Our super low budget wedding - Please help

sherry_d

Ok i am getting married on the 5th of april 2008 so we have just about 7 weeks to go and the only thing certain that has been booked is the church ceremony at 3:30pm. Now I need you help guys with all the other things. Our budget is £1200 and the church has costed us £460 so we have about £700 for all the other things.

We are planning on having the reception in a village hall or something like that. Nothing confirmed yet. Number of guest is 40 but working with 50. By the way I will be heavly pregnant nearly 8 months when we get married

I have got costing for some things.

-My friend's sister will do the catering and this will be £300 but she wont serve the food. She has those dishes that keep food warm so was thinking maybe guest could get their own food - like buffer style even though its proper food she is preparing. Starters, main course and the we will have cake for desert.

-I have enquired and been to a few halls. they kind of look the same but the cheapest one is a church hall (not where we are getting married but about 2miles away) the hall is a separate outbuilding and its not too big like village hall and 70 people can happily seat there. Rate is £12 an hour and we can be there up to 11pm. I will try and book it from 4pm and ask if they can allow us to do decoration early.

-I have my wedding dress already. I just need to adjust it nearer the time for it to fit me and my belly. I can do tailoring and have a sewing machine so i will adjust everything

-I will have 3 young girls as bridesmaid and have seen dresses in woolworth for £14 each and only have to pay for 2 as my sister is paying for daughter's

-For adults bridesmaid I am thinking will probably just need one and the man can wear the suit he has

-I am thinking of red as colour theme as it is easy to get hold of things cheapily.

-cars - will just use what our friends and family have. Maybe a ford focus

Things that still outstanding
- wedding rings - not sure where to get them cheaply. We just need nice bands. i have checked argos and hsamuels
-decorations for the hall as church will have own flowers - was thinking we could concentrate more on just doing the tables instead of walls?
-photographs - I was thinking we could just use our digi cams and friends will take them but we have hit a snag coz no flash photography is allowed during church service. I am sure the photos will just be black if we diy photos. Plus where are we going to get photos done after church? Church is beautiful but sorrounded by graves. The reception hall is almost the same and not very nice interior
-video - will be diy from family
-disco - we are going to compile a list of smalls and we are using the system from our church and brother will be DJ
-to get the dress for adult bridemaid
- cutlery and plates: not quite sure if we really want disposable. so we are looing at hiring which cost as much as buying and that will be £60. Wine glasses we will just get themfor free from supermarkets and pay the £10 deposit.
- drinks - sister is good with cocktails so she will make quite a bit using some cheap ingredients. who will know and we will just have a few bottles of wine
- cake - friend has offered to decorations plus a home made one. So was thinking we could buy 2 tesco celebtaration cakes. But how do we stack them together?
- i still need to shop for tiara - have found £9.95 shoes at www.bridalstyle.co.uk
-inivitation cards - thinking vista print postcards
-my bouquet - thinking of buying silk one at ebay buy still come at £25 from sarah's flowers

Ok guys your suggestion on what we can do are more than welcome to help with our special day. i have a lot of family and friends plus people from my church who have kindly offered to help but am trying to avoid them to do heavy stuff but they are there if needed.

By the way we havent budgeted for honeymoon but we are seriously thinking of going away maybe for a 2 or 3nights and max budget is £300. We live in kent so somewhere within 2 hours drive could do in UK. Any ideas are welcome. mind this wedding is during half term so they may not be many great hotel offers. Would even do travelodge if there are some nice activities to do for us as newly weds with a bulging bump.

Am so excited!!!!!!!!!

ikkleosu

YAY for you! Congrats all round - wedding and baby!

A lot of stuff you are doing is similar to what I'm doing for my wedding. We have abudget of £3000, with 100 day guests and around 180 at night. Thankfully we are managing becuase lots of people have offered to do stuff for us for free - eg Cousin being DJ, other cousin driving cars etc. Like I said, a lot like yours. I got my flowergirl dresses out of Woolies too, for £12 each!

We are having a hot buffet too, with courses. It works very well, i've been to a few weddings with this style. I find people tend to mix and chatter a bit more because they are moving around getting food. Could you maybe find some people (work mates or relatives) who would happy to do the serving becuase even with a buffet you'll still need someone to set it up and help dish it out somewhat.

I agree red is a very good theme - easy to find (I amde a rod for my own back picking a difficult colour!) PLUS look around because next week shops will be selling all their red Valentine stuff off DIRT cheap! You will probably be able to get lots of red heart stuff to decorate the hall with. You could even ask your supermarkets if you could have some of their Valentine displays, if they were reasonably tasteful!

For decorating the hall, I agree making the tables pretty is probably the best focus. Balloons and swathes of red fabric will cover a miltitude of sins.

Photogrpahy is the stumbling block I am having too. I want a proffessional photegrapher but I can't afford one and I don't like their packages. But be assured didgcams will work fine indoors without flash - as long as there is a reasonable amount of light. Do some test runs and you'll see you get some nice pics without flash.

Could you not have someone whisk you away to a nearbyb beauty spot after the service, while people set up the reception hall, and have a few people taking "official photos". Then you can walk in to the recption hall with all your guests comfy with a drink waiting for you to make an entrance.

I got my flowers from ebay - a bouquet for me, 2 posies for bridesmaids and a buttonhole and it came to £17 including postage! Check around for a better deal.

I'd also suggest ebay for tiara, as I doubt many people keep theirs so you might get a nice cheap second hand one.

squoog

I wonder if you could contact photography students at local college who might want the experience for a small fee.
Also you sound creative so why not make your own floral table decs and even hand tie your own bouquet. Have a few friends to help you the day before. for the table decs you will need blocks of oasis and small pots to put it in. the oasis can be bought from a florists v. cheaply.
Just keep everything cool for 24 hours and they'll be fine.
Get greenery from someones garden and buy flowers in supermarket.
Cakes can be supported with pillars that you can buy in cake decorating shops, check yellow pages for local one.
Are you a bootser? if not join th eparenting club and get free vouchers for disposable cameras which are usually on BOGOF. Get a few and put them on tables for people to use and leave for you to develop.
We stayed here for our 1st anniversary and I was 7months preg. it was lovely. http://www.bolebrokemillhotel.co.uk/
Enjoy!

MrsTinks

Ok quick photo technical lesson
If there isn't enough light then it doesn't matter who takes the pics. Yes a good camera will make a HUGE difference but even so... By incresing the exposure time more light will get in but there is an increased chance people will move even ever so slightly and you get a blurry bride or groom... etc
Any pictures in low light I would recommend taking with a good digital camera mounted on a tripod (you can pick up a cheap one form Tesco sometimes - they have one for I think £10 which I have in my boot all the time instead of dragging my inherited very complex (and HEAVY) tripod round. If I was doing protraits I'd probably use the posh one but when I do outdoors the small one is a winner everytime!
So definitely go and see if there is enough light in the church as is and try and make sure that no-one and no flowers cover up natural light sources!

knithappens

For red things, wait until just after valentines to pic up decorations for the hall.

Also might it be better to hire the church hall where you are having the ceremony as everything is in one location, so save on transport to the other hall and hassle.

Also ebay some stuff you dont need i have just made over £300 this past 2 weeks getting rid of all the stuff lying around the house i have nver worn eytc it could bump your budget up a little.

We are having a hot carvery buffet, so people will be helping themselves, again less hassle

kte

For the photos what about asking one person per table to bring a disposable camera with them (if u can't afford the BOGOF suggestion). I like the photography student suggestions - I would think that your best bet is to get a range of people taking pictures (including guests) and then from that large selection there are bound to be a set of really good shots

paddingtondoo

For the tiara
I got mine from eBay for the huge price of 99p plus postage!

It was posted from China and arrived in less than a week and is exactly the same as the ones in the bridal shops that were vastly expensive.

Flowers you can get them from a supermarket the day before and arrange them - there is a good guide in the sticky threads on the top here or go into your local library and borrow a book and have a go.

why not join our eBay for wedding challenge and see how much you can make in the next few weeks it amazing how much it can add up. One of us has paid for her dress and the deposit on her reception. I've so far paid for my dress and 1 shoe - lol

We are getting our rings from the beautiful company who are much cheaper than the high street and they send you a ring sizer. My hands swelled up a lot while I was pregnant so you might need to bear in mind having it altered later on.

sherry_d

Thank you all guys for you suggestions esp hitting the shops this weekend and next week to pick up valentine bargain sales. I hadnt thougth of that.

I will be learning a bit about digital photograph and forcing my brother too as well so we can do a few trial runs. We have a sony cybershot DSC-T70. Not sure how good that is as we havent really had it that long but I have been on didital photography forum and it all sounded like jargon but I really need to learn and practice how to use it so i can pass my knowledge to my brother. plus will get the tripod stand.

ikkleosu - which seller did you buy your bouquet from ebay. I was a bit hesistant to just buy from the ones i didnt get any reviews of. Can you post the link for me.

paddingtondoo - which seller did you buy your tiara from. Always better to buy through recomendations. have looked at the beautiful company and they have some good rings just want to find out more about titanium rings - how good they are etc.

Liked this http://www.thebeautifulcompany.co.uk/products/designer-wedding-rings/9ct-yellow-or-white-gold-patterned-wedding-band-width-3-to-6mm_ef5682/3285
or maybe these titanium but are these for woman though?. I dont have any engagement ring so am thinking they maybe a bit too plain for me too
http://www.thebeautifulcompany.co.uk/products/designer-wedding-rings/titanium-wedding-ring-plain-titanium-ring_t205/2347
http://www.thebeautifulcompany.co.uk/products/designer-wedding-rings/titanium-wedding-ring-plain-titanium-ring_t202/2336
In argos was thinking of maybe these - but I am being off put a bit now by them. Wanted to go and see them in the shop
http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/2030755/Trail/C%24cip%3D1500011826.Jewellery%2Band%2Bwatches%3EC%24cip%3D1500011857.Rings%3EC%24cip%3D1500011858.Wedding%2Brings.htm
http://www.argos.co.uk/static/Product/partNumber/2036371/Trail/C%24cip%3D1500011826.Jewellery%2Band%2Bwatches%3EC%24cip%3D1500011857.Rings%3EC%24cip%3D1500011858.Wedding%2Brings.htm

And if money wasnt the issue i really like this
http://www.hsamuel.co.uk/webstore/detail/R/4164083/
Shame its only £189 but cant afford it.

Unfortunately the church we are getting married in doesnt a have a hall to hold the reception otherwise that would have been better and more convinient.

I will come and join you guys at the ebay wedding challenge. I actually have books and CDs worth wholesale price of about £500 that i bought when i was hoping to have a small business selling them but it never really took off so I think it will be good motivation to see what other are doing.

I also really need to get my finger measured up for ring size before any swelling. Will have to do that before the weekend

taggiesgirl

can i be nosey and ask where abouts you are in kent as i know of a few venues around kent that are cheap!!

TillyTrippit

Hi and huge congratulations - what a fabulous year you are going to have!!
The last few weddings we have been to people haven't had official photographs, loads of guests had digi cameras and they were asked to upload them to Photobucket so everyone could share in them. My SIL was married last year and we had Photobox make albums from the best ones - really cheap at £19 and fantastic quality - they did a 241 in October so it covered MILs copy as well.
The most important thing is to remember to have a wonderful day.
Take care,
Tilly

sherry_d

I am in Maidstone

taggiesgirl wrote: »

can i be nosey and ask where abouts you are in kent as i know of a few venues around kent that are cheap!!