Weddingbee Blog

Well, obviously.

But they cost, like, A LOT of money. I had this notion when Mr. Foxy and I first got engaged that we could do a wedding for 10k or under, plain and simple. Since it will be entirely self-funded (aside from Foxy Mama buying my dress), it’s actually pretty crucial that we keep costs to a minimum. Then I started researching and reading articles. Many venues charge up to $5,000 just for a booking fee, without anything included. Catering is another $5,000+, with many places asking for a $7-10,000 minimum of food and beverage. Then there’s DJ, cake, photographer, videographer, dresses, favors, stationery, etc. Learning about all of this was really overwhelming for me, especially when a close friend of mine revealed that her catering/beverage budget alone is $20,000 - twice our entire budget. Gulp. Then I checked out costofwedding.com, where they reported that the average cost of a wedding in the United States is $19,581. For the area of Maryland that we live in, it’s more like between $20,625 and $34,375.

So…more than $10,000.

halp.

Well then. It looks like I just got schooled.

Now I know from several websites (like Weddingbee!) and sources that it is absolutely possible to go cheaper than that and still have an amazing wedding. I like to think of myself as crafty and am totally gung-ho on doing a bunch of DIY projects, but these too cost precious dollars. And time. (And “time is money,” etc. and so forth). So what’s a girl to do? We surely don’t have that kind of money; if we did, we’d have bought a house instead of renting one and would have our car paid off.

Foxy and I realized that, while $10,000 may be a bit of a stretch for our 100+ person wedding, we could probably go up just a bit, since it seemed to be necessary for the location, size, and type of celebration we wanted to have. And to compensate for that extra money, some lifestyle changes would need to be made.

At the current moment, we’re each working weird schedules. Being a massage therapist and part time instructor at my massage school, I’m not exactly the bread winner of this relationship. I generally work from noon until about 8PM, give or take a few hours. Foxy has just started shift work at his job, which has him working 7am-7pm for two weeks, then 7pm-7am for two weeks. It’s a really, really sucky schedule, but the weeks he works overnight? He gets his salary plus a whopping 30%.

Hellooo, wedding fund money jar.

Image via Kaboodle

Damn it, wrong jar.

Image via Amazon

That’s better!

This inevitably means less time that Foxy and I can spend together. Which I know has been (and will be) fine…hard, for sure, but good in the long run. We just got so comfortable with our past schedules and being able to see each other after work almost every day and hang out together on weekends, that the changing hours and extra jobs have obviously created some challenges here and there. We don’t have the same days off, we have very few date nights that actually consist of leaving the house, etc. Good thing our cats amuse us.

I have a feeling a ton of brides- and grooms-to-be have gone through this same thing. Anyone who can share in my poor-girl-plans-a-wedding woes?