10 questions about your WEDDING...

1, How long did you plan? 18 months

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? about $6k Pretty much what we planned

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? I sent out 150 invitations (including 1 invite for families), 250 +/- showed up

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? Candles with personalized ribbons in hand painted flower pots and matchbooks with chocolates

5. What season was your wedding in? Spring

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? 6pm on Friday Night Memorial Day weekend of that year

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? I would have invited less people, made it more intimate

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? Photographer, I feel it was worth it at the time, I think you get more for your money from photogs now-a-days

9. What were your colors? Silver and Cobalt

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? Handpainted the flower pots to make them more personal

1, 6 months

2. $25K, I know that's a lot, but the average cost of a wedding here is $32K.

3. Invited 92, 86 came

4. little paper bags of jelly bellies

5. end of summer

6. Saturday afternoon

7. honestly, wouldn't change a single thing.

8. the food, and yes, worth every cent.

9. didn't really have set colours, 'earthy vintage' was the best way we could come up with to describe it, lol. Cream, espresso, sage, copper and a small touch of light pink.

10. I did crossword/fan favours, the favours I guess were a DIY, pew wreaths and a few decorative odds and ends.
This wasn't really a DIY but it saved us a ton of money, my sister did our flowers. She's a florist and got them at wholesale cost, I got more flowers than a local florist quoted me $6000 for, for $520.

How long did you plan? 4 DAYS

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? APPROX. $2000...ABOUT RIGHT

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? NONE.....AND NONE SHOWED UP...GOT MARRIED IN VEGAS

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? NOTHING

5. What season was your wedding in? WINTER

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? MONDAY AT 4PM

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? WOULD HAVE BEEN NICE TO HAVE FRIENDS THERE

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? PLAYING THE SLOT MACHINES.....IT WAS ALL GOOD!!!

9. What were your colors? DIDN'T HAVE ANY

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? RENTED MY DRESS....DOES THAT COUNT??

1, How long did you plan? 8 months

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? $6000

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? 130 - 100

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? wedding color wrapped hershey kisses

5. What season was your wedding in? spring

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? 10am on a saturday morning

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? i would have made time for my toast. a bridesmaid had an issue and had to leave the wedding early (her car window was busted in the day before and she was robbed), so we bumped up our ending balloon release so that she could be a part of it

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? $600 for a jazz quartet - completely worth it

9. What were your colors? two shades of a teal blue color and brown

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? we had a brunch reception. i baked close to 15 dozen mini muffins, i blew up all of the balloons the morning of, i made assembled the favors, not really a diy BUT i ordered fruit and veggie trays from harris teeter for the reception food. not counting the cake, we spent about $300 on all of our reception food. all of my decorations were a hand me down from a coworker's daughter's wedding.


i will add that as much as every girl dreams of the perfect wedding, if i had it to do over, i would just go to the courthouse. $6000 is much cheaper than what most people spend, but i would have much rather spent that on the honeymoon.

1, How long did you plan? 8 months

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? Roughly $10K, which was what we had budgeted.

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? We invited about 250, but had about 185 show up.

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? My bridal party and I made white chocolate lollipop roses. I had special ribbons made with our names and the date on them, and tied those around the stick to "seal" the clear plastic bags that we put them in.

5. What season was your wedding in? Late summer (August 31)

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? It was the Sunday of Labor Day weekend. To us that seemed logical since most of my side was from out of town, and that gave them time to travel without having to miss work. Plus having a ceremony that late in the summer on a Sunday made most things cheaper.

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? I would have hired a different florist. She was officially retired, but still did weddings. The pictures she showed me before I hired here were beautiful even though they were a few years old. The problem was that she got there late and was really SLOW to set up, and the flowers really didn't look that good. Our ceremony was over before she had all the centerpieces set up in the tent we had the reception in, so my bridesmaids had to run off right after the ceremony to go help her finish before all the guests started walking in. Then she left a bunch of the rented mirrors and glass candle holders behind when she picked her things up, and I had to go return them to her a week or two after the ceremony.

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? I'm not sure that we did splurge on much, but if we did I would say it was the venue or the limo. Our wedding was at a local metro park by a lake, with a big white tent behind the ceremony to hold the reception in. For the limo I hired a service to pick up the guys at our house, the girls at a local hotel we were staying in, and then drive me and my husband back to the hotel at the end of the evening. Normally they would have charged us for 2 rentals since the times were so far apart, but I negotiated for a daily rate with them since we were officially considered in their "off season", and they didn't have any other customers that day.

9. What were your colors? light blue and silver.

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? Yes. We did the favors that I mentioned above, the seating cards & table numbers. My husband also was the head chef at a catering company at the time, so he did most of the prep-work on the food (a lot of which had been donated by his vendors as part of our gift), and a couple of his co-worker buddies did the actual cooking the day of with some of his other staff doing the serving and bar tending (also as a wedding gift to us). His boss donated the alcohol. One of the bakeries that he use to refer a lot of business to gave us our cake at cost, and I hired a music student from one of the local colleges to play the music for our ceremony (he got college credit and I saved $$). I'm not sure if all that quite qualifies as DIY, but it's a big part of how I had a wedding that typically would have cost $40K for about $10K.

1, How long did you plan? 364 DAYS

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? $5000 - $6000

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? 200/130

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? PRALINES (SENTIMENTAL TREAT FROM MY CHILDHOOD DAYS)

5. What season was your wedding in? SUMMER

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? SATURDAY - 1PM CEREMONY, 3PM RECEPTION

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? NOTHING REALLY, RECEPTION HALL HAD A/C PROBLEMS AND ALMOST HAD TO MOVE THE VENUE 30 MINUTES BEFORE CEREMONY BUT IT ALL WORKED OUT OK AND WAS NOT IN MY REALM OF CONTROL ANYWAY

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it?
1. MY DRESS ($1000) - I LOVED IT BUT NOW IT IS IN A BOX FOR EVER AND SO NOT REALLY WORTH IT I GUESS
2. THING I WAS MOST HAPPY WITH WAS THAT WE SPENT AN EQUAL AMOUNT OF MONEY ON THE HONEYMOON (AND IT WAS A BLAST!!!)

9. What were your colors? RED (DIDN'T PLAN ON RED, BUT ONLY HAD 1 BRIDESMAID AND THE RED DRESS LOOKED THE BEST ON HER)

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? MOST OF THE RECEPTION. THE FOOD WAS ALL PREPARED BY MY FAMILY, AS WERE THE FAVORS. HIRED A NEIGHBOR TO PHOTOGRAPH (I WAS REALLY HAPPY WITH THEM), NEGOTIATED THE FLOWERS AND COMPROMISED TO SAVE MONEY, DESSERT BAR, KEG, AND CHAMPAGNE PUNCH, DJ WAS MY B.I.L. AND SOME MP3s, WAREHOUSE ORDERED THE INVITATIONS (NO SAVE THE DATE - MAYBE THAT IS WHY OUR TURNOUT WAS KIND OF LOW), CAKE WAS MADE BY A FRIEND FROM CHURCH WHO DID THAT AS HER SIDE BUSINESS (IT WAS THE BEST WEDDING CAKE I HAVE EVER EATEN), RENTED A CONVERTIBLE MUSTANG AS THE GET AWAY CAR (LOVED IT!)

It was a church wedding as was dictated by my faith and used the church hall for the reception. Overall, I was happy with everything, and even more happy to be married 6 years later. I loved that our goal was to spend an equal amount on the honeymoon as we did the wedding. We were able to do that even with my splurge of a dress.

1. 9 months
2. $3,000
3. invited 70 ppl only 45 showed up
4. Tux and wedding dress favors with candy in them
5. September 3rd, 2011
6.Saturday at 3pm
7. I would change , and get more decorations and moved my reception tables around a little more.
8. I bought two wedding dresses, due to my weight fluctuating. ( tummy disease)
9. David's Bridal Malibu Blue and Mocha
10. My theme was kissing in Paris, so I made a black back drop, and huge on the stage of our eating area. Then made all these huge silver stars and pasted to the black. It made a silver starry night .Even though it sounds cheesy, but turned out really beautiful . And my husband made me a 7ft tall Silver Eiffel Tower and set it next to our table. So the whole thing looked like our table was under the stars and Eiffel Tower in the distance.

1, How long did you plan? Serious planning, less than a year.

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? I wound up paying for my wedding. For location, flowers, cakes, favors, invitations, phhotography, decorations, JP, rings, hair and makeup, food and drink, etc it was about $4,000. Which is what I thought we would spend

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? About 150 invited. About 120 showed.

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? We had little heart containers filled with candy - M&Ms that were red and white (our colors) labeled (three designs - our names, the data, and a heart). You can order them from the M&M website. Super cute!!

5. What season was your wedding in? late Spring (late May)

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? Sunday. Ceremony at 12:30 pm. Receoption 1:30-5:30 (Much cheaper for the location on a Sunday and our flight was really early the next morning)

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? I wish that I had held his hands during the ceremony. I kept them at my side and they looked terrible in the photos. Other than that, everything was PERFECT!

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? Really nothing was a splurge.

9. What were your colors? Red (dark red) and white

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? We assembled the favors and printed our invitations at home.

1, How long did you plan?

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned?

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up?

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)?

5. What season was your wedding in?

6. What time of day and day of the week was it?

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out?

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it?

9. What were your colors?

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which?

1. I gave myself a year.
2. Wedding hasn't happened yet so I won't know till it's all paid for. Budget is $5000
3. about 100 is getting invited. expecting 3/4. haven't sent invites yet
4. will have favors but don't know what
5. next summer
6. 2pm Sat 8/24
7. nothing I hope!
8. photography. In the end all you have is memories and pictures!
9. pink and gray
10. I plan to make favors and decorations

1, How long did you plan? We got engaged in late February of 2010 and got married in early April 2011.

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? $500. We went super simple. It was the officiant, my husband, myself, my kids, and a photographer.

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? See above.

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? N/A

5. What season was your wedding in? Spring

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? Saturday 4pm

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? Not a darn thing.

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? My dress! That was the most expensive part.

9. What were your colors? Black & white.

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? Yes. I did all the flowers, accessories like headbands, jewelry, ect.

1, How long did you plan? About a year.

2. How much did you spend? None. Mom in law paid for most of it, my folks the rest.

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? About 150, most of them showed up.

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? Don't remember.

5. What season was your wedding in? Summer.

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? 7PM on Friday. That was when the church was available.

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? That I was straight.

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? Refer to questions #2.

9. What were your colors? Hunter green and white.

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? Mom in law did quite a few. Bows for pews (not archery bows), center pieces. decorated champagne flutes for toast, decorated cake server and knife. Probably more that I don't recall.

Oops I missed #7....I wish I'd taken really really comfy shoes to change into!!! I thought I had comfortable sandals but once my feet started to sweat (it was a really hot day) I got horrible blisters (I had to wear flip flops my ENTIRE honeymoon b/c I couldn't get shoes on my feet the blisters were so bad)...I wish I'd at least brought flip flops or something just in case.

1, How long did you plan? One year

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? We spent about 7 thousand

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? We invited 100; about 75 were able to make it. We got married in Nags Head, so guest had to drive three hours and pay for a hotel room.

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? We gave out Hershey kisses and hugs. This was our DIY project.

5. What season was your wedding in? Fall - Late November

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? Saturday evening at 5 pm.

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? Hum, perhaps had the church and reception site a little bit closer.

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? We splurged on a few things, we essentially took two honeymoons. We paid for our wedding parties hotel rooms.

9. What were your colors? White and black.

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? Our wedding favors.

1, How long did you plan? About 6 months, though there wasn't much to do, it was a small affair in Gretna Green (though it did make the 10 o'clock news!)

2. How much did you spend? (sorry if that's personal) Was this more/less than you planned? Less than £1,000

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? Just the 2 witnesses. We were going to have an after-wedding party later, but circumstances meant that it's been postponed

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? Gave matching necklaces to our 2 witnesses/ best friends

5. What season was your wedding in? November, Autumn. We chose it for the date - 11.11.11

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? 1 o clock on a Friday. Just cos that was the date we wanted.

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? I'd have loved the big party with friends that we'd planned for 2 weeks after the actual wedding. I'm still hoping it might happen for our first anniversary!

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? My bouquet, which was hand made by a local artist from old jewellry, some of which came from my mothers and grandmothers jewellry box, and which contained lots of little special symbols. It's a permanent and unique piece of art - I've even included it in my will to be passed to my daughter.

9. What were your colors? I wore green, my favourite colour, he wore a Titanic tartan kilt.

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? My dress came from eBay, and the Gretna Green staff took the photos (which turned out brilliantly!)

1, How long did you plan? - 1.5years

2. How much did you spend? 30K - it was way more than we planned
Was this more/less than you planned?

3. How many people were invited/ how many showed up? 150-about 1125 showed up

4. What did you give out for favors (if you had them)? Glass Coasters that has a spot in the middle for a picture (we inserted a thank you note in there )

5. What season was your wedding in? End of Summer (august)

6. What time of day and day of the week was it? evening

7. 1 thing you would change about the way it turned out? we barely got to see our cake, had we known it was going to play out the way it did, we would have requested that the cake be cut AFTER dinner

8.Biggest splurge (financially)? Was it worth it? Open Bar - and for the guests I guess it was worth it, but for me no, I didn't even have time to drink!

9. What were your colors? Turquoise

10. Did you do any DIY project to save money? If so, which? Not really