Weddings Shweddings

[tasha313]

Hey everyone !
I'm in total wedding planning mode (and saving for said wedding mode), so as I have never planned a wedding (duh!) and never even attended a wedding... just like 10 years ago (and i'm 24 so I was quite young) . I was wondering, those of you who are married, how did you plan ? Any ideas ? Tips ? How much was your budget and how did you stick to it (if you don't mind me asking), did you do any DYI and was it worth the hassle ? Anything you wanna tell me ill be uber grateful I know this is maybe a long answer to tell but I'll be super happy for all the info as my married friends are quite limited so all help there is therefore also limited ..

Thank you so much in advance dear SCers
Natacha

[Natalka]

Congrats!

I got married back in the stone age when I was 28 - had a very traditional wedding with just over 200 guests. Ceremony in church, reception in hotel ballroom.
We were able to book things in eight months from when we got engaged, so that's how long I had to plan! I was living almost five hours away from my home city, where the wedding was, so that made things a little tough at times.
Had a budget and totally stuck to it because we paid for the wedding ourselves - it's WAY too easy to pick up little things here and there; you really must resist unless they are things you truly need, want, and fit in with what you are planning.

I've helped out my sisters with weddings of my nieces and nephews in the past few years, and I've found that the biggest DYI that most couples do now is invitations.
One of my nieces used silk flowers and totally regretted it - it's just special and well worth it to do fresh flowers for bouquets, corsages and boutonnieres, especially. I think silk ones are fine for centrepieces.

For more info, what you would need to let us know is just a bit more info if you are willing to share it - the general style of the wedding, when it is (at least month/season), about how many guests, colours, etc.

There are several SCers getting married this year, and a few next year, so hopefully they will be able to help you out a bit more.

Biggest advice I can give you - make sure you spend time with your man over the next months NOT talking about the wedding sometimes!
Your relationship should always come first!

[tasha313]

Congrats!

I got married back in the stone age when I was 28 - had a very traditional wedding with just over 200 guests. Ceremony in church, reception in hotel ballroom.
We were able to book things in eight months from when we got engaged, so that's how long I had to plan! I was living almost five hours away from my home city, where the wedding was, so that made things a little tough at times.
Had a budget and totally stuck to it because we paid for the wedding ourselves - it's WAY too easy to pick up little things here and there; you really must resist unless they are things you truly need, want, and fit in with what you are planning.

I've helped out my sisters with weddings of my nieces and nephews in the past few years, and I've found that the biggest DYI that most couples do now is invitations.
One of my nieces used silk flowers and totally regretted it - it's just special and well worth it to do fresh flowers for bouquets, corsages and boutonnieres, especially. I think silk ones are fine for centrepieces.

For more info, what you would need to let us know is just a bit more info if you are willing to share it - the general style of the wedding, when it is (at least month/season), about how many guests, colours, etc.

There are several SCers getting married this year, and a few next year, so hopefully they will be able to help you out a bit more.

Biggest advice I can give you - make sure you spend time with your man over the next months NOT talking about the wedding sometimes!
Your relationship should always come first!

Aww thanks Natalka, I definately will spend time with him. Actually, we got engaged in may on greek easter and at first it was wedding wedding wedding wedding.. then i started a new job, got pregnant and took a breather from it and it was great. So we are doing modern elegant, our colours are deep purple pink orange silver and peacock feathers . We wanted a budget of 20 000 but as i was looking at venues and all, it seems undoable .. We have about 160 more or less guests and we don't want to charge them for coming as some people seem to do now.
Funny you say alot of people go DIY on invitations i found beautiful ones for like 1.50-2.00 a card with the envelope. I was more concerned about centerpieces. That's where i would go the DIY route but then that obliges me to go away from fresh flowers but had some other ideas if that was the case.
We are pretty much set on Sept 27th 2014 for a date.

[Natalka]

Oo, you will have such fun with those colours!
Centerpieces are a great as a DIY project. When I talked about having fresh, that was referring more to bouquets, but then with peacock theme, there are some very cool ideas on some of the below sites for funky crafted ones.
There are just SO many great sites online for inspiration!

http://www.stylemepretty.com/wedding-diy/

http://pinterest.com/hartnickphotog/...wedding-ideas/
http://www.bestbride101.com/top-10-u...l-wedding-day/
http://www.etsy.com/search/?includes[0]=tags&search_query=peacock+feather+centerpieces&pa ge=1

Some of these are pretty lavish, but give good ideas

http://pinterest.com/aglowweddings/p...wedding-decor/

[Natalka]

Some general sites for DIY

http://www.bridecraft.com/index.html

http://www.superweddings.com/wedding-ideas/wedding-diy/

http://www.cheap-wedding-success.co....corations.html



Awesome sites
http://offbeatbride.com/
http://poptasticbride.com/

Canadian sites

http://www.weddingstar.com/
http://www.weddingbells.ca/

http://www.weddingobsession.com/
http://ruffledblog.com/locations/canada-weddings/

http://champagnesweets.com/
http://www.stylemepretty.com/canada-weddings/

http://sashandsatin.com/blog/all/
http://www.todaysbride.ca/

http://www.theringbearer.ca/wed_life.php?v=main
http://www.theperfectwedding.ca/

[nicolthepickle]

We did peacock feathers too. I loved them.
I don't have a lot of helpful tips except for don't let other people pressure you into doing things you don't want.
Also spend a day or two just looking at ideas on Pinterest (and saving them). You likely will find something doable you love just because you spent a little extra time on it.

[avoncallingu]

I am a wedding officiant and so see a LOT of decorations for weddings. Many of the couples I have married have made their own centrepieces. I have liked some that have used glass containers of some sort (some even have used fancy glass dishes that you can find at second hand stores) with coloured glass beads and a small candle in the middle. People who are sitting at the table want to be able to SEE the people on the other side of the table. If your reception is in a hall, just using a different coloured napkin underneath the above and sprinkling some "sparklies" around looks lovely - lots of light reflected. The "sparklies" and "glass beads" can usually also be picked up at second hand stores. Also - look on Kijiji in the "wedding accessories" or "wedding Services" section - often people are willing to sell their centrepieces after their wedding for much reduced prices. Just a couple of thoughts.

Good luck and enjoy!! Congratulations on your "little one" coming along, too!

[tasha313]

Thanks for all the great ideas.

Natalka these sites are amazing , you just gave me a couple hours work to look at which I'm very much looking forward to

[curt81]

No advice, but congratulations

[Darth Penguin]

I don't have a lot of helpful tips except for don't let other people pressure you into doing things you don't want.

This....so much this...neither of us are religous and having lived together for multiudes of years the fact that some of our nearest and dearest were hoping for a Big White Wedding complete with church and bells and so on and so forth....


We had a small civil ceremony followed by a reception on a local family bar, suited us and our 2 yo daughter!..Maybe ther were people who felt cheated but because they loved us and wanted us to be happy, swallowed thier feeling to make our day thier day too..

[VeeVee]

Congrats Tasha! I am engaged too (wedding next August 2014).
So far we have booked our hall, church, photographer, videographer, makeup and hair and were finalizing with the band. As for decor, I took the easy way and have hired the banquet halls decorator, she is doing my back drop, head tables, guest tables, center pieces (candelabras with pinks flowers on top,our colours are navy, pink and silver) and the flowers for myself and the wedding party. I have already ordered my invites, got a great deal (40% off), I am always looking for deals so my advice is when you find something and its on sale etc get it now! Less for you to do later. The one thing I am doing myself is the table numbers, I am doing standing table numbers and I will glitter them silver.
I created a wedding binder (the zipper one so nothing falls out) and I have sections like VENUE, CHURCH, GUEST LIST, PHOTO/VIDEO, etc and I keep everything in there, pictures of dresses I Like, colour samples to show vendors, contracts I have signed etc. Makes it so easy bc its all in one spot and I can take it with me to meetings (you will have lots of meetings with vendors), you can find templates online just google wedding binder templates.

Also starting in September there should be lost of bridal shows - not sure about Montreal but here in Toronto we have 3 in Sept and then 2 or 3 in January. If you have any where you are, GO! Lost of great ideas, great way to make contacts, fashion shows etc.

Best of luck! PM me if you have any questions

[beckie.c]

Wow - sorry this got really long...

First off Congrats! It is a super exciting time! My biggest advice is to be flexible and give up some of the control. Remember that making the memories on those days is much more important than if all the tables don't look exactly the same, but it is a nice memory when you have all your family around helping you decorate - Disclaimer: I have awesome drama-free family members

My super-hero-organized mom helped me plan my wedding last year, I shudder to think what would have happened without her. We did it all ourselves. We made the choice to get married in my ubersmall home town rather than the city where we live; as a result we were able to increase the guest list, serve supper, have a pancake breakfast and keep the costs under control! Our budget was around $10,000.00 and we stuck to it pretty well - Its those darn "cute little things" that get you! Stay far far away lol, my mom got suckered in by those "cute wedding things" a few times :p

For planning, the first thing my mom did was make an excel file with all of the To Do's and a date to have them done by and who was in charge of completing the task then she let us know what we were in charge of and to report back to her when the task was done. As things got done, they were highlighted off the list.

Also, start a brief Agenda for the weekend in advance, just so everyone knows where to be at what times, this is really helpful when coordinating between two larger families {communicate, communicate, communicate}, decorating the hall at xyz time, rehersal at xyz time, etc. It doesn't have to be set in stone yet, but it really helps in those days when your stress limit is right up there, if everyone knows where they are supposed to be it was one less thing to worry about and you shouldn't be chasing anyone down, although its not foolproof Email out a final version a week or so before the big day

As we aquired things for the wedding we would put them into large rubbermaid containers and label them with what was in them, where they needed to go, by what date. (i.e. decorations to the hall by Friday morning). This was super helpful because anyone who was around to help haul things knew where things were going and didn't have to track me down to ask or chase things around because they went to the wrong place. This can be done ahead of time rather than going through things on decorating day when time is precious

To save on budget, we ordered fresh flowers online that arrived via ups a few days before the wedding and made our own bouquets the night before - this was awesome bonding time with my bridesmaids {we ordered the guys flowers already done from the same site to save time} **IF YOU do something like this take them out of the package right away before they start to mold from being damp, we left them for three days and well I'm happy we ordered extras LOL !!!** I also used freeze dried rose petals on the tables instead of stemmed flowers, a little cheaper but you still get the nice 'real flower' effect.

If you are wanting fabric tablecloths, research the price of renting vs buying. We used LinenTableCloth dot Com and it was awesome! They were much cheaper than renting (surprised me!) and were of good quality. I resold them after the wedding for close to what I paid so I didn't need much budget here!

Don't be afraid to ask extended family members for help! They will most likely be more than happy to lend a hand that day to take some stress off you and your immediate family BUT give them specific tasks to do otherwise you can end up with too many cooks in the kitchen wanting to help with everything and you don't know what to tell them to do i.e. - my aunt had the keys to the hall and her job was to open it at xyz time to let in the Caterer and DJ. I also have a really creative aunt, her job was to show up the afternoon before and help us put together our bouquests. Use everyones strengths!

The more you can get done before that weekend, the better! Hopefully you have access to your venue the afternoon before and can get everything set up. It was so nice to wake up on my wedding day and not have anything to worry about except getting married, I had coffee with my ladies, got my hair done and then just enjoyed my families company all morning. After the ceremony our families knew where to be at what time for family pictures and then off to supper we went

I hope your day is everything you want it to be. Just don't sweat the small stuff and enjoy making memories! A year later only you will remember if things didn't go perfectly - everyone else will remember having a great time and being proud and happy to watch you get married!

[tasha313]

Thank you so much everyone these are fabulous tips ! I just read on my mobile and I'm so grateful you guys took the time to answer me . I will re-read Tommorow with a rested mind and pm you guys if I have any more questions.

Thanks SO much

[blueeyetea]

Congratulations Tash313.

First off, you need to decide what you want, what's important to you and your fiance, and go from there. It used to be that weddings were almost set in stone in what they should be, but that went out the window a while ago. Don't let yourself be influenced by what the wedding industry says your wedding should look like.

I've been to so many variation of weddings in the last 10 years, and they all varied. Here's a rundown:

* my own: the most important thing for me was having a gourmet dinner for myself and my guests (meaning I was paying), the second was that I have a decent dress and a nice bouquet of flowers. Paying for the meal influenced greatly how many people I was inviting. In all, we were 12.

* A colleague of mine, her wedding was all about the dress and having the ceremony at a swanky place downtown. No dinner, just a party at her house for drinks and cake.

* Another colleague of mine had a casual wedding at a resort by the St-Lawrence River where they rented the patio for the evening. Her and her bridesmaids all wore very simple summer dresses, and the grooms and groomsmen wore hawaiian shirts. For food, they rented a chip truck for $900 and the chip truck supplied all you can eat fries, hot dogs and hamburgers to guests when they were hungry.

* My nephew's last year was completely DIY except for the clothes they wore. They rented the hall at their church for the party, and food was pot-luck, supplied by people attending the wedding, including the cupcakes and wedding cake.

Having said all that, bottom line, a wedding is a celebration of two people joining their lives together. Invite people that are important to you and forget the rest. Anyone else wants to have their say, well, they can always supply the money to make it happen.

[vesper]

Wonderful you are getting married and hope it is a very fun one!

I won't promote my eloping propaganda here (never take wedding advice from a man who's 36 and single).

BUt I will tell you this is very important. Don't obsess over it! Don't obsess over it. DO NOT obsess over it.

What that means is, let your BF enjoy you, plan times to go over wedding things, don't burden him with non stop details.