Planning A Wedding

I think I started planning my wedding when I opened my eyes for the very first time. I am not sure how many times I play acted getting married until the actual day, either. It’s no secret that I’m obsessed with weddings. If you follow any of my blogs on blogger about wedding shoes, planning a wedding, wedding table decorations, cheap bridesmaid dresses etc or any of my Hubpages about weddings, wedding planning, wedding flats, cheap wedding favors, beach wedding invitations, handmade wedding invitations, casual wedding dresses, bridesmaid jewelry, wedding dress patterns .. well you’d think that would be all of them, but you’d be wrong. There are at least 10 or more pages dedicated to weddings. I can’t help it and to be frank, I don’t want to help it. Weddings are the most singularly beautiful day in a couple’s life.

The truth is when you’re planning a wedding it doesn’t have to extravagant or expensive. It can be elegant or fun, tasteful or tacky, it really won’t matter because all you’ll remember is the fun you had. My wedding day was excruciating. I did a lot of the planning myself, and my friends and family chipped in with labor doing decorations and cooking along side me. I saved around $15,000 on a wedding that should have cost thousands more. I had my perfect dress, shoes, reception, colors.. everything I wanted. When I decided to make a website, it seemed only fitting to make one in which I could share what I learned and all the secrets to be had when planning a wedding on a budget. There isn’t any specific budget I had in mind. If you have a budget, there are plenty of ways to trim the wedding budget, cut costs on liquor, food, clothes etc. and still have a magnificent day. But back to my excruciating wedding day (before the actual event, I should add).

Because I had planned everything down to the last detail, it didn’t matter that I only had a few friends and family around to help before the actual day. Living in a small town in Sweden, but coming from the States, I didn’t know too many people. I had two sweet girlfriends that did a lot of the work, but mostly I planned and executed an outdoor wedding with 54 guests, buffet style food, out of town lodging, and flights etc for everyone coming from the States. As you can imagine the day of my wedding I was quite frantic. By that time, thankfully, most of my family and friends from the U.S were here in Sweden and zipped me along getting ready and handling the finishing touches. Up until the moment when I started putting my makeup on, the day was frantic as heck. I am trying to be as honest here as possible, because while I give a lot of good ways of planning a wedding on a budget, a lot of the wedding costs I trim have to do with doing the work on your own. Basically it’s a decision : save money and do a lot of the work on your own or with family and friends,  or hire people for a couple of grand more.
Everything I write about in my blog, I either found out by trying on my own, or when researching and deciding whether to hire or labor through it. I can tell you how to save money on your wedding dress, how to research online shopping etc. I didn’t come by this information through years of wedding planning for others. I came by it out of necessity. You see, while I thought our wedding day should be priceless, my future husband thought our price was ten grand. No amount of puppy eyes and cajoling could change his mind. The great thing was, we actually ended up nearly 2 grand under budget because of the cost saving measures I took. Simple things like advertising a local business on my invitations let me reduce my flower cost to $300 bucks. Calla Lilies for $300 bucks! In July! In Sweden! Not an easy task. It wasn’t just Callas either, we had roses as well and petals.

I’m hoping that what I pass on helps a bride achieve her dream wedding. There are always important factors when you get married. For me, and many other brides,  it was the dress. For some it’s the location. Others hold importance on a date. Whatever is important, lets you sacrifice what isn’t important. I sacrificed very little, except for my time. I was harried on my wedding day. I forgot our reception music at the apartment (4 hours away), but all in all it was perfect. What I remember wasn’t that I looked a little chubby or our cake wasn’t a masterpiece. What I remembered was how much fun my guests had, how perfect the vows were and how everyone still talks about the wedding nearly 3 years later. That is how every couple should remember their wedding.

I hope my articles help you plan a wedding of your dreams.