Finally! Four weeks after the wedding I finally have the cost on our wedding which I had hoped to keep under $2000. We invited 160 people, and 96 actually showed up. We had a lot of children at our wedding, too, which really made it a lot of fun! I can't believe people don't want children at their wedding!
- Ceremony/Reception Location: $0 We had our wedding at my job, which normally charges $800 for the room but let us use it free.
- Books in lieu of wedding consultant: $40 purchased from half.com
- Bridal Gown: $25 + $3 from Goodwill on 50% off day. A real wedding gown - white, name brand Eden's Bridals. I wet washed it myself, altered it, applied a decorative piece to the back and ironed it. The lace piece cost me $3.
- Other Bridal Clothing: $81
- Cake: $115 Dh made our four-tiered wedding cake, and the groom's cake. He had to buy everything to assemble it, plus frosting tools, etc.
- Reception Decorations: $73 I got the arch for $15 with a 50% off coupon at Michael's; I made all the table decorations with juice glasses from Goodwill 24 cents each
- Our Special Toast Glasses: $2 2 glasses 50 cents each plus $1 for little white bows to tie to the stems. My boss said we needed to have these and they were running $15 to $25 retail. No way!
- Paper Products for Reception: $373
- Boutonnieres and Corsages: $23 I bought some supplies and purchased 3 off eBay. The lady from eBay ended up sending me everything she had left - some 40 corsages!
- Bride's Bouquet: $24 Hand-tied white roses, put together myself.
- Flowers to Decorate the room: $88 Purchased 75% off from Joann's; and unfortunately we didn't even use 1/3 of what I bought, so that was a waste of money.
- Food: $457.
- Gifts for my mom, MIL and my boss: $73 My boss totally took over the food preparation and even went out and bought everything (she even tried to buy everything when it was on sale!)
- Groom's Clothing: $87 Dh is a jeans and t-shirt kind of guy and had NOTHING at all. We had to buy the suit, white shirt, tie, black socks and shoes. All on sale and from Goodwill on 50% off day.
- Bride's Hair, Makeup and Nails: $100 My first ever manicure and pedicure! My hair was gorgeous, I looked like a princess!
- Groom's Haircut: $20 I usually cut his hair for him, but we ran out of time so he went and had it done at a shop. $12 plus tip.
- Honeymoon: $320 2 nights at a local resort + nightwear
- Invitations: $17
- Postage: $65
- Bride's Wedding Band: $225 Actually purchased earlier in the year for my Mother's Day/Birthday gift
- Groom's Wedding Band: $8 eBay
- Bride's Necklace: $8 eBay
- Wedding Program: $8 Wrote it myself, printed it myself. Only had to buy paper.
- Veil: $24 Made it myself, hand sewed on over 1000 beads.
- Photography: $133 We had two friends taking pictures and my MIL put disposable cameras on the tables which she paid for the cameras and photo developing.
- Videography: $0 Our youngest son videotaped the wedding. We borrowed the camera from my SIL and she gave us the mini-DVDs that the camera uses.
- Officiant: $250 This is what we decided to give our pastor - he did not require any payment at all.
- Marriage License: $50
- Music: $27 I bought some CDs off half.com and downloaded two songs for $1/each
- Our sons' haircut/wig, and clothing: $155 I know people don't normally count in the cost of their children's clothing, but all of us have to dress up. Our oldest son has alopecia totalis and wanted "hair" for the wedding. The wig cost $56.
Gifts:
- $1000 - Dh's mother gifted us with $1000 for our honeymoon - I told her we'd only want to stay two nights and it was $130 each night, but that is the number she settled on giving us.
- $400 - My boss went around and collected money from everyone at my job, about $20 each and paid for all the food
- $300 - Dh's mother also bought most of the paper goods for the tables, paper plates, drinking glasses, napkins, silverware, etc.
- $133 - Dh's mother paid for the cameras and developing
- $945 - Cash, checks and giftcards from our guests
So technically, our final cost was $96.
Until next time.
6 comments:
Hmm. $1 per guest, then?
What a cheap wedding with pathetic, nonalcoholic beverages.
UHH, UHM, THAT WAS STILL A BEAUTIFUL WEDDING, of course! Yes! Despite the pitiful nonalcoholic beverages it was beautiful and the cheapness what a great wedding!
...whew.
You can see that your marriage was a match God is Blessing, from day 1! What a blessing!!
Cassie
Okay, you would make our Grandmother proud. One thing I remember about her was her tendency to record where all her money "went". She knew exactly how much she spent on everything, it seemed. I remember shopping with her one day and she bought me some food. Right after she paid, she recorded the amount along with my name. Anyway, in that respect you remind me of Grandma.
Yes, I remember Grandma used to keep track of every penny. I am not THAT detailed, but I do save all our receipts and enter them into Quicken so I can pull reports and see what we've been spending our money on.
Wow! Could you imagine doing it without computers like she did?
Post a Comment