What would you do?

sugarwalsh

Jaqu, why not use the money to go wat on your holiday of your life time, get married and then have a party when you get home? You could hire a village hall or the likes, everyone could bring a dish and you could do it for next to nothing. You could even wear your wedding outfits and have a friend 'marry' you again - ie you renew your vows in front of family and friends but without all the extra cost.
Then you are both happy!

JimmyTheWig

Jacqu79 wrote: »

Yes, the money I've saved has been saved from my wages, our regular income. The money he's been earning since Christmas has been spent on doing the house up and buying us all new clothes!:o

Because we've been used to living off my wages for a while, anything he earns isn't counted into the household budget and we use it for non essentials and holidays etc! That's why I'm so sure we could afford it comfortably!

I don't follow your logic, I'm afraid.

If he wasn't earning you would have to use your money for doing up the house and buying new clothes.


But I do take your earlier point about the biological clock. I wondered if the child was from a previous relationship, but didn't like to assume.
What does your OH think about the biological clock issue / having children before marriage?
Incidentally, our first-born was 13 months when we got married. He was a page boy, though ended up being carried by my wife up the ailse. In many ways he was the star of the ceremony - wandering freely between both sets of grandparents and clapping when the music finished.

sugarwalsh

2 other points. If your clock is ticking listen. Do you really want to wait until you're 35 to discover it's not always a given that just because you have one child you can have another?
Point 2 £5000 is less than £10 per day over 18 months. Surely your OH can find a way of raising that?

LEJC

Jacqu79 wrote: »

Thanks for replying.

The venue deposit is £250, followed by £750 in 6 months with the remaining balance to be paid 14 days before the wedding day.

Dress £250 maximum! Even if I had a lot of money, I don't think I could bring myself to pay much more for a dress for one day.:o
Hair and make up - my cousin will do for free
Shoes and veil - hoping to borrow my sisters.
Underwear - hadn't thought about this, although not planning on splashing out on this, so probably £30max from m&s.
Groom and son - kilt hire £60 each
Bridesmaids hair and makeup - themselves/ my cousin if she has time
Flowers- my brothers fianc! is a florist and has said she'll do these and I'm not having anything elaborate, just a few stems each tied with ribbon, (centrepieces are included in venue package) - so I'll say £50 for these.:o
Cake - I forgot about too. :oMy friend is making my cake and we're planning on cupcakes, so hoping to spend no more than £100 on that.
Hotel the night before is £79, so no transport for me
2 Wedding taxis for groom and Rest of bridal part - £150
Registrar - £125 + £70 to give notice.
Thank you gifts - didn't think about these, but will probably just be a token gift so roughly - £60
Invitations I will do myself or get from vistaprint - £50

Going by that I should be under the £5000 all in, although no doubt there will be some unexpected expenses sneaking in, or I'll have forgotten something.:o

I still believe its doable and that we should be able to save £250 per month comfortably.

Thanks for your help.:)

Ive been having a look at your budgets and Yes I think it is doable ...but only if you call in lots of favours from others and are totally committed to the saving....and this is an area which whilst on paper you say you can comfortably save £250 per month...if thats really the case why havent you saved it previously?
I suspect you could indeed save the money but it really is going to be a challenge because if you were a "saver" you would already have savings...to save £250 per month regularly for 18months when youre not used to doing that is actually quite difficult....
What happens at christmas for example...will you still be able to maintain that level of savings and enjoy the type of christmas you want...birthdays too...and thats just regular things that always happen...thers other things to consider like for example an unexpected car bill or an insurance renewal...

Your breakdown on budget above still doesnt include a photographer...or rings....both can cost as much as you want ...but I expect both things to cost more than £166 which is what you have left from the projected £5000 budget once everything else is taken out...

It still remains a very tight budget IMO...but if you really are committed to pulling it off I am sure you can....I wish you lots of luck

Jacqu79

bubbles0169 wrote: »

I just wanted to see if i could forewarn about any redundancies that could come up, this is one of the most turmoil times for working people nobodys safe.
if you stated your hours i was going to suggest if there was scope or not to do over time so you could throw more money at your savings

Aw I see.:) Thankfully my company offers an essential service and we are doing well, despite the economic problems. I know this could change at any time, but the projections for the next 12 months are very good. I couldn't do overtime during the week, but the weekends wouldn't be a problem. My manager knows I'm always available for overtime, so I'll refresh her memory on Monday!:D

Thanks again for your input!:money:

Jacqu79

sugarwalsh wrote: »

Jaqu, why not use the money to go wat on your holiday of your life time, get married and then have a party when you get home? You could hire a village hall or the likes, everyone could bring a dish and you could do it for next to nothing. You could even wear your wedding outfits and have a friend 'marry' you again - ie you renew your vows in front of family and friends but without all the extra cost.
Then you are both happy!

Sounds ideal tbh, but it all comes down to OH wanting his family to be at the wedding. I'd be ok with that, but my family couldn't afford to come and I would regret that, and I know they would either end up in debt for the sake of going, or them regretting that they couldn't be at my wedding.

The other option we've discussed is get married in church/registry office here, then go for a meal with family somewhere.

We've decided to give it another couple of months before deciding on anything for definite. I think I got too carried away by the package being such a great deal, and just wanting to get married!

We'll save the £250 per month, plus tighten out belts and put away any surplus we have at the end of every month!

Jacqu79

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

I don't follow your logic, I'm afraid.

If he wasn't earning you would have to use your money for doing up the house and buying new clothes.


But I do take your earlier point about the biological clock. I wondered if the child was from a previous relationship, but didn't like to assume.
What does your OH think about the biological clock issue / having children before marriage?
Incidentally, our first-born was 13 months when we got married. He was a page boy, though ended up being carried by my wife up the ailse. In many ways he was the star of the ceremony - wandering freely between both sets of grandparents and clapping when the music finished.

The house didn't need doing up and we wasted a lot of money on clothes that we didn't actually need. That's why I did the at the end of my post. We're very bad for wasting money on things we don't need. We all have tonnes of clothes, shoes etc, but still buy more that we don't need. This money could all be going towards savings.

I just feel that I'd like to get married before having anymore children, as I went through some horrible times with family when I had my son due to being unmarried and pregnant. It's totally different this time, as I'm in a long term relationship and we do plan to get married, but I'm still wary about it.:o

Jacqu79

sugarwalsh wrote: »

2 other points. If your clock is ticking listen. Do you really want to wait until you're 35 to discover it's not always a given that just because you have one child you can have another?
Point 2 £5000 is less than £10 per day over 18 months. Surely your OH can find a way of raising that?

I know it's not as easy as that. Also I had surgery last year which may have affected my chances of getting pregnant, so there's always the chance it won't happen, and if that's the case, then so be it. I'll be sad, but at least I had the chance to have my son, and it isn't a big deal to my OH, as he sees my son as his own.:)

Wow, I hadn't broken it down to that! That makes it seem all the more achievable to me. If I start taking my own lunch and juice to work everyday, I'd save at least £5 per day! I'd be half way there!:eek:

Jacqu79

LEJC wrote: »

Ive been having a look at your budgets and Yes I think it is doable ...but only if you call in lots of favours from others and are totally committed to the saving....and this is an area which whilst on paper you say you can comfortably save £250 per month...if thats really the case why havent you saved it previously?
I suspect you could indeed save the money but it really is going to be a challenge because if you were a "saver" you would already have savings...to save £250 per month regularly for 18months when youre not used to doing that is actually quite difficult....
What happens at christmas for example...will you still be able to maintain that level of savings and enjoy the type of christmas you want...birthdays too...and thats just regular things that always happen...thers other things to consider like for example an unexpected car bill or an insurance renewal...

Your breakdown on budget above still doesnt include a photographer...or rings....both can cost as much as you want ...but I expect both things to cost more than £166 which is what you have left from the projected £5000 budget once everything else is taken out...

It still remains a very tight budget IMO...but if you really are committed to pulling it off I am sure you can....I wish you lots of luck

Thanks for replying!:)

We should be saving every month, but we (me in particular) are wreck less with money.:o. I'm seeing this as a challenge, and hopefully a way for us to see what we can achieve by cutting down and being more careful and responsible with money!

With regards to birthday/Christmas, I budget for those, and buy throughout the year, put money on a savings card etc, so it shouldn't be a problem. Insurances are all paid monthly by d/d, so usually just continue, albeit this year the car insurance jumped up loads:eek:

With regards to the wedding, I haven't budgeted for a photographer, as OH's brother is one, and my uncle is an amateur photographer and I think we'd get all we need from them, as they done my sisters pics and they were great.:T. I now don't need to budget for the flowers, as my brother is buying the flowers as our gift, and his fianc! is a florist, so she'll arrange them for me!:T
For rings, the nicest I've seen so far is from warren James for £65ish:o it's silver tough and I don't know if that would be strong enough for a wedding ring. We also have lots of tesco vouchers saved that can be converted into goldsmith vouchers if I don't go with that one. OH is considering wearing his dads ring I think.

I did forget to budget for a DJ for night time I think. I used to be a DJ/karaoke presenter, so I'm hoping I'll be able to call in a few favours if needs be. Also, my dad wants to contribute something. I'm not sure how much, but he gave my sister £1000. I'm not counting that until I know for definite though.

Anyway, I still believe it's achievable, but as I said, we're giving it a few months before deciding what to do for the best.

Thanks everyone for all the comments. If I hadn't posted on here, I might have gone and booked the place on Saturday!:eek::D

sweetilemon

If he's happy and your happy then go for it! It sounds like you've made up your mind. Personally it would send me mad with worry incase my car broke down or needed my washing machine fixed so i try to save before then book and buy but if your realistic with your budget and what you can save then it should work. Happy wedding planning!