Cheap wedding ideas.

Start a notebook--or a card file. Give each problem a page or a card.

I have my "Not So Black Book" (it's purple; my version of the little black book) in which I have various sections dedicated to things like that. Dress, venues, clothes, etc. But I don't know if I'm missing anything. There's a lot of stuff I haven't even thought of, that I need to get done.

And any tips for how to get certain stuff for cheap would be great! I'm a total newbie at this.

Really cheap?

Get married at City Hall now, and have a party when you can afford it.

That's what a number of my younger colleagues, and children of my friends are doing.

No fuss, no muss, and very little upset.

No Bridezilla problems possible with that sort of arrangement.

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My best friend had a very small church wedding - 2 guests each outside of IMMEDIATE family, and then an afternoon cocktail reception at her parents. That was very elegant and not too expensive.

Another friend had a mid-size church wedding and then an evening reception at the local canoe club hall - catered by family and wedding party. Inexpensive, not so elegant, and horribly annoying and stressful for family and wedding party.

I'd recommend an afternoon reception vs an evening reception for cost-cutting. Also much less time-consuming for guests. Nothing worse than an entire weekend sucked up by going to a wedding and reception. 4 - 6 hours is more than enough time to spend with all of that.

One thing about Miami is that you've got those beaches -- beach weddings can be fun (but really depends on the weather of course.) My cousin got married in Miami on the beach, it was a cold gray day (in Miami!) but it didn't rain, and the variations of gray-blue-green in the sky and the water with the white foam were actually gorgeous.

Venue and food is often what takes up the most money.

Krysia--



Would you rather be an expert, planning your third or fourth really cheap wedding?

We got married at a so-called wedding chapel in Santa Monica by a justice of the peace. Total of seven people, including us. Then we went out for Chinese food at a good restaurant in Beverly Hills, where we had many platters of this and that. Our friend Harvey got to take all the leftovers, since first of all he paid for it - and besides we didn't have any room in our refrigerator because...
the next day, a Sunday, we had friends and family to our house for a buffet and drinks catered by, er, me. We had already lived together in our house for three years, and I had worked out the cooking so I didn't have to be stuck in the kitchen on our wedding night... and we could go to a movie, heh. We had a fine time, it was actually quite romantic in its way, and not at all expensive.

<awaiting horrified frowns>

One possible way to find inexpensive flowers is to have a close friend there in Florida who has a sumptuous flower filled garden. To me there is nothing as wonderful as real garden flowers as their natural selves.

A few ideas.

1. Get married any time other than Friday night or any time on Saturday. Possibly even avoid Sunday if you can. RP and I were married on a Monday afternoon (Memorial Day, 1992) and it was a LOT less expensive.

2. Only use flowers that are in season. I see you're going with wholesale, that's great! But you can cut that cost even more by going with seasonal. That means tulips if it's now, holly and the like if it's in winter, etc. Also, consider supplementing bouquets with a lot of greens, or just go with one flower. A one-flower "bouquet" can be quite lovely for a bride, assuming the flower is perfect and I mean PERFECT. Centerpieces can be just a plant (we had ivy plants. Ivy stands for fidelity, it was a nice touch) or even nonfloral in nature. You can do pretty bowls filled with colorful candies or origami if you know how to do that.

3. Photography/videography is expensive. We don't watch our video too often but we do look at the photos on occasion. If you're going to put money anywhere, put it into the photos and skip the video.

4. Dresses are cheaper if they are from last season. Some places do one-night rentals of formal gowns. That probably won't work for your gown but it might for your bridesmaid(s).

5. I was at a wedding once which was "catered" as a potluck by the bride's female relatives. See if your church will allow something like that. If not, see if you can do a tea or similar small meal as opposed to a big deal all-out caloric blitz. Afternoon weddings mean lunch. Evening or night weddings mean multi-course meals. Obviously, the former is far less expensive than the latter.

6. Keep the wedding party small. You should give a small gift to everyone who's in the wedding (we gave wallets for the guys and purses for the gals; I received a Tiffany key chain when I was a bridesmaid at my brother's wedding. That kind of thing) so of course it's less expensive if you buy for only two or four attendants rather than eight or so. Don't force yourself into an even number of attendants or feel obligated to even up the number of men and women. It's not important.

7. Shoes, hair etc. for your bridesmaids does not all have to be uniform. After all, unless you've got sextuplets in your bridal party, they are not going to be all alike. And why should they?

8. As for your own shoes and hair, go for comfy shoes and easy to manage and style hair. I worse peach satin slippers that were something like $12 from a Hanes outlet. No one is looking at your feet. Unless you need to have a particular heel height in order to get your gown to hang right, go with what you like. Any white, ivory or pastel shoe is fine. Just stay away from combat boots.

For hair, I had a French braid and a pretty barrette to keep it in place. That's all. It was no worry and my regular hair dresser took care of it the night before. Try a few hair styles now and see what you like. You might find you can even do it yourself or have an attendant do the style if it's a simple one.

9. Cleanup is done by the church, but find out what their policy is. If they need to hire extra help, you will probably be charged for that.

10. Rings are inexpensive if not bejeweled. I assume you are asking about wedding as opposed to engagement rings. We got ours for about $150 total. It was a regular jewelry store. Just shop around. These days, you might even want to check out eBay although be aware that you will need to deal with a VERY reputable, well-rated dealer to be sure you aren't being ripped off.

11. Tuxes or suits -- to rent a tux for the evening is far less expensive than buying a new suit. But if a new suit is needed anyway, you might as well go with that. If you're going the rental route, shop around. We got ours pretty inexpensively and the groom's tux was free. The guys could even rent shoes and the like.

12. Paperwork -- open the phone book for the county where you are getting married (if you don't own the right phone book, go to the Library and do this there) and look up marriage licenses. When you call City Hall to find out the particulars, find out if you need a blood test or anything else.

13. Makeup -- I did my own, so did my attendants. Keep in mind it's Miami and take the time of year into consideration. Will it be really hot? Humid? Of course you want makeup that won't sweat off.

14. Get together a small basket of samples -- dental floss, Tampax, emery boards, cotton swabs, little mouthwashes, stain blotting wipes, perfume samples and the like and keep it for the day of the wedding. Put it in the ladies room. If there's more than one ladies' room, make enough accordingly. This is a nice touch, and the items will be used. We really appreciated the dental floss in particular. No one is going to brush their teeth during the reception, but no one wants spinach in their teeth while pictures are being taken.

15. Keep track of any specific traditions that should be covered, and how. My mother-in-law is deaf so she did not want to have a mother-son dance if it was just going to be her and my husband, so instead we did that in combination with the father-daughter dance. We have a tradition of raising the bride and groom (and sometimes also their parents) on chairs while dancing. Our folks didn't want that, so we settled that before the wedding and no one worried about it.

Hmm, I think that's all of it. Congratulations to you and remember that something will go wrong (for me, it was that the DJ forgot "our" song. It was okay, I improvised on the spot). Accept that, wait for it, and then tell yourself that you've had the thing go wrong and now the rest of the day will be perfect. Because it will.

I know I may get called up about this, but since you said you're Catholic i'm assuming that despite all the above you're planning on being married in church. That's fine, i'd never have it any other way either. Where most people do small wedding, big reception to save money, the fact that you're paying for the use of the church and the ceremony means that if needs be you could fill the church, and have your "reception" as a small night out with friends... although obviously for a lot of people the bride and groom's first dance etc are important - i don't know how you feel about that

In terms of rings, unbejwelled doesn't mean any less amazing. I'm guessing it's different over there, but in the UK (or my part at least) engagement rings have gems but wedding rings hardly ever do - it's normally a very simple gold band - not expensive. I don't know if there is a US equivalent of Argos.... (this is like a big catalogue company that have a 1400 page catalogue about 200 pages of which are jewellery. They do some really nice stuff at high street jeweller prices - but they have a lot of variety)

Paying for the choir at your church could be rather expensive - it depends on the church. And often they're not needed. I sang at one wedding where rather than having the choir sing the anthem during the signing of the registers the bride and group had a group of 4 friends who sang, played violin, guitar and drums. We (the choir) were pretty much surplus to needs and it was GORGEOUS. If you have friends who can sing then utilise them.

I agree with jespah - as far as the photographer - don't skimp on that, but instead of paying some one to take a video - ask a friend (could be a prefect wedding gift) to video it. We had my brother and a family friend. The family friend came from across country and she not only video taped the wedding, but all the festivities leading up to the wedding. Tours of Boston we had for out of town guests, the rehearsal, she even video taped the town we were living in. Seeing you will all be in Miami, that would be lots of fun to tape.

It also sounds like you are on a great start. Keep the wedding to as small as possible (within reason of course). Seeing you are getting married out of state this will probably help. Do you know some one who is good at styling hair and make up? Instead of going to a salon - have a friend put you together.

Invitations - again just shop around (the earlier the better). Fortunately for me, I had a friend who sold these on the side, so I got a good price. The one thing, the simpler the invitation, the least the expensive (and to me the more elegant). Also, if you are very good on the computer, you could probably put together your own after looking at samples - especially if you do not want all the graphics on it - just buy some high quality paper to print them on - do similar on place cards.

As far as napkins and matches with your names on it - forget it. We didn't do it, because of some huge problems with our wedding venue, and no one even noticed.

Desert can be your wedding cake.

I went to a wedding last month. The bride wore an absolutely stunning white silk gown with pearl, silver and crystal beading all over the bodice. It fit her like a dream, and she looked like a princess.

Later she told me she found the dress on eBay for $100! It was the right size, and she had it fitted by a tailor when she received it for about another $100. It looked like a million dollars.

There's no such thing as small weddings in my family. What makes our weddings so expensive is food, beer, security and live music. They are usually no frills weddings in terms of dresses, limo's, jewelry, fancy waiters, and fancy halls.

It's all about the people in my opinion. If you can't invite poeple who want to be there because you're trying to keep costs down, then i would pospone it.

The most boring wedding I ever went to was a small, fancy, "no kids" wedding. But it looked like it cost a fortune on food, waiters, chandelears, and fancy dresses.