My wedding was 20 years ago, but I still get bragging rights when it comes to all of my friends weddings. Flowers were cut from my mother’s flower garden, the china and silverware for the reception was all borrowed and mismatched. We had the wedding on my parents deck and borrowed the chairs from a local church. My mother in law made the grooms cake and we bought a simple tiered cake at a local bakery (with cream cheese icing) and placed the topper ourselves that we bought at Wal-Mart clearanced  out at $6.00. My dress was a piece of luck that I bought for $6.67 (clearance rack at CATO with additional 50% off clearance sale). The bouquet cost the most as I love daisies and my wedding was in late September(we chose September so that the weather would be cool enough to have it outdoors). I spent 75.00 on it. I bought my shoes as a buy one get one and bought a hat so that I wouldn’t have to spend money on a new hair do. My make-up was applied by a good friend of mine who is a cosmetologist. My photographs were done by an old boyfriend who was a professional photojournalist. In all, we spent $150.00 on my wedding. It was a lot of hard work for a handful of people but it was very worth it.  Although the marriage didn’t last, that wedding was worth every penny.

I had a classy $3k self-funded wedding the week after I graduated college. 

Seven years later I would do it all the same EXCEPT I would have gotten a cheaper dress I could afford with cash (I bought the first dress I tried on…at David’s…with a loan. Ugh.). I also would have been less anal about bridesmaids dresses (sorry, girls).

Things I’d add to what’s already been said:

* Consider giving away your dress (on a site like Freecycle) instead of trashing it. There are girls out there DYING to have a pretty dress who just don’t have the money at all. You have to weed out the scam artists but it’s worth it.* Reuse the bridesmaid bouquets during the reception on the tables. Also, don’t even dream about micro-managing the flowers. I picked someone talented and said “I have $400, do whatever you can and include pink.” They were stunning and really helped set the tone.

* My husband would rather die than dance in front of anyone, so an afternoon reception was awesome for us. No alcohol, no dinner, no DJ, you have the evening to yourselves and your guests can go out on the town together (which is exactly what ours did and they had a fabulous time).

* Asking people to help you is NOT mooching! Well, at least not if these are people who really care about you and vice versa. To this day I still have people thanking me for asking them to help make my wedding a success and literally dozens who’ve told me how beautiful it was to watch a community come together and make this happen for us. *sniff*

* If you do have people helping with the food: 1) Be selective in who you ask to help. You’re not doing anybody favors if you are going to be stressed about your food. Go for quality instead of quantity.  2) Be very organized so your volunteers know what kind of thing, how much, when to show up, and what serving wear to bring (and make sure the serving pieces have a theme like pewter or silver, etc.). I could have been more organized and it was inconsiderate, so learn from my mistake. 

* Book your venue early, at least a year beforehand if possible. This will mean more choices, which means you’re more likely to get a lower cost place.

Hope that helps. Also, don’t forget to thank everybody who helps and reciprocate when they have a need later on. Happy planning!