Wedding Update: 12 Weeks To Go!

Oh my god, where has the time gone?! I feel like it was only yesterday when I was sending out my Save the Dates and we had aaages to plan everything! Now, there's only 12 weeks left and I feel like there is still so much to sort!

A quick rundown of things that I have managed to tick off my checklist so far are:

Dress, shoes, suits, bridal gifts, chair covers, DJ, photographer, reception venue, church, table centres and transport and the total for all these is around £2300.

There's still rings, hair accessories, cufflinks, church and reception decorations, place cards and table plan among other things that I can't think of off the top of my head.

There are some obvious things that aren't on either list like cake and food and that's because we have booked them but don't have final costs yet. The food is definitely the most expensive item and the suits have actually come to more than my dress!!

I have finished pearling my shoes and I will get a post up about how to do it yourself very soon! I recorded me pearling a section of one of the shoes as it's hard to show what to do with pictures but I'm not sure if I'm confident enough to actually put it up! We'll see!!

Top Tips for a Budget Wedding

Did you know that the average wedding costs around £18000!

I wanted to bust the myth that a wedding had to cost an arm and a leg and so far I'm proving it!

I think people have an image in their head about what a wedding should look like or include and it really is an all rules out of the window kind of event. Anything you want goes!

Pinterest is my best friend for inspiration, DIY ideas, decorations etc, and eBay is what makes a lot of them a reality! Did you know I got my wedding dress off eBay? It was brand new with tags in, never been worn and I got it for a quarter of the retail price! There are loads of bargains to be had if you keep your eyes peeled!

I also found 60 glass jars on eBay, all with pretty ribbon around the rim and got them for £12.75! These will all have candles in to give a romantic cosy feel to our reception venue. I've also got 100 organza favour bags for £3.95! I'm currently trying to do my own version of a 'Wedding Day Survival Pack' or a 'Hangover Survival Pack'.

I thought they were really cute and useful ideas rather than a bag of sugared almonds which usually get left on the table. I've currently got these working out to cost approximately 70p per person. I'll be doing the kids a different pack which will included a colouring book, pencils and maybe some bubbles and a toy. I'll do a full post on these once I have them done :)

There's loads of brill downloads from wedding ideas magazine that you can look at here which are really helpful. Their budget planner is by far my fav one that I found and have been updating the spread sheet constantly and trying to beat the original budgets that I set for everything!

Amazon is also a good website to check out as well as your local 'used' websites as a lot of people sell things like table decorations after getting married for much cheaper than they bought them for!

Let me know your tops tips for finding things on a budget! I'm always on the lookout for new sites and places!