Wedding day booked...

Droolinggimp

Droolinggimp

Droolinggimp

Soldato
Joined
16 May 2004
Posts
7,181
Location
Derby
After a few months of deliberating on what to do for our wedding we have sort of decided what to do.

A little bit of a back story:

The good lady wanted a Country house type wedding, big house, nice gardens and full Wedding breakfast and evening do all at the same venue. Looked at the cost and thought it would be out of our pocket. We would have to fork out for the whole cost as I don't have any family and her family are not exactly well off.

After writing up our guest list of around 150 roughly and looked at figures for various venues a bit cheaper we decided we are basically paying to feed and get people ****ed. £12,000 on a wedding and about 10k of that is food and drink.. plus location. Sod that.

Went with the idea of a bit cheaper and get a Blessing in Ibiza instead (then Reg office once we get back). Just invite a few VERY close friends and family. About 9 guests in total. Still worked out about 5-6k. Hassle and still doing it for other people and not us.

The other day we decided to go with the Registry Office ceremony with about 20 guests and have a little garden party at our house. Buy a gazebo and a few chairs, slap on a buffet and BBQ. Nice garden as it has just been renovated so to speak. Not massive but could handle 20-30 people including room in our house if the weather ends up being crap. Its in May next year so 50/50 on weather.

She has been stressed and very upset over planning all the above as it seems to her she is doing it all to please other people and not herself. Her family up north know about us getting married but they have not even said anything really to help out or offer anything. Her family here (grandparents in particular), what ever she does isn't good enough. She has had enough and frankly giving up on the whole idea really.

We are still doing it but doing it for US and not them...

Anyone else been in this situation, thought, sod everyone else and do what YOU want to do and ignore others who say, "why wasn't we invited" or "why are you not doing this or that?"

Bloody family, in a way I am glad I don't have any :eek::D

So, Registry office followed by garden party.. We like it, what would you do?
 
Congrats

If it's a relatively small do, you have the advantage of telling those that were not invited that it was a really small...unless they pry they are not going to know how many 'small' is and for all they know it was you, the Mrs and some witnesses

Yes it can be a shed load of money for a single day and if you feel that you are doing it for everyone else but yourselves, you are doing it wrong, so well done for changing your plans to suit you two
 
Booked our last month - 150 people during the day and a further 30 at night.

Every single one of them I would want to be there so I am happy enough, and we are getting married in my fiancée's perfect location.

I'm happy and she's happy - it is a lot of money but it is important to us.

The general feeling on this forum tends to be that paying a lot to get married is stupid hwoever/
 
Congratulations on your marriage!

For all the reasons you list, we eloped to Vegas. Was brilliant :)
 
Thats quite a big change from your other half wanting the whole big country house wedding to a garden party, you might want to make double sure its what she really wants.

As for what we did, registry office with close family and friends, then hired a room at the local country club for the evening and invited everyone with a bar and buffet. Was a great day and cost us in total about 2.5k, meant we could splurge on a really nice honeymoon and decent rings.
 
I get married on the 24th of this month. We have 100 people joining us during the day and another 16 in the evening.

So much to organise! We are nearly done. We've been really lucky in that there hasn't been any family politics to sort out. We invited who we wanted to invite and didn't have anything dictated to us by our parents. We are paying for pretty much the entire thing, although our parents have given us some unsolicited cash gifts to help cover a few things.
 
Me and Mrs LordSplodge didn't want a traditional wedding*. So we booked our wedding at a steam railway, we both have an interest in steam trains and I don't know anybody who had that style of wedding so was suitably interesting,

Was our day so only invited people we wanted, sod having people come we don't like or haven't seen in years.



* Married for decades so this was some time ago. :D
 
I think everything at some point during wedding planning thinks they should just elope instead. If it's going to save you an extra £8k or something which could go towards kids or a better house its not a bad idea at all.

That said we are still going for a wedding. We'll keep it relatively cheap and only spend £10-12k of our savings but I do grudge thinking what this could go towards instead.
 
We spent quite a lot on our wedding (total cost circa £18k, we paid for £15k of it) and it was a great day. Mrs Cheesyboy wanted a big-ish, traditional family wedding, I didn't care much either way.

With 2 kids, a much bigger house, and Mrs C working part-time, there's no way we would do the same big do if we were to get married now (could never afford it now) - a reg office and garden party would actually be great, and you can still do most of the nice personal touches you would at a hosted party (flowers, speeches, or whatever)
 
last wedding I went to the father of the groom put 2,000 behind the bar.
so free drinks until it ran out.

loads of chavs were ordering trebles...

seriously don't bother with a big wedding just to feed and get a bunch of free loaders drunk.

they don't care about the wedding just the free stuff they can get.


better to have a small do with people you actually know than 150 people that are mostly strangers.
 
Last edited:
I've photographed a wedding that had a registry in the week and then "garden party" on Saturday.

They actually did a pretend ceremony on the day, one of the groom's friends acted as a registrar and was rather good, told lots of jokes and it was quite amazing day all in all.
 
Last edited:
got married in France, had registry office at home first of all and then religious ceremony in france. only invited immediate family and very very close friends. was absolutely brilliant. food was out of this world - typical fare in Northern Ireland is a turkey and ham dinner at silly money per head. in france we had, salmon, roast beef, glazed pork fresh from the garden veggies and much much more! and at a fraction of what we would have had to pay at home.

all in all cost about 5-6K including the honeymoon. if I ever had to do it again it would be done exactly the same.
 
I would go away somewhere if you can, tell everyone where and when (but stagger it so they don't join you for the Honeymoon too) and let them make their own arrangements. You could do a few nights in a hotel with a ceremony and then rent a villa for a week on a Greek/Spanish island.

Those that want to be there will make the effort, those that can't won't mind too much and those that are after some free food and drink will have to pay for it (All Inclusive would work for this if you just add a ceremony only).

Your friends and family should understand that weddings are expensive these days. If you have a house, let them know that gifts are nice but you have everything and would rather they put it into a Honeymoon 'pot' (and that way it helps you out with something you are doing anyway)

Its not something I have to go through fortunately (Missus is Irish Catholic and I refuse to let religion have any bearing on a personal thing).
 
Rules of the Wedding Day

  1. Get Married
  2. Don't do anything you don't want to do
  3. Enjoy

It's a day for your bride, no-one else.
You don't have to feed anyone. Your guests are there to see you get married.

Hire the local community hall and have a disco but beware of leaving a buffet sitting there too long. (Every 20 mins bacteria multiplies by itself at room temperature. It takes just 500 bacteria to put your guests in hospital)

I sound like a right scrooge but as a former wedding videographer I have seen some of the most obscene excesses for the day and some of the most creative on a tight budget.

The tight budgeted ones are by far the most fun, which is what the day is (mostly) all about.
 
As long as you are both truly happy with the arrangements that is all that matters. It is your wedding day, after all.

You don't need to spend a fortune, and if your friends/family are worth their salt they will understand. If anyone gives you a hard time, tell them to do one.

Be happy and have people around you that are happy for you. :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom