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I suggest you get a copy of :
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It will walk you through the steps. They also have a website.
140 people for 12500 is going to be tough, at least where I live. It's not impossible, but you may have to adjust expectations for what it will include. At that price, you may need to do a backyard wedding, with light food options, and DIY most of the decorations.
Before you start booking things, though, you and your fiancee should iron out what is and isn't important to you. No one thinks they are "wedding crazy," but you'll be surprised at what you think "obviously" has to be a part of your wedding, and how it differs from your partner. A book that helped a lot in that process for us was A Practical Wedding -- it gives you a framework to discuss these things. How important is venue? flowers? attire? What would you sacrifice in order to have 140 guests? What would you sacrifice to ensure that you are under budget?
These conversations are huge, and help you and partner manage each other expectations throughout the process. Things said explicitly are always better than things assumed.
Additionally, it helps to talk to friends and family who have gotten married recently, at weddings you've attended that you've liked. You can ask them about planning strategies, vendors, even costs. People are generally willing to share that stuff. You can then get a better sense of what's possible -- perhaps you can get everything you want at the price you want. Perhaps there are tradeoffs that you realistically have to make, and now you can make them with open eyes.
I feel like the major advantage of having a book like this is the streamlining if information. If I tried hard, I’m sure I’d find a lot of what this book says throughout the sub said in different ways, but what I feel is the real strength of this book is that’s its detailed enough to be useful and broad enough to be adaptable. Keene never assumes a lavish wedding, nor does she assume a 100% DIY; rather, each chapter lays out a variety of tips for all different price-points.
Additionally, this book (as well as Budget Savvy Bride mentioned in this thread) provides the reader with helpful charts and activities to do with your partner. (e.g. Helpful budgeting and guest list charts, a guide to creating your wedding “mission statement”, etc.)
I have found this book so SO helpful in planning alongside my partner who has never attended a wedding (whattt?!) because it lays out the nitty gritty logistical things that I would never think to google on my own (e.g. in the “feeding everyone” chapter, she lays out everything from what kind of meal are you thinking to, “and if you’re DIY’ing, who’s responsible for taking out the trash?”)
I’m halfway through but for 1) the conversations it’s prompted between me and my partner, 2) the organizational flow of topics, and 3) the abundance of considerations given to all price points... it is SO worth the money.
(And honestly for $12 on Amazon, why the heck not?)
Tell her you have been doing some research about weddings and and the role of MOH and BM's in particular. "Did you know that there are no real duties for the MOH and BM's any more? Everything they do is entirely optional and within their budgets."
Also bring up the fact that you read that anyone invited to a pre-wedding event, must also be invited to the wedding.
Tell her you are sending her a good wedding planning book, which will cover off the etiquette issues.
If she chooses to ignore etiquette, after reading the book, that is on her. If she still insists on inviting people to the bachelorette who aren't invited to the wedding, tell her you are not comfortable with that.
If anyone does decide to host a shower ( she doesn't get to assign that), the hosts decide the number of guests they can afford to invite, and the bride supplies the guest list in that range.
Tell her that you are happy to plan the bachelorette, but will be consulting her BM's to make sure you plan something within their budgets, so not to be disappointed if Vegas doesn't happen. Tell her to let you know when they have a date and venue confirmed so you can begin to plan the bachelorette.
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What about a wedding planner book? https://www.amazon.com/Practical-Wedding-Affordable-Meaningful-Celebration/dp/0738215155 I've heard great things about this one.
Could go a little fun/silly and buy her one of those tumblers or mugs that say things like "Bride to Be" or "Does This Ring Make Me Look Engaged" or something.
Could also do one of those coupon books. "This Coupon is good for One (1) Hour of Wedding Planning Assistance" or "This Coupon is good for Fifty (50) Hand-Addressed Envelopes" or stuff like that?
As much as you need means very different things to different people. Are they offering 5k to have a small and modest celebration, or 50k to have a full blown professionally planned event? I think you need to have two conversations here.
The first is with your fiance, what do they want? Have they always imagined 150 guests and a 3 course meal and dancing on a weekend evening? Or would they prefer to elope in the woods with a few friends and family members present? Take budget out of it for a second and have a conversation between the two of you for what kind of wedding you'd be happy having, and how much control over it you want. If you both want a traditional wedding and are fine with ceding some control to their parents as they control the pursestrings, then that's a tentative plan. If you both really would prefer something non-traditional (again, budget notwithstanding), then plan for that. A practical wedding is a really great place to start on this one.
The second conversation, once you've decided on a rough vibe for what a wedding that would make you both happy looks like (estimate of guest count, general location or vibe), have a sit-down conversation with his parents and see what their expectations look like if they help fund this celebration, along with actual numbers for what as much as you need means. This conversation could be uncomfortable, but really illuminating and useful for how you approach this going forward.
As others have mentioned - eloping/courthouse for the legal bit followed by a non-wedding reception celebration with some friends and family at a restaurant in a big backyard is a fairly common alternative, especially in COVID times. There's still expenses there (feeding people is a deceptively huge expense), and you'd need to be okay with out of town guests possibly being less motivated to make the trip for something that's not a Wedding.
First, your budget does not depend on what vendors charge. the two of you set your budget by deciding the maximum you can afford to spend. Then, you make a guest list and plan a wedding you can afford, within that budget.
There are lots of tools online that help you break down the total budget into budget lines for venue, catering etc.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process.
You can also use their website A Practical Wedding.
This sub has a great 'just got engaged, where to start?' guide that I recommend reading through. I also recommend the book A Practical Wedding to basically anyone who's newly engaged, it was so helpful for my fiance and I to figure out what we wanted!
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will guide you through the process step by step.
There is also the website A Practical Wedding.
A lot of the stress of wedding planning comes because couples who have never planned so much as a formal dinner party are now planning to host upwards of a hundred people, with literally no idea what to do or what things cost. In the old days when parents hosted weddings, they had years of hosting and party planning experience before they had to host a wedding for their children.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process, step by step. I preferred this one.
There is a companion website A Practical Wedding.
I think there are many other priorities for planning other than diving into making a registry right now. Engagement parties are not normally gift giving events.
Might I suggest a copy of one of Meg Keane's planners? it will walk you through the process step by step.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keane's planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. I preferred this one. It will walk you through the process step by step.
There is also the website A Practical Wedding.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
There is also the website A Practical Wedding
I suggest you buy a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
Someone already mentioned the website a Practical Wedding, but I found her book to be even more helpful as it was all laid out in one place. The Kindle version is only a few bucks and I've referred to it so much, particularly at the beginning when I was like "what do we do now?"
We're planning for September 3rd 2022 (labor day weekend), and in a similar boat (got engaged in March of this year, not a COVID-postponement). I'm also in graduate school in a HCOL/high demand wedding area as well. If you're flexible on dates (i.e. you just want a Friday or Saturday in around June) that can help. In my experience so far contacting vendors everyone has had availability for our date, with the exception of one DJ. But June is peak wedding season, and also closer than September, so you might run into more difficulty.
Once you have wedding vibe goals, rough size, and rough budget sorted out (I can't recommend A Practical Wedding enough as a starting point for these, I had it recommended to me and it's made this whole thing SO much easier), then it's time for venue. Sending out emails and getting rough quotes can help with budget formulation as well, the whole industry is so opaque that we just had no clue what a reasonable venue fee was for around our area.
More so than any other vendor, you need your venue to have availability on a date that works for both of you - they can usually only have one wedding a day, so they'll book faster than say a florist that can easily deliver flowers for 3 weddings on the same Saturday.
Many venues will let you put in a soft hold on a date (i.e. they won't book it out to other people without asking you if you want it first), so you can sort out if that's the venue you want. Getting those holds in can help lower anxiety around availability (it certainly did for me). From there we figured out photographer, since they also can only do one wedding a day, and photos are super important to me. We would have also prioritized catering at this point if the venue hadn't included it. From there you can tackle other important vendors (florist, DJ/band, etc.), but I felt a lot less stressed once we had our venue! Good luck :)
I think the only thing you should even consider doing right now is reading a wedding planner or doing some research online. Your tastes may change dramatically in 5 years.
I suggest you get a copy of Meg Keene's book and use the site Practical Wedding.
I suggest you get a copy of Meg Keene's wedding planner, and use it to plan the wedding you can afford
instead of traditional wedding gifts we're planning to ask the guests to sponsor different things like the cake, the tables, asking everyone to bring a dish, stuff like that. The most expensive thing is probably going to be his suit because he deserves it!
I suggest you consult with people you trust re the etiquette and acceptability of this plan. It would be a hard no where I live. Always remember that even if people don't voice their disagreement to you in person, doesn't mean they aren't talking about your decisions behind your back. You also won't likely receive most wedding gifts until just before or even at the wedding, so those won't help with your expenses at all.
If I recall correctly
I second the suggestion for Meg Keene's wedding planners. The three variables in wedding planning are budget,the type of reception and the number of guests. Every couple has to make choices and compromise somewhere.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
I also do suggest that you set a budget and stick to it. Break it down into budget lines (there are lots of guidleines online). If you want to go over in one line, find another place you can cut back by an equal amount. Without a budget and a commitment to stick to it, you can easily find yourselves spending twice as much as you initially planned.
I just posted this for someone else:
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
There is also a website A Practical Wedding.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's wedding planners. It will walk you through the process step by step.
There is also a website A Practical Wedding.
I found this book very helpful and certainly not expensive
There is also the associated website A Practical Wedding.
I found Meg Keene's planner very helpful in keeping us focussed.
I suggest you get a copy of one of Meg Keene's planners. It will guide you through the process step by step.
I recommend A Practical Wedding Planner by Meg Keene — super helpful!