Planning a wedding

It's future Mrs. Appgrad05's second wedding. Between that, and her dad's uncertain financial position, we are picking up the tab ourselves.

 

I'm with Cadet on this part.

Obviously some girls are higher maintenance than others, and hopefully people get an idea of this during the dating process. One of my friends is planning a wedding right now and she & the fiance are doing a small/medium wedding (80-ish people). I think they're going to get it in for less than five grand, everything included. It helps that she found her dress for $65 on sale.

You just have to hope you're both on the same page on enough things that the wedding planning goes off without too much of a hitch and too many arguments over what is and isn't necessary.

 

Most likely, your guests will give you money as a wedding gift. That should help.
Some suggestions... for our wedding, we did our own flowers. We bought them wholesale and had family and friends make the bouquets, boutonnieres, and simple centerpieces. We also asked a friend to videotape (but used a professional photographer- pictures are VERY IMPT). We also did our own invitations.

 

I think it's dangerous to jump to some kind of conclusion regarding anyone's relationship based solely on stress level during wedding planning.

It's a tough period to get through without having some moments - especially early on - when you feel like there's way too much to do, and not enough time, money or compromise to do it all. And it can feel like it's all crashing in on you.

Had we not been flush with cash at the time, we probably would have had a bit more stress, as a friend of mine is experiencing right now. Which is not a commentary on anyone's relationship, but rather an indicator that figuring out who doesn't get invited, what everything will cost, and how in the world you will ever be able to afford it and make it as great as you hope, is a very stressful experience.

 

But only do it this way if she's made it clear that's what she wants. You don't want her to feel like she's in the middle of a shit storm and you're doing nothing to help. And remember, it's your wedding, too -- this is a good place to practice the art of compromise you'll need down the road. No need to fight her at every turn, but I think having a cooperative spirit in planning the wedding is a good way to start a marriage.

Who pays? Ultimately, that depends on who wants to and can. In my case we had three sets of parents who offered to kick in what they felt comfortable with. One of the most uncomfortable conversations of my life came when we were needing to make decisions on what our budget was, and my father (with whom I am friendly, but not close) hadn't said anything about whether he was going to contribute. Not that I felt he owed us, but I just needed to know so we could move forward with planning.

I had to find a tactful way to ask him, "So, uh, should we be counting on anything from you?" When I actually got it out, he just said, "Oh, sure. Put me down for whatever your mom is giving."

 

Fiancee and I just started planning as well.

Found a nice outdoor chapel at the local state park and all they want is $15 for three hours or $30 for the whole day.

They also have a reception area and they want $40 for the whole day for that.

The only drawback is there's no booze allowed because it's a state park but since I 1.) don't drink and 2.) don't want to pay for an open bar, this is a great thing.

Next, we're going to attempt to do our own invitations. I figure it'll be a fun way to spend a weekend and while we're at it we can do the Thank You notes at the same time.

As for music, she has a friend who we're trying to get to do it for relatively cheap and we're probably going to go the 1p.m.-5p.m. idea mentioned here.

All in all, I'd be thrilled to do it for less than 2K.

Anyone know what the proper form is if we would prefer "cash in lieu of gifts"? We've got everything we need for our apartment already and don't want to put a registry together just because we can.

 

Man, leave it to schieza to throw a wedding where you can't drink.

 

Saving all the money for hookers and blow in Vegas, baby!

 

When people start threads about the intimate details of their lives, they forfeit the right to have people refrain from analysis or criticism.

For as many friends/family/etc. as I've seen get married and live happily ever after, I've also seen many who got married too young, got married for the wrong reasons, got married because of parental/religious/societal pressure, or the bride just wanted the big wedding spotlight and the marriage was an afterthought.

Everyone needs to enter marriage with their eyes wide fucking open. And yes, wedding planning is insanely stressful. But there's a difference between stress over seating charts and relationship issues, and they shouldn't be confused.

 

Then . . . why did you confuse them?

Yes, it is absolutely true that people are asking for analysis and criticism when they start such threads. That analysis should be more well-considered than "You're stressing over the wedding?! Better examine your relationship!"

I think we've all seen a lot of happy ever after and a lot of NOT happy ever after. A lot of us have watched others plan these things.

My point was that it's a bit of a leap to go from "planning stress" to "examine any other issues you might have."

 

My advice is to begin drinking heavily.

Also, with all due respect to those who have been able to plan a wedding that's less expensive than a new set of brakes on your car...I don't believe you. I also invite you to get married in the tri-state area, where everything beyond a courthouse wedding costs $20K. My wife was in grad school and I was unemployed when we got hitched and we didn't go apeshit and it STILL cost us north of $20K. I think I still owe my parents for some of it. Let's not go there.

And while SC makes a good point about the wedding industrial complex (or whatever she called it, sorry, long day), my school of thought is I'm only going to do this three or four times once, and there are flourishes, for lack of a better word, that we should have. That's not a giant bachelor/bachelorette party, or a $15,000 dress for my wife, or flowers made of special Ukranian ass hair.

It's the videographer we are grateful we paid for every day, b/c more than a few loved ones have left us since June 2002 and it's wonderful to see them on the screen. It's a competent fucking photographer who does this 52 weekends a year and manages to produce a Grade-A effort every time. My sister went cheap on her photographer...who promptly disappeared. Literally. She has like six photos from her wedding. We have somewhere around 6,000. Think she wishes she wasn't her typical cheap-ass self?

And it's about celebrating with your friends and loved ones, and being willing to pay for a place that everyone will rave about and remember. Maybe it was different for us, since we were together eight years before we got married, but there were a lot of people who were with us every step of the way and we wanted it to be a celebration of friendship as well as our love (awwwwwwwwwww).

And if I had to do it all over again, I'd drag her ass to Vegas.