NOBLEBABYMAMA: Wedding Ideas.

Hello lovely ladies (and gentlemen :)

My sweet, little fam went back to the town we got married in this weekend, which happens to be my husband's hometown. We visited family and celebrated his dad's 60th birthday! It was really fun to be back at the church we said our vows in a little over a year ago! It made me think of a few things that I wish I had been reminded of when I was planning last year.

First things first:

Our wedding was not {fancy} by any means, but it was very special to us!
I should note that we spent around $4,000 for everything, including my dress and our honeymoon. It can be done!

1. USE COUPONS!!!

For real. This saved my booty. Michael's, Jo-Anns, and Hobby Lobby have coupons every week, so use them. Even Bed Bath & Beyond may have something you need and they have a coupon every week. Jo-Anns now accepts more than one competitor coupon at a time, so you can go in with all of their 40% coupons that they offer every week on your phone and save some serious dough!

No lie, I worked at Michael's through part of our engagement so I would use a coupon every time I worked to buy burlap garland. ONE AT A TIME! And I needed 20. When I would be out with friends, we would have to make a trip there because they only accepted one at a time! This may sound silly, and you're probably wondering why I would do that, but consider this.

20 garland roll times $5.99 equals $119.80.

20 garland rolls times about $3.60 equals $72!

That's about $50! And when you are trying to be frugal, you can't be wasting $50 when you could use coupons. And when you have months to plan, you have time to buy one at a time :)

This could also spark some creativity! Because if I have a coupon for a place, I am going to use it! And you may walk around and find something that you could do instead because it's cheaper than another option.

2. HIRE LOCAL PEOPLE OR FRIENDS AND FAMILY.

I really like this for two reasons. Supporting small business and people you know it just nice. Those who own small businesses or have a craft that they could share usually work really hard! And it is nice to support them. And also, they are significantly cheaper than big business. I was thinking about this yesterday... There was a lady right down from the church where we married that made cupcakes out of the back of an antique shop. I ordered 7 dozen and they were beautiful!! I think we spent like $6 a dozen...and she delivered! Wonderful to do business with. My husband also knew a girl from college that could make and decorate cakes really well. She made our two small wedding cakes (They looked exactly as I wanted them!) and she made the double layer chocolate chip Groom's Cake. We spent $200! Our photographer was a sweet friend of mine. We paid her $100 to take our photos and she got some great experience out of it! I did our flowers with my bridesmaids because I love floral arranging. We ordered our flowers from Sams and made a stop at Homeland to pick up more. I saved SERIOUS money doing this and it is a fun memory from our wedding when all of us girls were designing our own bouquets :)

3. SHOP THRIFT STORES, BORROW THINGS, REUSE WHAT YOU HAVE.

A big part of our savings. I wanted lots of different plates for our reception. So I borrowed and I went to goodwill. They gave me about 100 plates for $10 because I asked them what they could do for me! Insanely cheap. I am also very sentimental and I used things from our grandparents, like old watch pieces, the tea set, the crystal punch bowl, and the drinking goblets. It meant a lot that they were from our family. I also saved lots of jars and decorated them for flowers and used old books for centerpieces that were borrowed from Sam's sister. Not to mention several other borrowed things.If I had wanted, the church had vases and silk flowers to use. Don't be afraid to ask to borrow!!!

4. CHEAPER HONEYMOON. (If you need/have to).

I will not lie, this one was reallllyyy hard for me. We really wanted to go to Seattle, but it just was not in the budget. So we went to Frisco, TX.. and IT WAS THE BEST!!! We had such a great time and did not spend a lot of money.

I mean, let's be real, most of your honeymoon is already planned {ahem..}. We felt like because we didn't spend a lot of money to travel to a far place, we could just be lazy. We went to a movie, spent an afternoon in Barnes and Noble and Ikea (two of our fav places), we ate at local restaurants and places we normally couldn't afford to eat because we had extra money. It was really nice to just have time together to enjoy our favorite things without being in a rush. Not to mention he had to be at work sooner than we expected and we had been traveling back and forth to Oklahoma for months for wedding prep. It was so nice to just BE. We got home a few days early and we settled down before real life began. And we do not owe a penny on our honeymoon.

Eating at Olive Garden on our Honeymoon.

5. DON'T BE ASHAMED.

Just because you do not have $20,000 to spend on a wedding does not mean that it can't be a nice wedding. It does not mean that you are less. It does not mean that your wedding will not be meaningful. It DOES mean that you may have to work harder for what you want and picture your day to be.

I remember walking down the isle after we were married and thinking, "That's it! We are married?!!"

Ater all, it is just saying covenantal words and giving your life to another! Nothing else really matters.

Don't be ashamed that you can't have all the glitter when the day really is about giving yourself to spend all your days with that one person, and together, honoring and showing Christ with your marriage.

KEEPING IT IN PERSPECTIVE always helped me.