As any Bride will tell you, they want a day to remember. I was no different but I guess the one thing that can be said about me is that I am probably an exception to the normal rule about Brides – I do not get stressed and I do not sweat the small stuff and I DO NOT worry about the day itself because I knew with my friends and family there it would be nothing but awesome.
I’ve seen brides get so worked up about their Weddings that they lose sight of the reason they’re actually getting married in the first place. Working yourself up is the quickest and easiest way to ruin your big day – so spend a lot of time, before you book anything, planning what kind of Wedding you want. What’s important to you? Where do you want to spend the money? (some people want the most flamboyant & expensive dress, others want something less fussy and to spend more on putting money behind the bar…..that kind of thing), talk to the groom and see what his vision is – don’t forget that it’s his big day too! The biggest piece of advice that I will give you is, as much as possible, use people you know to be your suppliers! I managed to use friends who were in that particular line of business and got myself a Photographer, Florist, Cake maker and Chauffeur with Cars – it doesn’t mean that it will be any cheaper (they are in the business after all) but you are guaranteed to have people doing the absolute best for you, you trust them and you never know, they may give you a bit of discount!
If you’re looking to plan a Wedding these are the first things you need to get set in your mind:
- Date – you need this before anything else!
- Venue – Church and Reception or will you have a civil ceremony and combine the two
- Budget – work out how much you have to spend and try where possible to stick to it (ALWAYS add a contingency)
- Colour Scheme/Theme – Some Weddings don’t have a theme, I had both!
- How many people to invite – this will largely depend on your budget.
- Kids or No Kids – some people want kids there, I chose not to due to the per head amount we were being charged for food
- Wedding Party – How many Bridesmaids and Ushers/Best Men – this will again depend on budget as normally the Bride & Groom buy their outfits
- Dress, Suits, Hair, Make-Up and everything else etc
Lets start at the top then………………….
Date
I got engaged on Christmas Day 2013 and we decided that we didn’t want a long engagement and I wasn’t fussed about doing it while the weather is “hot” so we picked November 22nd 2014. There were a couple of reasons we settled on this date. Firstly, it gave us enough time to plan the Wedding – we are both highly organised people and knew that 11 months was more than enough time. Secondly, it meant that we could afford the Honeymoon we wanted. If we’re honest I think we’d both have loved a Christmas wedding but the price of the Honeymoon we wanted was almost double what we wanted to spend, due to the fact it would mean jetting off in December. Lastly, We were planning on moving house and wanted to make sure we had enough energy to fit both in before Christmas.
The other important thing to remember about the date is that there are some months where venues will do you a deal because it’s not a “Premium” month – February/June/July/August/September & December are the most expensive times to get married – pick a month outside that and you’re guaranteed to make a saving!
The Date is THE first thing you need to decide. It’s the first question you’ll be asked when ordering anything for the Wedding – Flowers, Cake. Photographer etc
Venue
I was married in the beautiful Chobham Church – it holds many special memories for me. It was the Church connected with the Primary & Junior School I attended, it was also the Church where many of my immediate family have been married as well as where my Niece was christened. James was fine with a Church Wedding and I am so glad that I chose it because Mr Bessant, the Vicar, was wonderful.
Saying that, I have been to many beautiful Wedding’s in the past, some in Barns, some in Town Halls and even one at London Zoo – that was a brilliant experience! I think as long as you decide on something you both want then it really doesn’t matter.
If you’re getting married in a Church and going on to a reception venue then ideally you don’t really want your guests to have to travel more than 30 mins – after looking around a handful of local venues, we decided on The Woodlands Park Hotel. The reason we settled on woodlands Park was because A) The Staff there were SO accommodating when we went to check it out. Nothing was too much trouble B) My Cousin had been married there some years before and I remember it being a great Wedding with accommodation, which makes it SO much easier for guests who are travelling from afar and C) I’ve had so many people recommend it – which is always the best reason to book somewhere.
Also, when you are organising the Wedding with them always keep in the back of your mind that you are spending a lot of money on this day, so make sure they do everything you want them to do!
Budget
Unfortunately, unless you’re some kind of celebrity or a lottery winner, you need to remember there is a difference between what you want and what you can actually have. Like I said earlier there are ways to keep costs down by using people you know as your suppliers, generally they will give you a discount, which you can either put down as a saving or do what we did and put the money saved towards another aspect of the day.
Get yourself a spreadsheet and do some research. Call suppliers and get rough costs/quotes for what you want, put it into the spreadsheet and use that as a guideline. The main things which will fluctuate massively are Venue and Dress/Suits – because this is all dependant on whether you go budget or no expense spared. We looked at venues and there were some we’d have LOVED but they were a good £2000 – £3000 more than our final choice. Like I said before you may bag a bargain if your Wedding is “Out of Season”.
Decide on what parts of the Wedding are the most important to you and spend the money on those. For instance – I racked my brains and couldn’t remember, out of the last 5 Weddings that I attended, what the flowers at the reception were like! So I made the decision quite early on that the only flowers I wanted were Bouquets & Button Holes. The flowers in the Church were whatever was in the Church at the time and instead of Flowers at the reception we decided to be a bit quirky and pick something else (which I’ll come onto later). Saying that, my friend Sarah provided the flowers and they were absolutely STUNNING – so many people have made comments about them (Contact Sarah @ The Flower Tubb, Haslemere, on 07894 270229)
Your spreadsheet will allow you to track what you are spending and see at a glance if you’re going over or are on budget. There’s tonnes of advice on the internet for cost-saving ideas, so don’t panic that you can’t have the day you want, it might just mean compromising in some parts of the Wedding to accommodate the bits which are more important to you.
Colour scheme/Theme
It’s common to have a colour scheme for a Wedding – Spring normally sees pastel shades, the Summer brings Bright Colours, with Autumn seeing burnt Oranges and Corals. Our Wedding fell into the Winter category and Purple has always been one of my favourite colours, so I decided to have more of a Christmassy feel and go for a dark “Cadburys” purple. In my opinion, because we coupled the Purple with the gents wearing Tuxedos (which also saved us a bunch of money as they all had their own) it really looked smart and worked really well. We made sure that James had a slightly different waistcoat, so that he stood out and he had a button hole to match my bouquet.
In terms of a theme we sort of had two!! James was obsessed with Lego when he was little (actually still is) and we wanted to do something a bit different so opted for the theme of Lego.
I’ve always been a bit different, never one to follow the crowd and I really wanted people to talk about our Wedding and how it was unique, I don’t like to blend in. So Lego was the theme and I took it upon myself to think about ways of incorporating it without making it look tacky – I think we achieved it.
It started with the “Save the Dates” which we decided on because I found a Cake Topper made out of Lego people – as you will see from the pic below supplied by my friend Andy.
We also decided that instead of flowers on the tables, we’d provide bowls of Lego for people to play with. In a sense they built their own centre piece. I thought that perhaps it would only be the younger people who played with it but in fact everyone did. We found that it acted as a brilliant ice-breaker for those tables who had lots of different people on who didn’t know each other. Even though we didn’t use flowers as the centre piece, we still wanted the tables to look pretty, so we put glass beads and lights in the bottom of the bowls and put the Lego on top. Lots of people made comments about how unique it was – which really pleased me. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a cheaper alternative to flowers – Lego costs a fortune!
The other place we decided to use the Lego theme was on our Wedding Cake – my Bridesmaid Lisa bakes cakes and offered to do it as our Wedding present, which was lovely of her. This saved us some money because you will soon find out that cakes aren’t cheap! It was a really lovely addition to our quirky Wedding and again we had lots of people giving us compliments about the uniqueness of it!
James and I are also both really into Music. James is a Drummer in a band and I sing and we both love going to gigs – music really plays a huge part of our lives. So the second theme we picked was just that……well 7″ records to be precise.
The idea came to me when I was looking at how much Wedding invitations cost and I was loathed to pay a huge amount of money for something that would eventually end up in the bin. I was sure there was a way that I could send an invite that people would like to keep and it dawned on me that 7″ records would be a cool and quirky idea. Again, doing it this way didn’t save us any money as we had to buy all the components of it separately. Our Best Man, Neil, kindly designed the wording for us which would act as the label and James and I went onto eBay and bough 120 7″ records, heart stickers, record covers and envelopes for them. I then found a local printer, who didn’t charge the earth, had the labels printed and then spent a couple of hours putting them all together. I have to admit they did look fab and loads of our guests text us with pictures and videos of them playing the records at home to see which artist they had been sent.
We then extended the record theme on to the Seating Plan and also the Table names, which were all the names of our favourite bands! Again, not cheap and certainly a labour of love but I enlisted some artistic friends to give me a hand putting it together and all of the lovely comments from everyone made it all worthwhile.
As well as that we also made all the place names on the table Cassette Tapes – this also doubled as a favour, which they could take away with them and everyone did!!! It was really easy – bought tapes on eBay, sprayed them purple and wrote the names on with a heart in each corner.
How many people to invite & Kids or No Kids!
These two subjects sort of roll into one.
OK, so here’s the thing – everyone thinks they are entitled to tell you who should or shouldn’t be at your Wedding. When in actual fact it really doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks, you invite who you want. Don’t start thinking people will be offended if they don’t get an invite or that you need to invite so-and-so because Mr & Mrs Bloggs don’t know anyone else – it’s crap – you invite who you want. If you’re like me and you worry about offending people then ask yourself these two questions:
1. Do you really want to pay £100 + each for them to eat the Wedding Breakfast?
2. In 10 years time, when you look back at your Wedding Pics, will you say “I wish I hadn’t invited them”?
If the answer to those two questions is NO then strike them from the list and forget about them (not literally of course, just in terms of wedding invitees).
You need to be a bit ruthless when it comes to day guests especially because of the expense and remember you’re the one picking up the bill. This is why we decided on the “No Kids” policy. Actually, there were a couple of reasons for that policy but it was mainly that I loathed to spend £100 on a child who wouldn’t like the meal put in front of them. The other reasons were that I wanted my friends & family there to enjoy the day without worrying that their little one was bored or tired! We were up-front and honest with everyone from the start and sent out notes with the save the dates, to those people we knew had Children – that way they had 10 months to sort out babysitters.
If you do decide on inviting Children (perhaps you have your own) then maybe think about getting some entertainment for them. I’ve been to a wedding where they have a kids magician and a sort of crèche set up for them – they loved it.
When you’re putting your list of invitees together, stick to Family & Good Friends for the day and then invite all in-sundry to the evening. Most venues don’t really mind how many people you invite to the evening (within reason) as long as you have catered for 80% of the total numbers. The other thing to remember is that it’s unlikely the Wedding planner at the venue will be there on the actual day, so if you tell her you have 35 evening guests, you can probably get away with another 10-15 without them noticing!
Wedding Party
This is an important one for two reasons:
1. The more you have the more you will fork out on their attire
2. Pick reliable people who will be there for YOU on the day
James and I decided that since we had a November Wedding, we wanted the gents to wear Tuxedos. All of our male Wedding party had their own – CASHBACK!! We then extended that dress code out to the guests too and chose Tuxedo & Cocktail Dresses. It looked really glam on the day and looks fab in all of the pics.
I had three Bridesmaids, my two Sisters and my Friend – I was quite clear that I was happy for them to have a big say in what they wanted to wear because they were ones who were going to be wearing it for several hours. Luckily they all agreed on one dress and on the day they looked stunning.
All of my Bridesmaids were fab – they all played a part in helping to make our joint Stag & Hen Party a great day. They bought me L Plates and Balloons etc and organised a Mr & Mrs style Quiz with some of my other friends.
It was really hard trying to decide who to have as Bridesmaids because actually if money had been no object i’d have had another 3. There are lots of important women in my life and I’d have loved to make them Bridesmaids too but you will soon learn the phrase “You have to draw the line somewhere”. Also, don’t feel badgered into asking people just because you have been their Bridesmaid. There are other parts of the day they can be a part of. My best friend is a guy, so I asked him to be my Best Man and he gave a speech at the reception. I also asked two of my other really close friends to do a reading in Church and also act as my witness – which they were both more than happy to do and were honoured to be asked. In fact, I apologised to one of my friends for not asking her to be a Bridesmaid (as I had been for her a few months earlier) and she said “Nicole, don’t worry about it. I like going to Wedding’s where I just get to sit back and relax and enjoy the Weddings without worrying about my duties”. If they’re real friends they will understand.
James had four Ushers and two Best Men – they were great and on the day he didn’t have to do anything, which was something we both wanted to make sure happened. He and I are always the people looking after everything at events, so it was nice to be looked after for once.
If you have a reliable bunch of people around you who have your best interests at heart then all you have to do is sit back and watch your guests enjoy their day – it’s a great feeling.
Everything Else
I think I have covered all the fundamental stuff – there are other decisions like “The Dress”, hair, make-up, Time of the Wedding etc
The Dress is the best bit – go out with your Bridesmaids (and your Mum) and spend the day trekking around 5 or 6 shops trying on every dress you like the look of. Do not buy any of them until you have the “I don’t want to take this dress off” moment. I found a dress which I loved, until my Sister talked me into going to another shop. I put my dress on and just stared in the mirror for ages, my auntie burst out crying and because I felt like doing the same (I never cry) I knew that this was it – that’s when you know! Don’t settle on a dress, keeping looking until you find the one you fall in love with. I look at my pictures almost everyday and just smile looking at how beautiful my dress was (in my opinion of course).
My hair was also done by a friend. Most people go to the same hairdresser (and probably have been for years) so who better than to do your hair for your big day. Louise is actually a friend from Secondary School and I went to her with ideas and we had a trial to see how it would work. It was exactly what I wanted and on the day my hair stayed in from 8am to midnight, with barely a hair out of place. If you’re local to the Woking area and want a good hairdresser then contact Louise and mention my name!!
One of the parts of the Wedding that I was most worried about was that period after the meal finishes and before everyone is drunk enough to throw themselves around the dance floor. Luckily, my Dad and Sister organised some surprise performers for us and it meant the whole day flowed beautifully. We were lucky that someone surprised us like that but perhaps think about some entertainment, if your venue will allow it.
I went to town a bit on some aspects of the day, which at the time seemed to take forever to organise, but all of our guests commented on how they loved the personal touches, which made it more than worth it. I really do think it’s worth putting some little “You” touches on your day – people really do notice the effort.
For instance: We had a few tables of people where not everyone knew each other. So I made everyone a badge with something on it, either a nickname or a picture of something associated with them or how James and I met them. Put them all in bag and left instructions that they had to be handed out and people had to guess which one was for them. I made each individual badge myself, on a manual badge maker. It took me 4-5 hours but seeing everyone laughing as they read them out was a sight to behold. As well as that we also put out some rules of the dance floor, just for a touch of comedy (see pic below) and I provided all the women with a pair of Flip Flops each, so that at the end of the evening they’d still be dancing rather than resting their poor feet. I’d also REALLY wanted a Photobooth but refused to spend £500 on one, so I went onto eBay and bought lots of signs and props and let my friends use their own phones and cameras to take pictures with them. That worked REALLY well.
I shall stop wittering on now – hopefully some of my suggestions will help you, even just a little bit. Before I do, one of the best things I did was set myself up a Wedding Website. I listed absolutely everything to do with the day on there, including an online RSVP and put the link on the invites – it stopped people asking you mundane questions and meant that nearly everyone RSVP’d straight away because it didn’t mean them having to buy a card and post it to you.
Take a look at ours to get an idea of what you can put on there 🙂
Lastly, make sure you enjoy what will most certainly be the BEST DAY OF YOUR LIFE!!!!!
nicolehelenarose 