I'm getting married

A big wedding isn't what is important. Love and respect are the only things that matter. We did most of our own wedding food and decorations. David's Bridal has a huge selection of 99.99 dresses. The only thing we splurged on was the cake. It was beautiful snow covered with a sleigh on top. We spent less than a thousand dollars all told. We waited for a honeymoon until our first anniversary.

Wow congratulations. I hope it all goes well for you. My oldest friend got married last weekend and it was bittersweet for me because I was so happy for her, yet part of me was feeling sensitive wondering if my partner will ever get it together to propose. He wants to, but said he won't until he's found the perfect ring and since we're both broke at the moment, it will probably be a long time!

Hi! Congratulations and best wishes for your married life.I am so happy for you.I was going through the discussion it sounds so cute.What a lot of planning is going into it.Money and lavishness is not required.Even if it is a quiet affair with only close friends and your family you can make it a memorable occassion.Among the best marriages that on this earth were made,may your's always find a serene and secure place.God Bless the two of you.

Congratulations! We're divorced now but we pulled off a cheap wedding in 6 weeks. Now is the time to start finding out what family and friends are good at and what they have to offer. If someone has a nice backyard and house they're willing to offer as the wedding site you can save a lot of money on church/hall fees for the wedding and reception dinner. If you have cooks as friends or family enlist them for making the dinner instead of paying a caterer, perhaps one of them may be skilled in baking and cake decorating also. Use things like pasta and in season fruits and vegetables to keep the food bill low. Find out who has nice digital cameras and video cameras and ask them to take the photos and video the wedding. Any musicians around? One good friend willing to play piano or organ is all you really need for wedding music OR find some one with a good stereo and make a mix CD of the songs you want played during the wedding (even the wedding march) and then all you'll need is someone to hold the remote and push the appropriate buttons. You could do the same in place of a DJ or band for the reception. able center pieces can be kept as simple as a vase with fresh local flowers. I even know someone who picked wildflowers from along side the road the morning of her wedding to use as ALL the wedding flowers- bouquets, centerpieces, cake decorations, boutonierres. Again friends and family with flower gardens could help out with that also. That's all I can think of at the moment but I think I covered all the basics and the only real cost was the food...oh start looking at winter ball gowns, they'll be clearanced off here shortly and you might be able to find a really nice white one to use as your wedding dress for under $100, depending on what colors you want for the bridesmaids you might be able to do the same for their's. After prom time will also be a good time to find them and they might be more season and color appropriate for a summer wedding and their might be white ones then too.

I got married in a wedding dress from a consignment shop that cost $100, but had really been an $800 dress when purchased new. It was way better quality and didn't look like the same dress that everyone else got married in over the past year or so of weddings I had gone to. I did have to make one minor alteration with a local seamstress. I would check consignment shops rather than doing what a lot of people do - David's Bridal. The prices are reasonable at David's but they rope you into alterations that are outrageously priced by ordering a dress one size too big for you and you end up doubling your dress price. I agree with what people have said about using flowers in season. Boquets for our wedding only cost $7.00 each, and we didn't make a big deal to announce that "this was a wedding" = charge me more. They just put a few different flowers in mine. We bought white plates and put candles on them and I think each centerpiece cost us $8-9 each. What I would not cut corners on is photos. WHile you do not have to spend thousands and get a photo of every 5 seconds of the reception, having poor or no photos at all is what some couples regret maybe not that day but years later. If we would have left it up to guests to take snapshots, we would have ended up crying. We bought disposable cameras to put on the tables and got really dark/faraway photos or we got photos of people taking stupid things like urinals in the bathrooms, etc. None of those photos were at all usable. And even if you do have a good photographer in the famiy (and be honest) they are going to be involved in the day and are not going to be thinking about different shots. And on the other hand my cousin spent a lot of money and the photographer stood people in front of light fixtures and everyone looked like they had antlers. Take a little bit to find someone who has a very good eye, but will offer you a package where they will get the important stuff - bride and groom, the family and wedding party posed photos, and some candids. So no matter what the weather, someone will be getting a few good pictures. Then its up to you what you want to order but at least you will have something. My sister got a bad photographer who took only one shot of each bridesmaid instead of several to make sure they got when that they were not blinking in. We ended up using money gifts we got from the wedding to buy some prints.

I wish you all you have dreamed become reality, happiness, good health and much much love with your husband to be.Money doesnt make much difference, only people and emotions, so i am sure your wedding ceremony will be perfect. About honeymoon, you can always have a longer one later, no-one says that honeymoons have to be done right after wedding :) I am not married myself, i am quite young yet, but i can understand your joy.

A thousand dollar wedding IS possible...my daughter's beautiful wedding cost far less than that and got many rave reviews. Remember, the more people invited, the more it will cost. Stick to flowers that are in season, that way they won't have to be special ordered. Add tons of baby's breath to all the flowers in boquets and arrangements, and they will always look full and lush. My daughter wanted a garden wedding. So, in the spring I got an arbor on sale at the garden shop and planted quick growing floral vines over it so that by the time of the wedding it would be filled with flowers and the minister and they could stand underneath it. (I fertilized once a week, and it was huge and lush with blooms by the time of the wedding in early July) If you don't want a garden wedding, a smaller church usually works well too, as it's not usually as booked as much as the larger churches. Food...catering your own event with relatives is NOT all that hard:-) We made up large pans of stovepipe macaroni with tomato sauce and seasonings and then froze it. The day before the wedding, we took them out of the freezer to defrost and they were warming in the oven about an hour before the reception was. (We had extra sauce frozen so that we could pour it over top so they wouldn't be as 'dry.') One relative made a huge batches of potato salad, and another one made tons of cookies and treats. We had large platters with scads of different meats (NOT the kind that is packaged, but the kind you get from the local butcher...fresh and delicious) Also had platters of different types of breads, and cheeses. With so many people having dietary concerns, this way they could choose what they were allowed to eat. This worked well for us, as soon as you hire a caterer, you will be paying around $20 a plate (or more!!) Ask among your relatives who makes what specialty dishes, believe me, most would be proud to do that for you if you ask that it be their gift to you at your wedding. (My relatives did that and ALSO gifted the couple.) There are many ways to reduce the cost of a wedding. You just have to choose to become more involved yourself and not hire out tasks that you could do yourself (or your family.) I made my daughters 3 tiered cake, maybe you know somebody who is a baking whiz? (I've done several for my daughters friends, and for my own girlfriends, who couldn't afford bakery prices...it was part of my gift to them.)

IS that your biggest reason why you will marry your fiance? i believe that money is not the best reason to get married but when everything is in good place and just need the right time then it could be fine.. Congratulations!

yeah, its possible to do that we had one in which we just had the wedding at a state park in front of a pond a simple $500 reception at a restaurant my sis made the cake, and the after reception was at her house then we went to a hotel for a couple days, like 200 miles away in CA, the first hotel we went to was local and we diceded we needed more of a honeymoon than that anyway, you can see it IS possible , to do a cheap nice wedding, its really for just showing the love you have for each other to people who know you. If somebody has 10,000 or 50,000 for a wedding, spend it toward a house or something instead

Congratulations! Good quality marriage doesn't depend on an expensive wedding and honeymoon cost. It depends on both of you. I hope you will have a happy marriage and be with the one you love for your whole life.

Congratulations on your upcoming wedding. Probably the cheapest way to get married is just to go to the court house and get married. Thats what i did when i got married because we were so strapped for cash. I really didnt care about the wedding as long as we got married. I was tired of waiting. Good luck!

Grats on that Liber. I wish you and your fiance the best. Here's to your happiness. I hope your married life is a just, fufilling and loving one.

Hi,there! Well,since you guys love each other pretty much and you wanna get married with each other,I don't think the size of the wedding matters very much.The point is not the wedding,but you yourselves.The two could also spend a very happy wedding even if it's small cause love is the main factor and it makes everything else beautiful and gorgeous.I can already imagine your small but nice and pleasant wedding ceremony:) Best wishes for your wedding and I hope you guys will have a wonderful honey moon^_^Have a nice day and do what you like to do.LOL! Take care!

I would like to congratulate you for your marriage. I am also planning to get married after 3 years. Hope I will make up enough money till then to settle abroad.