 3800 but this only includes a 1 night stay and we have to be out by 10 am the next day which I think it a bit mean as I dont want to rush on my first married day. How much am I looking at for food with 50 - 60 guests for sit down and then max 100 for buffet at night. We are having wedding and reception in same place.

Thank you

I_am_mad

bubbles0169 wrote: »

have to go to work but just wanted to say welcome to i am mad, my fellow county lass

:hello::hello:

Lexxi

Maybe try looking on somewhere like laterooms for hotels near by, just in case there are any other hotels that you haven't thought of, that's how I found my place? Or the local council site usuually lists licensed places in the area

shellsuit

I_am_mad wrote: »

Wow can you share with me how your budget is this. We dont want to have to spend this much if we dont have too. We have seen a venue we like well 2 actually. One is 4300 for ceremony and reception hire and then a 3 night stay in their room which is for 4 people. Just doesnt include food or registra. The other is 3800 but this only includes a 1 night stay and we have to be out by 10 am the next day which I think it a bit mean as I dont want to rush on my first married day. How much am I looking at for food with 50 - 60 guests for sit down and then max 100 for buffet at night. We are having wedding and reception in same place.

Thank you

It's all in the venue and food and of course where you want to get married which bumps the costs up!

What we have is...

Registrar fee - 120
Give notice - 67

Food for day and night - 2000

Car - 200

Photographer - 300

DJ - 200

OHs ring - 275
My ring - 115

My dress - 200 (brand new and should be £700! price is low because it's not 'this season', thats all!)
My shoes - 20
My tiara - £20
My underwear - £20 (only need knickers!)

Daughters bridesmaid dress - 70
shoes £20

OH's suit - bargain £50
Shoes - £50
Shirt and tie - £20

Son's suit - £50
Son's shirt and tie - £20
Shoes - £40

Babies outfit and shoes - £40

Cake - friend is making it for us so £0!

Flowers - £50 (I'm making my own centrepieces with supermarket flowers!)

Flowers for me and daughters - £30 (I'm going to have a stab at making our bouquets)

Invitations - £40

Odds and sods - £200

Honeymoon - £600 (not including spends as we haven't started saving for that yet!)


That's just what I can think of off the top of my head.


Oops! I've totalled that up and it comes to £4817 ~ didn't think it was that much at all! :o :eek::rotfl::rotfl:

Lexxi

shellsuit wrote: »

Cake - friend is making it for us so £0!

Flowers - £50 (I'm making my own centrepieces with supermarket flowers!)

Flowers for me and daughters - £30 (I'm going to have a stab at making our bouquets)

Try the garden centre too, I was walking round earlier and there were some quite nice flowers plus they had florists in store you may be able to get advice from, my mum found a ready made bouquet of foam flowers earlier for 5.99, they're a bit smaller than what I wanted but we bought 3 so we can pull them apart and make 2 out of it.

very pleased at your free cake but I can't find anyone, except slattterlys, I was going to ask who you were using