Wedding Tips start here...

andertoonz

loopy-loo73 wrote: »

Hi Everyone,

We are getting married on Nov 15th of this year & am very excited :j I've read all the tips (which took me ages) and thought it was about time I introduced myself. We've been together 9yrs & engaged for 2 of them, we have dd1 (11yr old from previous marriage) and dd2 3mnths who will both be bridesmaids. We are getting married in the same hotel we are having the party in & we aren't having a big sitdown affair with speeches (infact definately no speeches) just a disco & buffet in the evening. So far we are spending ...

Registrar £300 (already paid £60 deposit)
Hotel room hire for ceremony £200
Buffet for 100 @ £10.95 per head £1095 (already paid £300 deposit)
Disco £160
Honeymoon Suite £120
Honeymoon 2 nights at b&b in Lakedistrict with flowers & champagne £295 (already paid by df)

My Mum is buying my dress & bouquet and also dresses for the girls & flowers for dd1 hair. Df is wearing he work suit & just buying a new shirt & tie to match my dress. We aren't having cars as all in one place. We aren't having flowers but i'm hoping to get balloons for the tables & table confetti, I had considered doing this myself but not sure if i want extra things to do on the day so might look for a local place to do this. No photographer, we are asking friend to have our camera & giving him a list of pics we want, also df will make folder on home server & give access for guests to upload their own pics so we can do an album from them, also having disposable cameras on tables for evening. Am hoping my grandad can do my cake for me but if he's not up to it then I will get from m&s and just put ribbon round tiers & topper on top. Haven't thought about drinks for a toast yet either!

What do you all think? Have a forgotten anything?
Lou x

sounds very similar to what i'm doing.. including the honeymoon! I might nick your idea of setting up an upload area for guests to upload photo's to. I was planning on having blank CD's on the tables rather than disposables as everyone i've ever spoken to (and read about) say they were a waste of time. Bad quality and the same thing over and over. Ie. 100x bad lighting pics of the 1st dance, people's cleavage & bums etc. Decided to miss the photograpler too as i'm only on a budger of £5000 for £120ppl. If i had more money this would be the first thing i would add on i think but luckily i have a lot of good friends who are good at photgraphy and going to have a few designated people with certain things to photograph.

i was also thinking of having something called 'paparrazzi cards' where i put cards on certain people's tables (who i know will have a decent photographer or 2) asking for certain shots if poss. Everyone has a digital camera/camera phone nowadays with a decent pixel spec.

I want a few official 'pose' shots but would much prefer the natural ones anyway as we went to a wedding a few weeks ago where the guest were fed up of waiting around for finiky photographers and the bride and groom looked fed-up!:eek:

M x

hippadeemo

I have been lurking for ages and have decided that I should really join!

Getting married next year on the 18th of July, haven't really thought it all through yet but have booked the church and the local village hall for the date. There was no debate on the topic because I've always wanted to get married there and my OH was quite happy to let me have my way :T and I think he could see that it was totally right for us anyway!

Luckily my parents want to pay for it all, but I'm not an extravagent person and we want to save as much money as possible anyway since my parents have 3 daughters and I would feel guilty having a big wedding.

The church can only fit 60 people in it so that's limiting the numbers straight away although we will invite more people to the reception. We want to invite people and then tell them that they can only bring plus 1s to the reception not the church but we don't know how to word that... any ideas? We are having the wedding in the afternoon so that we only have to feed people once and we are hoping to have a buffet. We will have to have a marquee and the boyfriend has extravagent plans for a band so that will be where money will have to be spent. We don't want to have a photographer and we also know a lot of people who take good photos so we shall enlist them to take photos. I like the idea above of giving tables specific shots that you would like them to take.

MsChazzer

shellnapier wrote: »

can i ask a question, on the budget idea i really want to get married in family members gorous house! but i live in scotland, does any 1 know if you can getn married there etc, i dont understand any of the licensing thingf?

That's a lovely idea. You won't be able to be married by a registrar as they can only marry people in licensed venues and registry offices (as in England and Wales). However, you can be married by a Christian minister or a Humanist celebrant anywhere you like in Scotland, as long as the venue is 'appropriate' for a marriage ceremony. I don't know about other religions but it definitely goes for Christianity and Humanism (not that Humanism is a religion, it's just been defined this way to give celebrants legal rights to perform wedding ceremonies).

We are having a Humanist ceremony, you can get more information from the Humanist Society of Scotland. I assume your minister could tell you more if you would like them to marry you.

Good luck!

maccaandclaire

Hiya all, Havent posted in a while, just thought id update.

Booked the wedding in a registry office for the 30th May 2009!

Having the evening reception at a hotel and we are not having an afternoon reception as we are getting married at 4pm so straight to the evening celebrations!

Going wedding dress shopping tomorrow and sent out my save the date magnets from Vista Print for just the cost of the postage!

Just one think I am stuck on and dont think it has been mentioned on here before, cant think of any songs for the ceremony.

We can have one where we walk in, one where we are signing the register and when we leave but so far all the ones i picked, my OH doesnt like!!! :rotfl:

Any suggestions or ideas or has someone already got married and had songs?

Would prefer up to date songs but might settle for some kind of instrumental or classical if i cant think of a song!

The only one I really like at the moment is The Beatles It must be love to walk out to! (my OH likes this!!!)

HELP!

greenmoneysaver_2

Thanks Ms Chazzer!

Oh and I plan to marry at some point, but we aren't into the big day, but didn't want a registry office thing and I think the Humanist option is fab!

I didn't know that Scotland had the option, and although I now live "down south" it would be fab (and cheaper) to hold a wedding near home!

Thank you!

elliewild

im getting married in cyprus april 2009 (organising it myself), and wanted to add some ideas that might help:

mixing cakes and favors,
due to the hot weather, why not combine cake with favors, im using slice-shaped boxes (made to look like a two tier cake) with favors inside (for me im thinking mini love hearts or sweets (choc and cake melt!) this way you get a nice cheap alternative on traditional cake - and best of all you can flat pack the little boxes (instead of carrying around cake) you could also personalise these (family on top row, friends on bottom and do designs on)

Receptions
as there are only 20 in my wedding party i wanted to seek out a little restaurant or bar where we could have our reception (this is cheaper than hiring a room) this would be especially good if i could find a traditional little greek place, playing live music or something. this not only cuts costs but can be quite fun (bar crawl!) but also you dont have a huge space for a small wedding party.

go early to arrange
im going to cyprus july 2008 to check out details of town halls and wedding ceremonies, this also allows me to get to know my way around, find cheap florists, jewelers (if needed) bars, and hotels or b&bs for guests. also im calling into the tourist info to get maps and info to give to guests. and of course i get a well deserved holiday out of it!

use an online blog
ive set up a blog for my guests to keep them uptodate on any developments, cheap flights/accomm. but also a place to arrange sharing accomm (e.g villas, hostels for single guests etc) and i can easily give people tasks, (e.g being in charge of flowers, disp cameras etc)

if anyone has any further ideas for weddings abroad, i would love to hear them. i will continue to add items as and when i find them.

nickandkelly

Wedding musicians for the ceremony or evening dance could be booked directly rather than through an agency. This can also save some money as agency fees can be more than people realise!
If your wedding is not on a Saturday, this may also give an opportunity for a discount.
I know this because my wife and I are wedding musicians and we mainly play at civil weddings these days!

eclipse78

hi
we have brought our wedding forward nine months! Purely because we couldn't find a reception venue we liked that wasn't booked and thought it was pointless paying out for somewhere we didn't want.
When we first got engaged we wanted our venue to be a local manor house but after we booked the church the council announced they were selling it off the end of the year!
Anyway when we couldnt get the other venues we wanted o/h suggested we see if there are any spaces left this year!

We have got a fantastic deal with their own caterers which means we get the entire downstairs for free! This includeds the 2 side rooms. We are goingto use one as a kiddies room - the main hall is quite small so thought this would be great for pushchairs etc and are going to put in crayons and printed off wedding colouring sheets etc
However we are not sure on the other room. It is a bit small. We wanted a casino but they cost £250. Does anyone have any other suggestions? we wanted something to 'do' so those who don't dance are not propping up the bar all night bored!

ragz_2

Doing my wedding invites this morning as wedding is in less than 2 months, instead of a recpetion we're having a camping party, not sure what to tell the elderly relative's who won't like it but they can just come to the ceremony (only 26 guests and I have a huge family!)
Tearing my hair out now, want to elope. I wanted the simplest, heapest wedding and it's getting so complicated!!

paddingtondoo

ragz wrote: »

Doing my wedding invites this morning as wedding is in less than 2 months, instead of a recpetion we're having a camping party, not sure what to tell the elderly relative's who won't like it but they can just come to the ceremony (only 26 guests and I have a huge family!)
Tearing my hair out now, want to elope. I wanted the simplest, heapest wedding and it's getting so complicated!!

I wanted a simple cheap wedding and mine is now stressing me out - lol. Everyone keeps telling me to relax and go with the flow but it's really not easy.
Don't worry about everyone else do what you and your OH want. the thing I've found out is that it's impossible to please everyone so you might as well please yourself.