bride on a very tight budget!!!! NEED IDEAS

[ddzlilangel]

I am a 29 yr old bride to be.. getting married for the first time in June. I am on a very tight budget. We are having to pay for it ourselves, and as it is we have a hard enough time paying bills let alone paying for a wedding. Anywho, needless to say i need anyone that has ideas for a nice inexpensive wedding. i already have my dress, so that big expense is out of the way, found it at Brides Mart. need ideas on how to possibly make my own invitations, sites ( in dallas/ft worth area), cheap flowers, headpieces and veils.. all the other stuff... can anyone help?????

[bnd94]

Welcome to Onewed!!

What style wedding do you want? formal or informal?

Have you decided on what colors you want?

Do you want to plan around a theme?

I am sure we can all help you with ideas. There are alot of ways to cut costs. :D

[ddzlilangel]

thank you.. i just happen to stumble across this site on google. what classifies it as informal or formal? like i said this is my first time at this i dont know really the firs thing about it. i am torn between just doing a black and white wedding because the color i want is hard to find in flowers and other decorations. my mom and i spent several hours this past weekend looking for something to match. some stores call it a melon color and others are calling it a coral color. the theme like for my reception and my guest book and stuff is the platinum ( or silver) hearts inner twined. i have found it an alot of things when we went pricing.. but the place i went to was supposed to be a saleplace for wedding stuff and their prices were outrageous. my other main concern is finding a location for the ceremony and reception at a reasonable price. they dont have to be at the same place, because i am preferably wanting an outdoor wedding.

[bnd94]

Formal or informal is just how fancy you want it.
Formal is more black tie/tux and informal is casual.
I am going to try for something in between. We are paying for our own wedding too and don't really want to spend a whole lot of money on it.

Are you a DIY girl? Or would you rather buy stuff already made?

I am sure we could find some stuff for you online in the melon color you want. I think that would be a awesome colore to use!! Great for a spring wedding too. I think you would find the best prices on things too on the internet.

I am will see what I can find. I probably won't be able to post anything for you till tommorrow though, I don't have much time right now.

Check this out though. It may give you some more ideas:
http://www.askginka.com/themes/valentine_heartstheme.htm
http://www.foreverwed1.com/articles/themes/024554k.html

Hope they help! I will be back to post pics for ya later ;)

[ddzlilangel]

thank you so much i will check out these sites and yes i am a diy girl and so is my mom that is helping me. i guess mine would be considered formal then, i mean all the guys will be in tuxedos. if i say casual my dad will try to embarass me and show up in shorts... he already joked about just wearing a shirt that looks like a tuxedo i threatened his life ..lol.. if he did. once again.. thank you for your help.. Keisha

[bnd94]

Oh good I was hoping you were going to say you are a diyer. I am too. I want to make everything I can.

Here is a website I think Weblady posted for us on how to make a veil:
http://www.wegotgame.net/jen/veils.html

[bnd94]

Here are some I found. I'm not sure if it is the exact color you want though.
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/orange2.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/orange-frangipanis.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/orange_table_setting250.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/Orange_Summer_bouquet.jpg

Your right that color is hard to find. You can incorporate the color easily with ribbons though.

[bnd94]

Some heart things:
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/1027550822210172m.jpg
These would look awesome with the coral colored roses:
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/9087.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/WE2229.jpg
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/W1740_038lr.jpg

[bnd94]

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/Bnd94/Orangemaintable_lrg.jpg

[Jenn060306]

I have seen alot of linking heart things like DIY invitations at Staples Business Depot and Micheals Crafts. They have the stickers and everything, if you watch they go on sale fairly regularly.

You could also purchase card stock and print the invitations at home. Use a script font in Word, you can make your own RSVP's, menus, place cards. The only thing is having the time to cut everything out.

Also pick flowers that are in season. My wedding is in June as well, we're thinking we're going to use peonies for most of our flowers since they are in bloom then. Plus they are huge so you don't need as many to make the bouquetes and centre peices as full.
For a veil to could make your own. And headpeice... i went to an accessory shop in the mall called Claires and bought one for $30. Veils and headpeices are ridicuously over priced that the bridal shops i've found.

Good Luck with everything!

[ddzlilangel]

wow those are some beautiful pics!! thanks that gives me some ideas of how to get the color in there. since i cant find matching colors exactly i think i am going to go with the black and white and incorporate the color like in the pics you gave. that way i dont have to worry about them clashing or not matching.

Keisha

p.s how do you get the name thing and the countdown thing? i went to the web site for the countdown thing, but i dont know where to put it on my profile or wherever it goes.

[bnd94]

Once you make your ticker it gives you what it calls codes. Copy the one that starts url=http and paste it into your signature. To get to your signature click on "user cp" in the blue band above. On the left you will see a list of links. I think signature is the first one.

Let me know if you need any other help.:D

[CindySue]

Welcome to the board. Im in a similiar situation of the "tight" budget. We are also paying for every thing ourselves.
Something that works for us it our "Wedding Fund" Every week we each take $20 and put it in. Using this we will end up with double what we thought we were going to have for a budget. Things are kinda tight for us too, but we dont even miss it.
Having your wedding at a public park or someones home will save you ALOT on the ceremony fee. This could even end up being free. If you can have you reception there too, even better. On your flowers, the craft stores have real looking silk ones for cheap. Right now Michaels has all their flowers 1/2 off. I think Hobby Lobby does too. Garden Ridge is usually better, and Im hoping to get to the one in Mesquite this weekend. I live north west of Tyler but my FMiL lives in Sunnyvale and I wanting to go up and see her so we can go shopping.Im not sure if anyone said it or not, but read our journals. Everyone has great ideas.

[ddzlilangel]

thats good info to know about the flowers, i am thinking that the only real ones i am worried about is my bouquet. the others i am not to pressing on them being real.i live borderline garland/mesquite area so i am not far from the garden ridge and michaels. have you checked out a place thats called Saleplace, its a wedding superstore just down 635 and exit elam rd. its not the best prices but on some things they are pretty reasonable. i think i found my location, its a gazebo and if i choose to rent the community center for the reception they give a discount price.im just not sure how i feel about the community center but i guess with the right decorations you could make it look really nice. where are you guys getting the grooms tuxedos and stuff??? is it cheaper to rent or just buy??

[Andriella]

You can go to Michael's or JoAnn Fabrics (craft stores) for a lot. Depending on what kind of theme you are having you can catch really good sales! For example If you have a fall themed wedding you can find tons of fall stuff on sale at the end of Fall. They also have veils that you can attach to combs or tiaras yourself or already attached for abywhere between $10 and $40. A good decoration that doubles as a party favor is hershey kisses, you can usually coordinate the colored wrappers with yu wedding theme or colors. I'm not sure about the Fort Worth area but small towns like Wylie, Sacshe or Murphy have lots of little "hole in the wall"shops that usually have really inexpensive silk flower!

[CindySue]

Hey, my FSiL was married at the city park in Mesquite and said that it was beautiful and didnt require much decoration.
No I havent been to thate store you were talking about. I think we are going to Sunnyvale this weekend so maybe I can check it out with my FMiL.

[RebeccaW]

iam also doing a inexpensive wedding. i actually found a really nice dollar tree out near me that i am going to be getting all the decoartions at. i suggest looking for a place like that and see what they have. i found really nice fake flowers there and everything. i also foud mini silver bag statue things(hard to explain what they look like) that iam planning on putting candy in and putting tags on with the date and our names. So my suggestion is if u wanna do things at no cost then i would go to a dollar store.

[usahgrad]

Here's some litle ideas that will help shave some of the budget (I'm paying for most of the little things for my wedding, so I'm all about these):

Instead of tool around your favors, use tissue paper. More variety of colors (I'm going with the irridescent one) and you get a WHOLE lot more for a WHOLE lot less.

Walmart has decent fake flowers for 86 cents a bunch. I picked up a TON of them and then hit Michael's for a couple of bunches of the more expensive ones to mix in so it just LOOKS like all of them are expensive.

Post your seating chart on an easel where people walk in (or on a table or something) instead of doing place cards. On piece of posterboard/foam core is a lot cheaper than even just the regular place cards.

Check out the web (especially any sites you find posted in here). The links have to be of a certain caliber to stay in this chat site AND these girls are GREAT at finding good deals!

If you want votives/candles and aren't a web junky, Target has good candles in packs for like $5. We're planning on getting our floaters there.

Can't stress this enough: Dollar store dollar store dollar store. My centerpieces are wine glasses with floating candles. I have three VERY long tables and my centerpieces will run me a total of sixty bucks...for everything (and I'm running 13 glasses down each table).

If you can do it yourself comfortably, do it yourself. This applies from everything from the flowers to the caterer or dj. While I wouldn't suggest doing the catering yourself, maybe someone you know knows someone. My FMiL works with a guy who used to own a restaurant and he will be doing our catering. We cut our catering bill in half!

While we're on the big stuff...check out venues that aren't big ritzy places. I suggest community parks or halls, churches, or even someone's house (if you know someone with a nice house). We're holding our wedding at a community park and paid $300 total for TWO FULL DAYS of use. We get to go in Friday morning at 9am and then they'll come and lock up after our rehearsal Friday evening. Then Saturday we have it until Midnight.

Hope that helps you out. And remember, if you're looking for something in particular, ask...chances are, these ladies could find it for about HALF as much as you were expecting to pay for it in the first place.

[rainbowtreat]

Be sure to check out this site. You can get 6 heart floatign candles for $1.99 and 108 assorted colors tea-lights for just $9.99. I love this site.

http://www.efavormart.com/index.asp

[ddzlilangel]

ok girls, this is bad.. ive had my dress for a month now and it fit perfect when i got it, well i went saturday to have it altered and when i tried it on.. we couldnt get it to zip up, ive gained weight in all the stressing. i dont understand why either, i dont munch or snack on fattening things.. and i watch what i eat all the time and drink lots of water and do the ab lounger once a day, what am i doing wrong???? i cant gain anymore weight or i wont get into this dress. anywho... another thing... thanks for all the ides... they are helping alot!! keep them coming!!! how close should the wedding ceremony be to the reception site?? i want all my guests to come to it but im sure that wont happen. how do you tell a mom that you dont want everyone she knows to be there, geez if that happened we'd have 500 plus people...shes talking about old church members from past churches that we went to, old coworkers, etc.... how do i tell her without sounding rude??

[usahgrad]

I don't know if this was the correct way to handle it, but when my mother mentioned inviting half of the state of Michigan to the wedding, I told her that was totally fine, as long as she realized that it was her who was going to be paying for the bigger hall and the extra plates of food and so on and so forth...that changed her mind REALLY fast! :)

[CindySue]

Brian and I made it very clear at the beginning that since we were paying for everything ourselves that WE were going to do things OUR way. While we have changed a few minor things for a couple of guests (mainly the time so his grandparents could be there), we have stuck to it and not let anyone bully us into doing anything we really couldnt afford.

[Once Upon A Party]

Please get in contact with me at your earliest convenience. I'm sure I could work within your budget.

Christy
Once Upon A Party

christy@onceuponaparty.citymaker.com

Once I can get to talk to you and have an idea of what you need, we can work out something. I hope you are interested!!

:p