Wedding Blog

Date: September 12, 2009
City, State: Finger Lakes Region, New York
Budget: $13,057.63
# of Guests: 156 invited, 120 attended

We originally thought we might be able to do an $8,000 wedding, but after doing a little research and committing to a church wedding, we realized we needed to bump it up. We decided on $13,057.63 by budgeting out each individual piece, rather than the entire wedding as a whole. Since we already knew how much some stuff would cost when we made our budget we came up with a very specific number, instead of a round one.

We saved in a lot of areas, but the biggest savings for us was probably the catering. It was done by a local grocery store (Wegmans). We splurged a bit on the ceremony and paid a lot of fees to the Church and for music. Our parents also contributed around $2,400 and the bride’s sister and BIL paid for the champagne. We kept what they paid for in the budget to portray the real costs of this wedding, even though we ended up paying less due to their contributions.

Wedding Day Costs

Ceremony Site fees & Type of Venue: Catholic Church

• Church fee: $150
• Coordinator: $125
• Priest Gift: $50.25 (gift cards)
• Guitarist: $320 (paid for playing as well as gas to drive 7 hours)
• Music Coordinator: $125
• Pre-Cana: $75
• Decorations: $50 (two flower vases with carnations)

Total: $895.25

Marriage License: $40.00

Reception Site fees & Type of venue: City Park on Lake Front with Rented Tent

• City Park rental fee: $50 (Friday through Monday)
• Insurance: $50 (estimate, my parents paid, said it was less than $100)
• Tent Rentals: $1,237 (40’x60’ white tent with 100’ walls, 20’x20’ caterer’s tent)
• Dance Floor: $180.00 (16’x16’)
• Music: $17.47 (cable and mic; iPod thru laptop + Jukebox brought by friend)
• Tax on Tents and Dance Floor: $105.12

Total: $1,639.59

Rentals & Supplies for reception:

• Tables and Chairs: $258.75 (15 60″ round tables, 2 6’ rectangle tables; 120 white chairs)
• Linens: $183.90 (15 ivory table cloths, 120 linen napkins, bought paper napkins)
• Dishes and Cutlery: $217.16 (rented china and silverware, bought plastic ware)
• Glasses: $71.06 (rented wine and champagne glasses, bought plastic cups)
• Tax: $57.83
• Delivery Fee: $60.00
• Tip: $40.00 (the guys who came to pick up waited an extra hour for us to finish)

Total: $888.70

Catering & Drink (total/per person): Catered by Wegmans; provided own beverages

• Chafing Dish Rentals: $100
• Appetizers: $444.41 (Sushi, Shrimp cocktail, European cheese platter + baguettes, veggie platter, fruit platter, antipasto tray)
• Buffet Dinner: $537.56 (Asian cucumber salad, General Tso’s Chicken, Beef and Broccoli, Thai Red Curry with Chicken, Lo Mein; Kid’s Finger Sandwiches platter, Baked Mac and Cheese)
• Servers: $525.00 (2 servers & 1 manager for 7 hours)
• Gratuity: $176.75 (included in bill ahead of time)
• Catering Tax: $134.99
• Liquor: $148.56 (5 pre-mixed drinks in 2-gallon pitchers from dollar store, we ended up not using even half of all the liquor we bought)
• Beer: $200 (two kegs for $175 plus $25 tip)
• Wine: $282.60 (1.5 cases white, 1 case red, .5 case blush)
• Champagne: $242.25 (15 bottles)
• Non-Alcoholic Beverages: $26.44 (Coke, Diet Coke, Tea, Juice, Gatorade)

Total: $2,818.56 / $23.49pp

Bridal Gown, Accessories & Alterations:

• Maggie Sottero AD1008: $632.72 (this includes tax)
• Alterations: $50.00 (charged $40, I gave $50 because she did such a great job)
• Veil: $0.00 (wore my mother’s)
• Jewelry: $0.00 (necklace was gift from MOH, earrings were gift from FI)
• Shoes: $113.63 (red heels for ceremony, ballet flats for reception)

Total: $796.35

Groom’s Attire:

• Suit: $0.00 (free with rental of four GM suits)
• Vest: $35.00
• Shoes, socks, etc (already owned): $0.00

Total: $35.00

Stationery/Postage: invites from Whimsical Prints

• Invitations: $192.00 (67 invites, RSVP cards, thank you cards + addressed envelopes)
• Shower Thank yous: $14.75 (20 cards, 25 envelopes)
• Postage: $73.84 (mailing invites, stamps for replies, mailing thank you’s)
• Programs: $20.00 (cost of paper, we made the programs)
• DIY Maps: $4.80 (cost of copying at Staples)
• Photo inserts for Thank you’s: $19.87 (pack of photo paper unused, prints at Walmart)

Total: $325.26

Photography: We found Perrotta Creative on Craigslist. She was just starting to get into Wedding Photography so she offered a great deal and we took a chance on a not-yet-established photog. The risk was worth it, Erin did a great job and we couldn’t be happier with our photos. All the photos for this recap were taken by her.

• Wedding Day photography: $500 (7 hours of coverage, all raw images on DVDs)
• Prints: $83.87 (over 400 prints of various sizes from online printing company)

Total: $583.87

Flowers and Decorations: DIYed with fiftyflowers.com

• All flowers: $553.20 (250 carnations, 200 ranunculus, 100 phlox, bin for flowers, floral tape, satin ribbon)
• Pots and Vases: $148.99 (30 ceramic pots 6″-10″, 2 tall glass vases)
• Tissue Paper Poms: $72.21 (tissue paper, shipping charge, fish wire, twine)
• Supplies from Michael’s: $59.30 (paper for table cards, pens, markers, etc)
• Table Card Holders: $23.00 (15 holders which ended up not working well)
• Cricut mat: $10.00 (borrowed Cricut from friend to make Table Cards)

Total: $866.70

Favors: $123.56 We made truffles, pecan praline bars, lemon butter bars and bought tiny sugar cookies plus made dark or white chocolate fleur de lys candies. These all went into cute little white boxes which we tied with ribbon and tagged with guests’ names. We also did very simple OOT bags, accounted for in this amount. DIYing this really saved a lot of money, and every loved the homemade treats!

Cake: $307.19 Three layer butter cream with white cake layered with strawberry and cream filling. We decided not to decorate because we didn’t really see the purpose. It was delicious!

Hair & Makeup: We had this done at a local salon and I was thrilled with how well they did our hair. We only ran about 20 minutes overtime, too!

• Hair for bride + 4 BMs: $250.00 (includes trial and tip on day of)
• Makeup: $41.00 from Sephora (most of which I did not use)
• Pedicure: $75.00 (paid for my 11 year old cousin to have pedi and mani, and a pedi for myself. She made most of the flower arrangements and helped a ton with decorating!)

Total: $366.00

Wedding Party Gifts:

• Bridesmaids: $369.50 (For all: handmade clutch purses, pashminas; Individual gifts: handmade vases, personalized stationery, personalized address stamper, necklace, sleep balm, under eye depuffer)
• Groomsmen: $330.00 (paid for all suit rentals)
• Priest: $12.99 (wine for groom’s hometown priest, who did a lot of paperwork)
• Helper: $11.00 (specialty beer for BIL’s brother, who helped set up reception)

Total: $723.49

Transportation: $0.00 (friends drove us, nothing fancy)

Hotel: $159.68 (we spent less than 12 hours in this room, and 8 of those hours were sleeping)

Misc: $140.51 (dress for rehearsal, hotel for guitarist)

Wedding Day Total: $10,709.71
Total Cost Per Person: $89.25
All Inclusive Costs
Wedding Bands: $148
We got 3mm 14k gold bands from iWeddingband.com. We were very happy with this purchase, as we both prefer simple bands and these were a really great deal. Shipping and engraving was free!

Rehearsal Dinner: $250 (?)
The parents of the groom hosted this at the bride’s parents’ house (groom’s family are from out of town). Not renting a hall or restaurant saved a bunch of money, and the food was provided by the local grocery store. Salad, roast, lasagna, etc. plus drinks. Very casual atmosphere. I don’t know how much this cost, the above is just an estimate. I also have no pictures, unfortunately!

Honeymoon: $2,156.31
We went to Bermuda for 5 nights. We stayed at the 9 Beaches resort, which was pretty nice, if a little bit quiet. We had a lot of fun in Bermuda and didn’t hold back too much. This number includes all food purchases, all transportation including bus passes for the islands, airport transport, and airfare. It also includes the price of the hotel where we stayed.

All Inclusive Total: $2,554.31

GRAND TOTAL: $13,264.02