Wedding Blog

Talking budget was the hardest thing when it came to our wedding. After I came off of the high of getting engaged, I realized that there was a very real possibility that my parents would not contribute in a large way to our wedding. Even the least expensive “traditional” weddings cost entirely more than I think either of my parents would have anticipated. When my grandmother passed, she left me a little money that I put away for a very long time; I intended to use it toward my wedding one day in the future. Instead, we bought our condo 2 years prior to the wedding, and that money was gone. I avoided the subject of money entirely. We talked about the details of the wedding with my parents—what kind of wedding we envisioned, how many guests, etc., but we didn’t discuss money. I didn’t have the heart to bring it up, and I figured if my parents never brought it up, then we’d just find a way to pay for it ourselves. I was positive my parents would gift us some amount of money for our wedding, I just wasn’t sure how much. All the while, my parents both made a ton of noise about how in Thailand, it is the responsibility of the groom to pay for the wedding (don’t know how much of this is true, but my parents liked to say it OVER and OVER again). With that, I just decided not to really talk about it.

One day, my dad finally blurted it out: “How much money do you think your wedding is going to cost?” At this point, we were already talking winery wedding. I asked him how much he thought it was going to cost. He guessed $5,000. (Honestly, if I’d never talked about or attended a traditional “bells and whistles” wedding in my adult life at that point in time, I’d have probably guessed the same.)

I didn’t know what to say, other than that I figured it was going to cost a lot more than that. So, he guessed $10,000. Uncomfortable as hell, I just said that it was probably going to cost way more than he was ever going to be comfortable knowing about. He finally told us that he and my mom were going to gift us $15,000, and that we were to do with it whatever we wished. Buy a car, pay down our mortgage, have a wedding, whatever. I think he was hoping we’d pay down our mortgage. Of course, we didn’t.

In the end, we were so grateful for the gift, and I fully intended to spend whatever it took over that amount to have the wedding that we wanted to have. I guessed it would cost us $25K, and so I was prepared to spend $10K of my own money to make it happen, while Mr. Penguin was assigned to take care of the cost of the honeymoon and rehearsal dinner (a combination of his own money and generous gifts from his own parents).

So there it was. A $25K budget for a private winery wedding in rural Northern California.

I think the real wedding features are so beautiful here on Weddingbee, so I’m setting my post up very much like one, except it’s probably way less fun because you’ve all already seen most of these pictures. But I hope seeing the money laid out alongside the pictures helps!

Date: 6/7/2008
City, State: Plymouth, CA (near Sacramento)
Budget: $25K ($15K gift from my parents, $10K out of pocket)
# of Guests: 120

Wedding Day Costs

Ceremony Site Fees/Type of Venue: included in reception, Winery

Reception Site Fees/Type of Venue: $6500, Winery - It was important to me that wherever we had our wedding, that the site was completely closed to the public. I envisioned a private estate, winery, or a restaurant completely rented out for our wedding party. $6500 was a lot more than I wanted to spend for a venue, but worth it for the complete privacy. Our venue was really good about letting us do whatever we felt like doing, and had very few rules and restrictions, including letting us come and store random wedding stuff in an extra room of theirs throughout the week, letting us leave the venue a mess the night of so we could clean up the next morning instead, and allowing our dog to celebrate with us.

Caterer/Food/Drink (per person if available): $110 per person ($13,200) - The event was catered by the winery, and worked out well. The process was pretty low-stress. They included 1/2 bottle of wine per adult person in the food fee, and we brought our own beer and soft drinks.

Service Charge/Gratuities: Included

Bridal Gown & Alterations: $2400 - I wore a Jim Hjelm JH8657. I wish I’d spent more time dress shopping! I really hated dress shopping, but looking back, wish I tried on more than 5 dresses!

Bridal Accessories (Veil, Undergarments, Shoes, Jewelry): (veil borrowed), $100 for rest - My veil was beautiful, and generously lent to me by my step SIL. There was no way I could afford a veil that gorgeous.

My shoes were by Guess. To be honest, I thought they were a little “cheap” looking for my wedding look. I loved the color and the height, although the gold heel wasn’t great, but I just got tired of shoe searching at some point. The pop of color did look great under my dress, but these aren’t exactly shoes I’ll “treasure”. Not gonna lie, wish I had bought a fab pair of Jimmy Choos or Louboutins. I’m not a huge “shoe” person, but if I was ever going to splurge on a ridiculously priced pair of shoes, our wedding day was gonna be the day. I’m sure at the time I would have felt totally guilty about such a purchase.

These were $6 earrings I randomly found somewhere. I don’t really wear jewelry. I lost them on the night of the wedding, and didn’t really care.

Groom’s Attire: $120 -Men’s Wearhouse, what what. Technically, the tux was free with the purchase of the groomsmen’s tuxes, but we gave the free tux to Mr. Peng’s brother who was in school during our wedding and would have appreciated the free-ness more than we would have. I wish the men wore suits, but with the logistics of suits (I knew not everyone had a black or grey suit, and coordinating a buying effort was totally not something I wanted to do with groomsmen in New York and LA) it was just easier to have everyone wear tuxes.

Stationery/Postage: $800 -Save the dates, invitations, programs, menus… all homemade, all pretty budget friendly.

Save the date magnet

Boxed invitations, homemade

Programs

Menus

Photography: $3100 (2008 pricing) including travel fees and accommodations for 2 shooters from LA - Sarah K. Chen had 6 weddings under her belt at the time we booked her (and several more by the time she shot our wedding). I LOVED her! Finding someone talented but somewhat new to the business was a great way to save money. Ask everyone you know if they know anyone, search the internet, even check Craigslist… there is always someone upcoming and very talented out there with great rates.

Videography: Free - A client of mine and an ex wedding videographer shot our wedding.

Ceremony Music: None - Our DJ played music for our ceremony.

Reception Music: $250 (DJ friend)

Flowers: $800 -Huckleberry Karen provided all the bouquets, moms’ bouquets, and bouts. She bought the orchids and leaves for our centerpieces, and a few good friends set up the centerpieces on the day of. Sparse flower decor saved us a lot of money. We used peonies and orchids for the bouquets, and orchids for centerpieces.

Favors: $150 - Goccoed coaster favors with jellybeans

Cake: both Bride’s cake and Groom’s cake $550

Our bride’s cake baker, Ingrid Fraser, is a well seasoned dessert maker, who supplies desserts to many of the restaurants in Amador. The cake tasted amazing, subtly sweet, and so rich! Our groom’s cake was made by an absolutely incredible “crazy” cake maker, Crazy Cake Company in Davis, CA. She can seriously make ANYTHING 3D—something that I didn’t think was available in the Sacramento area.

Officiant: Friend

Coordinator: none

Hair/Makeup: $350 - I had my hair blown out at a local salon, and then Lisa Deniz from Bobbi Brown in Roseville came out to my parents’ house with all her makeup gear. It was really great to get my makeup done at home, when I had so many things to do that day.

Wedding Party Gifts: $1000

Transportation: $1200 - We rented 2 coach buses to take our guests from the hotel to the venue and back again. I rode with my photographer to the wedding, and back to the hotel on the bus. We discussed a limo, but seriously, I thought it was going to be a huge waste! I’m glad we didn’t get a limo… because our ceremony and reception was in one place, we really would have only rode in it for a few miles.

Hotels: $160 - Holiday Inn Express, baby. No shame.

Misc: Thai wedding dress and Mr. Peng’s Thai wedding jacket - $1000

WEDDING DAY TOTAL: $31,680
TOTAL COST PER PERSON: $264
(divide wedding day total by # of guests)

All Inclusive Costs:

Wedding Bands: $1500

Rehearsal Dinner/Day After Brunch: RD - $4000

Honeymoon: $5500 - Airfare and 10 nights at all-inclusive Excellence Playa Mujeres, Mexico

ALL INCLUSIVE TOTAL: $11,000

GRAND TOTAL: $42,680
(wedding day total + all inclusive total)

~~~

WHERE WE SAVED:

• Keeping it all inclusive - The venue, staff, food, linens—everything was all inclusive. While it may not sound like savings, it closed the door for us to think about splurging on “extras”—there were no options for fancy linens, interesting china patterns, extra meal courses, etc. We wrote a check, and we got a set meal, white linens, full wait and bar staff. I think in the end, it saved us money.
• LOTS of DIY - I really do think we saved a lot of money doing DIY, because I think if I bought, I would have splurged on letterpress.
• New talent and lots of help from friends - Our photographer was uber talented and somewhat new to the game, and so was our groom’s cake baker. This translated to cheaper pricing over seasoned pros. Our DJ, and videographer were our friends, and the setup was done by friends and family. Mr. Peng, some family members, and I cleaned up the wedding the next morning on our own.
• Buying bridesmaid dresses online (House of Brides) - I didn’t pay for these, but this translated to big savings for my BMs.
• Our sendoff brunch was at my parents’ house, and they took care of the expenses.
• Having our wedding near my hometown saved us a lot of money on travel, logistics, and storage, because we used my parents’ house as a home base.

WHERE WE SPLURGED:

• Having a private winery wedding isn’t exactly cheap. A $6500 site fee and over $13K in food could have been cheaper if we held our wedding in the off season, and were able to serve a less fancy meal.
• The Thai Water Ceremony - I didn’t expect the dress to cost so much. At the risk of sounding selfish, I was a little bummed I had to pay for this dress. My parents were really enthusiastic about this portion of the wedding, and of course they had given us a generous cash gift, so I was happy to oblige, but it ended up being a huge extra cost.
• My dress - I’m just not really a $2400 dress kind of person. I don’t really cherish my dress, so $2400 is kind of a ridiculous amount of money to spend on something that I wasn’t that excited about.

WHY WE WENT OVER INITIAL BUDGET:

• Splurging on our honeymoon. I think we did OK with our budget for the wedding day. With my parents’ $15K gift and my willingness to spend $10K out of my own pocket, we went slightly over budget on the wedding day. I did buy a TON of craft crap that I do actually use after the wedding, so that’s OK.
• I anticipated we’d have 90-100 guests, but ended out maxing our guest list at 120 (venue capacity). If we had kept our guest list to 90 people, we would have saved over $3K.

I hope this helps any of you with an approximate $30K budget for your day-of wedding.  I know we could have spiced it all up a bit more with more elaborate florals, and hiring more professionals (I wish I had a DOC). But overall, that is all in the past, and I don’t think I would have looked back on the day any differently with fancier bouquets, and more professionals handling our details. We had a great time, and planning the wedding was a stressful but rewarding experience!

Cheers!