The Ultimate Incentive Threadies go all out!

Tete_en_l'Air

Eek Lara - £150 each?! And that's (presumably) just for a style not a cut and colour or anything?! Gosh I'm going to have to check this out ... I'm bridesmaid in December and have said yeah fine I'll pay for my own hair to get done etc. There's the bride and her mam and auntie and six (!) bridesmaids and we're all staying over the night before in the posh hotel and having our hair done on the morning - will have to try and find out how much it's going to set me back. I can see where my £1000 is going to be spent

I can totally imagine the W word inflating prices ridiculously, you have to be crafty!

Dinah93

My hairdresser charged me £200 - but that was to style my hair, 2 practices, cut my brothers and style my mums, then she helped the bridesmaids for free while I ran about trying to find my undies! She said £200 is about what she would normally make in the 4 hours she was with me so thats what she charge. I remember her saying that and thinking I was in the wrong job!

Tete_en_l'Air

My grandma always says that about the lady who comes to cut her dog's hair - she charges her £15ish and it takes like 10 minutes - not a bad hourly rate!

Birdie85

£450 is mental Lara! Definitely shop around and ask for recommendations for mobile hairdressers/ make-up ladies from friends/ wedding boards. I did my own make-up and it worked well, my skin actually looks pretty fabby in my wedding photos, think the weeks worth of tan helped though!

For my friend's wedding last month we went to a hair salon to get our hair put up in the morning and I think it was about £25 per BM (we didn't have to pay), not sure about the bride, maybe about £50? She then got a make-up lady to come to her Mum's and do the make-up; again, not too sure about the bride but she said that we could all get our make-up done for £20 each if we wanted to pay, I was the only one to politely refuse (falsely claiming sensitive skin to get out of it!) and I'm so glad I did as the other girls looked horrendous, all orange, with little cracks about their eyes and noses...ick! I'd personally nix the make-up unless you're a complete novice, you can get the same look doing it yourself and you'll have the products with you to top up throughout the day if you need to. I also stuck on (well, actually the bride stuck them on for me!) some 'volumising' false eyelashes, they were really fine and not too long, they didn't look fake either, but they made a difference to how I looked as they were a little extra special touch.

OH's Auntie used to be a nurse and retrained to be a hairdresser (although she now runs a B&B!), now I understand why!

Lara44

Hehe, I reckon I'm in the wrong profession as well! Yes, I once had the orange trowelled on make-up when I was a friend's BM. Nightmare! I am terrible with make-up though, so I would love not to have that hassle. Tete, I think you'll be alright - London and wedding together seem to exponentially inflate prices beyond the realms of normality.

It seems like around £60 for an up-do at a trendyish salon here, and £25 for me (I only need a blow dry ) So that's already £145. If I can get everything all in for £250 I think that would be worth it - as a final extravagance... and instead of BM pressies!

Lara44

Well the singing harpist was another extravagance at £300 but hey... I knew this would happen so I made quite a tight budget for the big stuff, and came in a bit under on that...!

poddle911

Ouch, Lara, that does sound scandalous. I think a mobile hairdresser would be good if you can get a recommendation and from what I've read on the wedding boards a free MAC trial (£25 but you get that back in products) is the way forward if you like MAC. And a lot of the MAC staff freelance to build up their portfolio so are quite cheap. Just booking an appt on any makeup counter is very MSE - it just depends if that's what you want to be doing on the morning of the wedding...?

wOW, that's a lot of cheese!

starnac

I did my own hair and make up for my wedding day too. I wanted to make sure that I actually looked like me (although a slightly more glamorous version) as I very rarely wear make up normally and never liked the way hairdressers try to style my hair.

That said DH and I did a lot of things ourselves for the wedding. It made it a lot more personal to us (and a bit cheaper too)

Flower08

Evening all,
Cinny your off to a good start with the savings!
I have been on the phone to Virgin Media today and have cut our package down saving £35 per month. This months bill has already been paid so wont see the savings until next month but will make sure that money is paid straight towards the debt instead of being swallowed up into the daily spending.

Dinah93

Thats a nice saving Flower, well done.

Right, everyone on the list has a ticker now which should auto update when you update your own totals on your ticker making site. CMD is the only one missing a ticker so I've updated manually and will keep doing so if you prefer hon. No tickers from Poddle or Tete but I don't know for certain if the two of you are in or out?

Did a MS on the way home today (£5 of food and £5 fee) so just starting the report now. Have done a few competitions as well, and caught up a bit on my vine reviews. No money into the account today, although I have sent some through that arrived in paypal this afternoon.

We have a £10 travelodge room booked for the night before we go to New York, they charged us 2 days ago even though we bought it about a month ago, and today they put the money back in again today - no idea what they're playing at!