Moneysaving wedding dilemma - what would you do?

Miss_Communicate

Hmmmmmmmm bit of a dilemma here.
Me and Mr C are planning a largish (80-100 day guests and 50-70 more in evening) but CHEAP but fun wedding- emphasis on CHEAP! Neither of us are that bothered about ice sculptures, vintage cars and towering cakes.

Anyhow my dad has offered to pay us 5k towards the cost of the wedding (which is very generous and we didn't expect it at all and were going to pay for it all ourselves) however he HATES weddings and ceremony (ie. he won't be walking me down the aisle or making a speech- which is fine with me) so he has offered us 15k if we DON'T have a big wedding and just go to for a civil ceremony with 2 witnesses then have a few parties later on.

This is a very tempting offer but this is classic fatherly manipulation so a) I don't want to accept as I am an adult now and not going to let him manipulate me anymore.
b) We would be forgoing the kind of day we wanted for basically greed and I am not sure I am comfortable with that.
d) I think I would regret it if I didn't do it our way.
e) I have brought a stunning dress from eBay which is BIG and so I would feel a right dafty wearing it for a lowkey do- its a BIG dress that needs a BIG wedding. I really want to be a "bride in a gorgeous dress" for a day

On the other hand all the wedding stressy crap is winding both me and Mr C up and we sort of can't be arsed with it all and it is very tempting to bring the wedding forward to xmas and elope with just the two of us and a couple of witnesses off the street but then have a massive wedding party next summer, (and hence the stress of organising goes and the party can be more informal). But maybe we would regret doing it that way? Also we went and gave our notice to marry on Friday which fixes us to location (a town hall which we pay extra to the registrar to come out to) which is a pain as if we wanted to elope we have to go through the fandango of getting another notice for somewhere else and paying another £60 (classic moneysaving dilemma!).

Hmmm just writing this all down is indicating I still want my big cheap wedding despite the money but nargh its such a lot of money he is offering and weddings are soooo sodding expensive! (then again another point is neither me or Mr C really need the money we are quite comfortable at the mo and have no debts other than student loan, I mean it would be nice for savings but we can manage perfectly well without it).

Although at the end of the day Me and Mr C just want to be married- a wedding is a bonus. So I have jokingly emailed my dad thanking him for his kind offer to control and manipulate our lives but that he needs to up his offer considerably if we are to go for it! (or we could just univite him from the wedding if he is that against it!)- and cc'ed it to my mum who is horrified by the whole idea and gets very cross with him about it!

Nargh- anyhow I know its an unusual situation (my family are weird!) but was just interested to hear what other people opinions were and what other people would do in same situation.

Apologies for the super long post- bit of a rant.

Cheers
Miss C.

Fortheloveofmoney

Wow what a situation to be in!! If it were me I'd still have whatever do I wanted and tell him what he could do with his money.

We have a situation in my family at the moment and my OH keeps saying "if they don't like it, they don't have to come" which I guess is true and the same could apply to your dad

Good luck what whatever you decide.

Millie's_Mum

I think you did the right thing, it sounds like you want the wedding not the money, however I wonder what the response to your email will be you never know he might up his offer and then you really will have a dilemma!

rsdiscos

INHO you should have your wedding the way you originally wanted and ignore your dad's 'demands'. I was lucky that my mum and dad paid for my wedding.
We got married straight out of Uni so I didn't have high expections and 'wants'. We both have huge families invited 120 but about 20 couldn't come. We both wanted to be surrounded by our family and have a good celebration.
Most of the family had to travel between 100 and 200 miles so most stayed in the hotel we had as our venue which made a good atmosphere.:beer:
Some things we did cheap
Booked a white taxi about 1/2 price of other wedding cars
Made our own favours, wedding invites.
A friend of my mum made my cake as a gift and another friend iced it beautifully for £50.
The DJ ( a friend ) had put some balloons on each table meant for making balloon animals and my brother in law joked he could make a giraffe unfortunately he was sat next to the DJ's best mate who whipped one up in a jiffy!!!:o
If you have kids coming - get some colouring books, crayons form the pound shop and borrow some toys - it keeps them occupied and they have no excuse to get bored and play up.:D
:eek: Sorry about the long post got carried away!! Good Luck!

Frugal_Fox

We went for the best of both worlds. We married abroad - just the two of us, no friends, no family. We wanted the day to be about us and our commitment to each other. Then about a month after we returned we had our marriage blessed in my family church and then had a party at the pub across the road. It also meant I got to wear my dress twice!! Small cake, small buffet - I only wanted afternoon tea - cucumber sarnies, scones and fizz, but felt I ought to consider some of the guests who were travelling a fair distance! No pomp and ceremony, just family and friends who were important to us. At the end of the day, a marriage is about two people showing a commitment to each other - the wedding should be a day you can reflect upon and smile upon. Let your heart choose and enjoy it.

Destined_to_be_skint

Sounds to me like you want your big cheap wedding and you've been so excited about organising it on here, I think you'd feel sad if you didn't get the day you wanted. Interesting that your dad is using money to manipulate you, is he a controlling type having a last chance saloon before you run off into the sunset with another man? It's normally mother-in-laws that behave like this over their sons!!

Totally know where you are coming from regarding the wedding stress though! Feel like running for the hills sometimes as fiance doesn't seem to realise it needs to be organised and soon as he wants it on a Saturday next summer! We STILL haven't booked a darn thing after six months of being engaged!!!

Sagaris

Ha ha! We've been engaged nearly a year but I'm not booking anything till our savings improve somewhat - the account seems to be going down more than up and I'm not putting ANY of it on my credit card (unless the money is somewhere to pay it off first!) :rotfl:
Don't be hijacked by anyone else's ideas of a 'good' wedding - it's YOUR day so do what YOU want - first time round my Dad had his own way over everything - it really wasn't what we wanted.
Now I'm much older and a little wiser (and second time round!) - and we're not going to be steamrollered into anything we don't want!

Miss_Communicate

hmmmm dad is considering upping the offer! (I was bargaining for 25k, a "new" car (as in my dad's old one which is newer than mine and he was going to give me) and help with buying a house (expertise not financially)

hehe. This is quite entertaining. Mum is not impressed but doesn't really mind one way or tother!

Thanks for all the advice guys, pretty much what I was thinking. Will sit down with Mr C and talk it through properly with all the options.

At the min:
Stick with current plan of big cheap summer wedding and ignore dad

!!!!!! off abroad at christmas (yayay get married sooner and more intimate) plus get dad's dealio then howge party at easter or summer (am a teacher so needs to be holiday time) then honeymoon in summer too so prolong all the groovyness.

Ho hum.

wishiwasarichgirl

why not do both, have the civil wedding @ xmas, to make your dad happy then have the big fancy "proper" wedding which you're already planning (and your dad doesn't have to come if its gonna be that much of an ordeal for hom :rolleyes:)

is there a law against getting married twice? (to the same person of course )

Destined_to_be_skint

You could have a church blessing for the second time round, followed by your big party!! Then you get to wear your dress again!

lowdenclear

Go for the big cheap wedding!! I know it'll be stressful, but it'll be worth it in the end.