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Step 1
Make your own flower bouquet: I was shopping at a flower wedding store a few months before my wedding and I noticed these beautiful white flowers with interlacing beads and sparkles. Almost ended up buying it but then I realized it was a bit too expensive for my taste, exactly $200. Special wedding bouquets cost around 200 and up if you want really good quality flowers. I went to Michaels after that and I purchased the same beads I saw and the white flowers. I also picked up a glue gun and some glue sticks. What you can do is mend the flowers and beads together in any arrangement you would like. When I was finished making my own bouquet, it looked stunning and it was such an accomplishment!
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Step 2
Choosing dinner: Instead of serving entrees before dinner, you can always go without the entrees. This will shave off a couple hundred bucks. Keep in mind, if it is something you can do without then go ahead! Also, the caterer may want to know if you want a one dish dinner, two, or three. Meaning many different foods do you want on the plate. Choose two and keep it simple. This will definitely safe you some money. Most weddings usually don't need deserts, since there is always the cake to eat.
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Step 3
Favors: Don't skip the favors because this shows appreciation that everyone came to the wedding. What you can do is visit your local flea market and get really inexpensive favors for only a buck or so.
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Step 4
Decorations: Balloons are a really inexpensive way of setting up decorations. Use stringers and balloons together. Also, if you are going to have many flowers throughout the wedding, make sure they are silk flowers and not the real kind. Most people won't even know the difference unless they were to touch them.
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Step 5
Photography: Usually, photography cost anywhere between $800-$4,000 depending on the photographer you hire and how long you plan to get coverage. I would suggest getting the first four to five hours of the wedding. They have some pretty decent photographers on Craigslists and most of them only charge around $500-$2,000, so your actually getting a great savings. If you do decide to get half of the wedding photographed, you should lay out disposable cameras on the table so this way your family members can take pictures for you too. It will be very interesting seeing what your family can come up with in the pictures and a great bonding time for the family to look at them.
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Step 6
Dress: The most important event for the bride is purchasing her wedding dress. Wedding dresses range from $800-$10,000. There are so many to choose from. I suggest shopping online for a dress and always make sure you order 2 sizes up to ensure it fits. The biggest mistake I ever made was getting my exact size and it was very hard for the seamstress to make it bigger since the dress didn't have that much fabric. It's very easy for the seamstress to make the dress smaller, but expanding a dress is much more difficult and costly. You can get quality dresses that are inexpensive at the LightintheBox. Just look for the store on Google.
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Step 7
Reception: If you want music and some sort of entertainment for everyone, you should hire a DJ over a band. A band would cost more since they have to split the income evenly for all members of the band. If you would like, you can have one special dance song for the opening dance instead of dancing to at least three songs. I would limit the after party to around one hour instead of two or three. This will definitely save you some money, and plus you will have more time to get away for the honey moon.
