How to Save Money on Your Wedding (Without Looking Like You Did)

August 21, 2011 by  
Filed under Guest Posts

Your wedding is a one in a lifetime event. It is a celebration of your commitment and an expression of who you are as a couple. And if you are like many brides, you’ve dreamed of this day for a long time and know exactly what you’d like.

But in this economy, every bride is looking for ways to trim her wedding budget. And to help, I’ve created a list some of my favorite ways to cut your wedding costs – without your guests being the wiser.

Save-Money-On-Your-Wedding

Save Money On Your Wedding

Save on the Wedding Ceremony

• Use flowers in key areas only (like the altar or place where you will say your vows). This is where all of your guests eyes will be, and where the majority of your photographs will be taken.

• Have your florist create hand-tied bouquets for you and your bridesmaids. They are less expensive than wired ones and every bit as pretty.

• Use your wedding party flowers again at your reception. Bouquets can make amazing centerpieces at your head table. And they look gorgeous surrounding your cake.

Food and Beverage Costs

• Have your wedding at an “off-peak” time (Thursdays, Fridays or Sundays, and in January – May). Because these times are less popular, the caterer’s cost per person and the required guest count will be lower.
• Butler passed hor d’oeuvres can actually be less expensive than buffet style (because guests tend to eat less of them). Ask your caterer about your options.
• Create a signature drink (made with non-premium alcohol) to save on bar costs. Give the drink a personalized name to make it unique.
• Reduce your cocktail hour by 15-20 minutes. None of your guests will notice. And your bar bill will be less.
• Skip the champagne toasts – few guests really drink it. Or if you want to include it, try Prosecco, a sparkling Italian wine that tastes like champagne – but is much less expensive.

Save Money on Wedding Flowers/ Centerpieces

• Use fewer, larger tables to reduce the number of centerpieces and linen rentals required. Create tables of 10 instead of 8. (Use larger tables that guests aren’t crowded).
• Consider less expensive flowers like carnations, baby’s breath or gladiolas. These blooms tend to be 1/3 the cost of roses and look very dramatic and impactful when used in large monochromatic arrangements.
• Give your florist a long list of flowers you love and those you don’t. Then give him/her flexibility to use the most cost effective/ seasonal flowers from your list. Flexibility equal savings.
• Buy your own vases from places like Pier1 or Ikea. They can be less expensive than what your florist carries. (And you’ll be able to give the centerpieces away at the end of evening if you’d like).
• Ask your florist for ideas about including non-floral items that add impact while lowering cost. A vase filled with lemons or limes can be quite striking.

Save Costs on the Wedding Cake

• Save by using a faux cake. They are absolutely beautiful and your guests won’t notice the difference (you can still cut it).
• Or order only enough cake for 75% of your guests (more guests than you think actually don’t eat the cake).
• Another option is to have a smaller cake (tall but smaller cakes have great impact) and then a second “kitchen cake” which is cut and served to your guests (who will never notice).

Saving on the Wedding Attire

• Of course, I have to mention the savings associated with a preowned wedding dress! Whether you buy a preowned dress or sell your new gown after your wedding, you can expect to save up to 50% of the retail price. That is hundreds or potentially even thousands of dollars that can be used on other wedding costs (or towards upgrading your honeymoon).
• Rent your jewelry. You can actually rent beautiful necklaces, earrings, bracelets and more for you and your wedding party – all for a very reasonable rental fee.

This is a guest blog post by Josie Daga, founder of PreOwnedWeddingDresses.com, a website she created to help brides buy and sell designer wedding dresses. You can also find her on her own blog, Facebook and Twitter.

How to Plan a Culturally Themed Wedding

July 5, 2011 by  
Filed under Wedding Planning, Wedding Receptions

Planning your own wedding can be stressful, especially if you want your wedding ceremony and reception to be an experience your guests will never forget.

Because even the most unique weddings can seem redundant after awhile, one of the best ways to add a little spice to your ceremony and/or reception is to incorporate your cultural heritage into the design of the wedding.

MyWeddingIdeas Photo - Traditional_Japanese_wedding

Whether your heritage is Chinese, Indian, Greek, Irish, African-American or even American, there are numerous ways you could incorporate your own culture into the style of your wedding. Here are some things to keep in mind if you’re hoping to plan a cultural wedding:

The wedding music

celtic band

Finding a specific band and/or songs to play at your wedding is one of the easiest ways to incorporate your cultural heritage into your wedding.  If you are of Irish descent, for instance, you could find a Celtic group to perform at your reception, or if you are African-American you could look into some R&B performers or even traditional African drummers to perform on your special day.

If you’re lucky enough to find the right performer, you could hire them o perform a song in the language of your culture, or even dress up in a traditional outfit and dance out a routine as well.

Sometimes it’s as easy as a Google search in finding the right band to perform at your wedding, but if are struggling to find the right band and/or musician online you could always do some research into the various musicians and bands that are known for performing a certain genre or style of music, and then download their music off iTunes.

Bridesmaids dresses

geisha bridesmaid dresses

Incorporating your cultural heritage into the design of your bridesmaids dresses can be a little tricky, especially if you are on a strict budget. Not only that, some cultures (like the American Indian culture for example) believe that white is a color of mourning, so be sure to do the proper research beforehand before picking the colors for your bridesmaid dresses.

Sometimes it can be as easy and choosing a specific color for your dresses that will match the flag of your country, (for instance blue and red if you are English, or red if you are Chinese). You could also try shopping around for different designs, like a plaid design if you are of Scottish descent, or even traditional Geisha dresses if you are of Japanese descent.

Food and alcohol

Oyster

When it comes to incorporating your cultural heritage into the food that will be eaten at your wedding, the world is your oyster…literally.

All you have to do is do some background research into the most common and favourable dishes that are typically eaten in a specific country, and you could also look into alcohol and/or beverages as well.

If you are of Asian descent you could serve some Saki or even rice wine at your reception, or if you are of French descent you could have some classy red and white wine to leave out for your guests.

Flowers

flowers-little-india

When choosing the flower arrangements for your wedding or even the bouquet for the bride, try to research the various traditional flowers and plants that are prominent in your country of heritage.

If you are planning a traditional Indian wedding, try to pick flowers like the water or gloriosa lily, orchids, and musk rose. For traditional French weddings look for lilies or yellow and purple irises.

Superstitions and customs

wedding banner

If you truly want to pull off a cultural wedding, it is extremely important to look into the various superstitions and customs for each heritage and culture.

For instance, if you are planning a Russian wedding it is custom for the male guests to bring flowers, but not to give yellow flowers as they are considered to be bad luck. For a traditional Swedish wedding, the bride must wear three bands on her wedding finger, and for Spanish weddings the bride must carry twelve coins given to her by the groom in a small bag as a symbol of the groom’s passion and support.

For a traditional Korean wedding, apparently it is superstition to incorporate ducks and geese into the ceremony as they represent faithfulness, and in a traditional Greek wedding the bride must carry sugar on her wedding day to “ensure she has a sweet life.” Also, in Eastern European ceremonies, it is custom for the bride and groom to circle the altar three times to represent their “first steps together as husband and wife.”

Bio: Maria Rainier is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident blogger at First in Education where she’s written on online graphic arts programs along with a piece on English degree programs. In her spare time, she enjoys yoga, playing piano, and working with origami.

Your Groom Speech – 5 Ideas for Success

Groom’s Speeches can be found here, Click Here!

I’ve observed lots of groom’s speeches, and there often seems to be that moment of hesitation and uncertainty by the groom. This is definitely a mistake you should do your best to avoid.

Let us start with some general suggestions for delivering any speech at a wedding ceremony.

What To Do When You Give your Groom’s Speech

  • Keep it clear, straight forward, and simple
  • Keep it short. Three or four minutes is sufficient
  • Write down down the major points on a piece of paper or a card
  • Smile at the members of your audience. This is a fun event.
  • Be sure not to look grim, like it’s a funeral.
  • Speak clearly and loudly. Maintain your voice at a volume where everyone can hear. If there is a microphone, use it.

Do Not Do These During the Groom Speech

  • Don’t mumble
  • When speaking, do not stare downward or look at the ceiling
  • Do not write out the entire speech, word for word. You just need some thoughts to keep you moving from one point to the next.

There are a couple basic things that men fear most: commitment, and public speaking. While this article won’t help you with the first one, it can be assumed that since you’re getting married, you’ve already overcome the commitment issue. So, that leaves public speaking, and it’s a lot easier than you think.

There are five things you must put in your groom speech in order to be considered a success -

Five Tips for the Groom’s Speech

  • Be nice. Say complimentary, nice things about your wife.
  • Don’t tell jokes, unless they have a positive tone to them. Remember, you have an upcoming honeymoon, the in-laws, and the rest of your life together to consider. Humor can play an important role in any speech, therefore, we will cover this topic in much greater detail in future articles.
  • Do thank your new bride’s family. You will most likely be involved with them the rest of your life, so you do want to start off on the right foot by showing your gratitude to them.
    • If you do not like your wife’s in-laws, just thank them for their support and move along.
    • If indeed you do like your wife’s in-laws, then by all means express your appreciation and fondness for them. You can also thank them for inviting you into their family.
    • If there was any financial contribution offered by your new wife’s family, now is the time to say thank you for their support.
  • Thank friends and family for coming to celebrate your wedding, and sharing the day with you.
  • Thank the Father of the Bride.

Your grooms speech is delivered right after the Father of the Bride speech, which customarily comes first.

This gives you the opportunity to play off that speech and continue by thanking him for his kind words; then begin your speech right after him.

A Short Example

“Thanks, Robert, for your supportive words. I am honored and proud to be your new son-in-law. I hope I can live up to what you expect from me. I would also like to thank my mother-in-law, Janice, who has always made me feel like a member of the family starting from when we first met, and for helping make our wedding and reception a success. I would like to give my thanks to both of you for allowing me to marry your beautiful daughter, Alison.”

With this brief excerpt, you have: You have thanked the bride’s family, mentioned their contribution to the wedding, spoken favorably about your new bride, and come off like an all ’round great guy to your audience. And, that was just the introduction to your groom speech.

The Best Groom Speeches can be found here, Click Here!

Tips to Personalize Your Wedding

December 7, 2010 by  
Filed under Wedding Planning

source: Bridalguide.com

There are plenty of ways that a bride and groom can personalize their wedding. Adding their own little touches or even big touches into their wedding can make their wedding day their very own. From everything from personalized favors to incorporating heritage or culture into your wedding, here are several ways that you can personalize your wedding day.

Instead of using boring numbers for your seating arrangements at your wedding ceremony, use names of places or things that have to do with your relationship. It could be things like places that you have visited, your favorite foods, the letters from your last name or any other hobbies or interests that you have.

Choose a first dance song that is not so ordinary. If you really want to get daring, take a couple dance classes before your wedding and really wow the socks off your guests. They will be expecting the same old slow song first wedding dance and instead you can give them a tango or fox trot routine. If you are really, really daring, choose a dance song and choreograph a dance routine to it.

For the wedding reception menu, re-create what you ate on your first date. If you went to an Italian restaurant, you can have rigatoni, sausage, lasagna, and chicken parmigiana for your menu. Another option is to have your favorite restaurant cater the wedding for you.

A simple way to add your own personalization to your wedding, is to buy personalized wedding favors. These favors can have your names, date of the wedding, or just your monogram. There are a variety of favors that you can choose from such as candy bars, mint tins, and CDs.

Incorporate any cultural traditions into your wedding ceremony or reception. You may have to do some research for this, but this is a great way to remember your family and its past heritage. You can easily find wedding traditions online for just about any culture or nationality.

If you are musically gifted, then you can sing or play your spouse a song. This is a great way to make your wedding your very own and pay such a special tribute to your new spouse. Even if you are not musically inclined, you can always write a poem for them or even just recite a love poem.

Instead of having a traditional wedding guest book, have your guests write advice and well wishes on pieces of paper. You can then take those pieces of paper and make your own scrapbook out of them. This way you actually have nice messages from your guests rather than just their name signed in a book.

Show your personalization with your wedding cake. Use a personalized wedding cake topper to show off your new name or monogram on your cake. This is a very trendy idea but still adds originality to your wedding, as it says who you are now as a couple.

Display pictures of your parents, grandparents, and siblings from their weddings at a special table. This is a unique way to involve your family and show that you are all one extended family. It also celebrates the ceremony of marriage and the commitment that is made.

There are plenty of ways that a couple can personalize their wedding. The best way is to think of what your interests and hobbies are as a couple and draw from those and your past to come up with some great ideas.

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