The hub and I will have been married 20 years on December 4. Even as I type it, that seems impossible.
When we got married, the average cost of a wedding was around $19,000. The hub and I got married at my family’s church (I have pictures of my great-grandmother getting married there), and then had a small party at my parent’s house. I didn’t wear a wedding dress (thank you, White House/Black Market for the threads!), and the hub didn’t wear a tux. I thought my wedding was perfect, and cost less than a quarter of the average at the time. (Although my father told me years later that he clocked the total at just under $11,000–which was only because he included the cost of gutting and redoing one of the bathrooms in the house. I didn’t realize that it was part of my wedding–I should have taken the toilet with me!)
Anyway, it’s twenty years later and I still believe that you can have a beautiful, special, and meaningful wedding on a budget. Apparently, CNN thinks that I know what I’m talking about, because they included some of my comments on a recent front page story on their site: https://www.cnn.com/2013/09/13/living/matrimony-biggest-money-waste/index.html.
My best advice to prospective brides is this: this is *your* wedding. Decide what is truly important to you and your fiance, and spend money in those areas. Everything else can be removed or scaled back in your plan. No one ever said “That would have been a lovely day, if only they had had more exotic flowers in the bouquets.” (Or “a seven tiered cake”, or “a designer gown”, or whatever it is that isn’t as important to you and your future hub).
You’ll save money, you’ll save yourself stress (they say the devil is in the details for a reason, you know!), and you’ll ultimately enjoy your day so much more!
Of course, if you are looking for a beautiful place for a wedding in St. Augustine–one that won’t break the bank–we’d be happy to help you plan your day!