Cost-Cutting Tip: Helping Hands
December 3rd, 2007 @ 4:57 pm by Mrs. Toucan
One of the cost-cutting tips that I’ve read thousands of times in bridal magazines and bridal books is to have talented friends and family help you with various parts of your wedding instead of hiring a professional to do it. I always thought, “Great tip. I don’t know anyone in the wedding industry. This tip totally doesn’t help me.”
It turns out, that I was wrong! Mr. Toucan and I have been pleasantly surprised at how talented our family and friends are! I completely forgot that my uncle (my mom’s side) in Hong Kong owns a silk floral factory. He’ll be making our centerpieces for our banquet tables. Additionally, my aunt (my dad’s side), for a hobby took up floral design, and has offered to do our floral arrangements for our church ceremony, as well as bouquets and boutonnières! 
Between the two of them, we have no need to hire a florist!
Recently, one of Mr. Toucan’s friends also agreed to make our wedding cake for us! She took a cake decorating class a couple of years ago for fun, and got quite good at it! I knew wedding cakes were expensive, but after doing some research, it really surprised me how really expensive they could get. Even after buying all the supplies for her, we’d still be saving a ton of money!
Do you have any friends or family working on wedding-related projects for you?
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14 Responses to “Cost-Cutting Tip: Helping Hands”
How lucky you are! I was pretty lucky too since my brother is a videographer and had his friends film our big day. What a money saver!
From the wedding planner side of me, though, be careful in relying on friends and family. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to find vendors at the last minute (sometimes 2-3 days in advance) to fill in for the friends and family that drop out. Many times it’s due to stress, traveling, or because they procrastinated and didn’t want to tell the bride. I’m sure your helpers aren’t like that, but just be cautious
I’m on a total budget wedding since we’re paying for it ourselves, so we’re very blessed to have many generous and talented friends. So far, I have a friend who’ll be playing the piano at our ceremony, photographer friends taking pictures of the whole event, a film major friend who’ll be doing the videography, hairstylist friend who’ve volunteered to do my hair and one of my bridesmaids will do my make up. Apart from that, I do wedding invites, programs, favors and decor on the side already, so I’ll be doing all that for our wedding. So I’m almost all covered! Yay!
my fiance’s cousin’s wife (whew!) designs wedding invitations and is doing ours for a nice discount, a friend is DJing (he DJs professionally and has done plenty of weddings, so no fears!)– he’s giving us a discount and is already super reasonable, friends will help with ceremony music, and i plan on getting help from as many of my crafty friends as i can! i think it makes the whole thing more special to have people we know in love so closely involved.
My FSIL has a friend designing our invitations for free. She is a graphic design student and is using it for a school project. I will only have to pay for printing costs. My uncle is a deacon and will be performing the ceremony. My FSIL made her veil so I know she does good work. She offered to make mine. My uncle is a DJ and is doing my wedding for free. My cousin is singing. I have gotten very lucky so far. I wish I knew a good cake decorater…..
are you still going with the short centerpieces? are they all going to be silk flowers? i’d love to see!
my best friend is a bridal photographer, my mom’s best friend from high school owns a bakery and is doing cupcakes for us, my friend from high school is a florist and is flying in from nashville to do the wedding and my bud growing up is a caterer, we have a friends and family affair all over the place!
Wedding is THIS SATURDAY! I may pass out. 
I made sure to go over all the printer’s paperwork with a graphic designer friend, and ALL of the day-of running-around and ribbon-hanging and all that sort of garbage was done–enthusiastically–by the groom’s cousins. The groom’s aunt does a lot of painting as a hobby, and she made gorgeous signs to mark the hidden driveway to the ceremony.
Laura, thanks for the word of caution! I’ll definitely keep it mind!
reila, yup still short. They’ll be all silk. When I have pictures, I’ll post them.
kimi, early congrats on your wedding!
I seem to be the one who people say they know rather than the person who knows people. Okay, that didn’t make much sense…but basically if someone I knew needed place settings for 100 or a day-of coordinator I was the one they called. Made me feel loved!
yes, i have many talented friends and family helping me out with my weddings. Here are a few shameless plugs!
my sister of wanart (http://www.wanart.com) designed my stds and invitations.
i’m part of gund kwok - the only all Asian women lion & dragon dance troupe in the nation - and they’re performing the lion dance at my wedding for free! (http://www.gundkwok.org)
my friend has his own photography business out in california and is going to do our engagement photos in a couple of weeks when he comes home for the holidays. (http://www.partitaphotography.com)
my friend is going to be our officiant. massachusetts allows people to apply through the governor’s office to be an officiant for a day.
I lucked out with photography - one of my best friends and my 2nd cousin are both wedding photographers - they tag teamed our wedding. I found out later what a money saver this was! One of them also did amazing bridal portraits for me!
We also had a close friend of my hubby’s family as our officiant.
My mom is super crafty so she decorated the railings and bought the center pieces. She has created all the blocks for the quilt guest book. She also made my veil and my garter. All this and she was a wonderful matron of honor too!
I bought our cake for the wedding since it was in my town - but when we had the reception in my home town my mom’s good friend made the cake. She has been making cakes for us for years!!! Birthdays, Showers, My First Housewarming, etc etc. It was beautiful and absolutely delicious. Way better than the cake I paid for for the wedding! In fact one of these days I’m going to take lessons from her!
It was super special to be able to include friends and family in our wedding!
I wish I did, but I don’t , so I’ll live vicariously through you! =)
You bet I am! My mom does calligraphy and wedding invitations, so she did that for me. I’m thrilled because they look beautiful!
My stepmom is baking cookies for the hotel baskets. She would have made our cake too, but my dad nixed that idea. I think he was worried that she would be too busy and that their NYC kitchen is too small.
My soon-to-be-brother-in-law is a wedding photographer, so he’ll be one of our photographers. I have another photographer who I used to work with who will cover the ceremony and more of the reception.
I’m a musician, so I was hoping to have a friend play the violin during the ceremony, but he has a concert earlier that afternoon. I have another friend I may ask to do it (though this person isn’t on the A list).
I think that’s about it… but it’s a lot! And it’s all been a huge help!
p.s. Hi. It’s my first time posting. Wedding is 1/20/08.
Mrs. Toucan, Boston
Age and Occupation: 25, Full-time Research Assistant, Part-time Graduate Student
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Actuary
Engagement Date: February 18, 2007
Wedding Date: June 7, 2008
Blogging Since: November 07, 2007
Venue: St. Catherine of Genoa, Jin Asian Cuisine Restaurant
About Me: I’m a Gemini to the extreme. On one side, I’m a girly girl. I read countless bridal and fashion magazines, and have an obsession with keeping up with the latest Hollywood gossip. On the other side, I’m a sports fanatic. Despite being a full-time bride-to be, full-time research assistant, and part-time student, I’m also a full-time Red Sox fan from spring training to October, and a full-time Patriots fan from mini-camp to February. I devote almost as much time researching my for fantasy football team as researching for our wedding!
That is so great Miss Toucan!
We also lucked out Mr. Starr’s cousin is a pro wedding photographer and is covering all photography as a wedding present.