How to organise your own wedding

There can be nothing more daunting than the thought or organising a wedding, which is why a lot of couples opt for a wedding planner, that in my opinion is a very expensive way of getting you to your perfect day, with a little imaginantion and a few helping hands you can do this task yourself saving a heap load of money in the process .

I am a mum of 5 children ranging from the age or almost 18 down to 9 months so thought I would never be able to fit in organising and making my own things for my wedding day, but I did and did it all under 6 months, all with very little stress, my day was wonderful and I hope the hints and tips I share with you will make your day one to remember as well .

List's list's and more list's are on the agenda next, you can never have enough of them.

SETTING THE DATE

The first and most important thing on your list is deciding your date , don't rush things and pick a date that gives you an unreasonable amount of time to try and organise things as you will only end up stressing yourself out and not enjoying the run up to your big day, I would like to say I found that although most people would like to marry on a weekend getting married on a weekday like a friday can save you a lot of money, it is surprising how much registry offices charge for that weekend date , also the times vary as well, for example you could get married up until 4:30 in most registry offices on a week day saving you having to spend money on a sit down meal for your guest and only having to have an evening buffet, but on weekends you only have up until 12:30, this leaves you the whole afternoon to keep your guests occupied.

We provisionally booked the registry office before finding the venue and was lucky enough to get it on the day we wanted, Your interview with the registry office will take between 30-40 minutes, In England and Wales, both of you must have at least seven days residence in a registration district before you can give your notices to marry. These notices can be given at any designated Register Office, but both of you must attend together. You will need to bring evidence of your names, addresses, ages, nationalities, and if either of you has been married before, your marital status.After you have given notice to marry, you have to wait 15 full days before your wedding can take place.The notice to marry is valid for one year from the date on which it was given in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and for three months in Scotland. Your marriage must take place within this time, or you will have to apply for another certificate of approval and give notice to marry again.

VENUE

Your next decision is your venue, We decided to have our whole day all in the one place, this was in the long term rather more expensive than what we would have liked to have spent but far more convienient for us .

The downside of having your wedding all in one venue is normally catering,meaning they have to cater for you and then your price goes up , You could cut these costs by finding yourself a nice little villiage hall and doing the catering yourself, this will of course work out cheaper but then you have the added worry or finding someone to make all your food for you, you could be lucky enough to have a few family members or a couple of friends that will pitch in and offer to help, my brother did such a thing and had his mother in law and sister in law make all the evening buffet food saving them a fortune , at the end of the day it is all down to personal taste.

I'd also like to point out that you will have to pay extra for the Registrar to come out and marry you at your venue, make sure you ask about your venue's surety charges before hand as that can be sprung on you at the last minute which can come as a shock to some couples, although you will get this fee back it can be a big chunk of money, ours was £400.

SENDING OUT YOUR INVITES

Once you have your venue and date set you can think about making and sending out your wedding invites, With most venues that are catering for you they will need to know a definate number for meals no later than 8 weeks before your wedding day, if things do change you can always let them know but make sure it is sooner rather than later, with that in mind I would send invites out about 2 months before your 8 week deadline for the catering, this will give your guests ample time to reply, I would suggest sending out little save the date cards which you can order online for a very reasonable price we used 123 print, that way people know you are getting married so can mark the date off in their calenders and can then expect an invite in the post at a later date

DJ

Next you might want to think about a DJ, they don't come cheap these days the ones I looked up ranged from £200-£400 and that is another thing that sets it's price by what day you are having it on , most I found charged more for weekend dates. It might seem a bit early on in the planning to even think about a dj but believe me the sooner you book one the better, if you are struggling for money then maybe someone you know will know of a friend that dj's in their spare time or for a living so ask about.

COLOUR THEMES

Once you have your date you can look at the time of year it is to work around your colour theme, for example, my wedding was in October so I wanted autumn colours so had Orange Calla Lillies and orange Gerbera's with a mixture of foliage.

If you are getting married in spring time you could go for yellows and creams, if you have a summer wedding you could go for pinks and lilacs, or for winter reds.

FLOWERS

Flowers can be another big chunk out of your budget, but I managed to get mine done with a very good friend of mine and my now sister in law for £130, if you can find someone you know to do your flowers then i'd advise doing it that way as florists charge an absolute fortune, I used real flowers in my boquet , the 5 flower girls boquets, the button holes which we limited to close family i.e siblings and parents and flowers for floating in the centre pieces.

WEDDING CAKE

I was lucky enough to have my cake made for me by my aunt, saving me hundreds of pounds, if you can get a relative or friend to make your cake for you then take them up on their offer , You could also look in your local bakers as they normally have a photo album of pictures of cakes they have made, but be prepared to pay a fairly high price for one.

CHAIR COVERS

If you are having your reception with a sit down meal they aren't a necessity but chair covers can make all the difference to your end result, we kept our wedding ceremony and sit down meal to a minimum of 40 and just for that amount it came to around £280 that included a damage fee of £150, make sure you ask when you are booking your chair covers about damage fee's as I spoke to my supplier several times and wasn't informed about it until I received a bill with it on so it is worth a mention if you are sticking to a budget.

TRANSPORT

Getting you to your wedding is another thing that is down to your choice, because mine was at a country house and everyone was inside and didn't watch us arrive my father took my flower girls in his car and my brother drove me down in my car, made no difference to me and saved me £600 on hiring a car big enough for us all to get in also mine was only a 5 minute drive from my house which made it easier as well , so you need to look into the distance from where you are leaving, if you are going from the registry office to the venue and if it is worth paying out money for hiring a car.

WEDDING DRESS and FLOWER GIRLS DRESSES

Looking for your dress can be one of the more time consuming parts of your wedding, if you have an idea of what you want then you can search keywords on the internet for it , for example I wanted one with chocolate brown in it so did a big google image search for dresses, if unlike me you are under a size 18 it is very easy to get yourself a dress, you could even look them up on e bay and save a fortune on them , that is if you don't mind having a dress that someone else has worn before, but honestly they are worn once and are in mint condition so i'd back the e bay dress all the way, If you are a plus size bride like myself then searching for that perfect dress can be a nightmare especially if you are on the short side as well , I was lucky enough to stumble across a site on the internet which turned out to be my saviour, she was an absolute star and i'd totally recommend her to anyone http://www.heavenlybodiesbridal.com/

Flower girl dresses can be found in stores like Next, or BHS, but tesco's or sainsburys do lovely little dresses at a very reasonable price, the same with shoes , I got my wedding shoes off of Amazon for under £25. My sister in law made my tiara, earrings and necklace for me to match my colours but you can find some lovely hand made ones on e bay for half the price they are in the shops.

WEDDING RINGS

Going out looking for your wedding rings can take it's time , you could look online in jewellery shops to get an idea of the rings you like and the prices they are probably going to be before venturing out for the day looking in shop after shop after shop, many places offer you package deals of his and her rings saving you at times a few hundred pounds, if you haven't got the budget for the rings you really want then you could always go for a cheaper version and get the other rings at a later date.

MENS SUITS

Hiring your suits can work out a bit expensive but not as much as it would cost you to buy them, we had 6 suits to get as we wanted all the men in the bridal party wearing the same colour suits to match, most suit hire companies like to meet both the bride and groom when they first visit to discuss suit styles and colours, but after that it is down to the men so one less thing for you girlies to do , don't leave hiring the suits down to the last minute, you don't want to end up not being able to have the one you really wanted because you didn't give them enough time for alterations, my husband went for his 2 months before the wedding.You will normally have to pay a chunck off at the start , then pay the rest when you collect your suits, they will also need your credit card details incase there is any damage done to the suits, which you will get back afterwards if all suits go back the way they came.

MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A WEDDING CHECK LIST

With your date and venue set and your other task's crossed off the list it's then down to the fun stuff .

I didn't have a clue as to what I was going to have as my centre pieces for my tables, what colours I was going to have or how I was going to do it , so like most people I got my idea's off of the net, I wanted a simple yet effective centre piece that wouldn't take a great deal of preperation on the day so went for a rectangle vase with the flowers of my choice standing inside a fishbowl vase filled with a few inches of water so that I could have several real flowers floating, I premade the artificial flowers a good few months before the wedding so that it was all done and out of the way.

There are so many things you can have that are very simple but look great, you could for example have your vases set onto a mirror with some tealights, or just a low round glass bowl with real flowers and candles floating in them , these are all very simple yet effective ideas that are quick and easy to do even for those less creative people. Get some nice organza ribbon for your table runner, scatter some rose petals or petals of your choice across the tables and you have a lovely looking display, There are lots of alternatives to petals, You can get gems/or crystal type stones, we also had little pearlescent love hearts sprinkled along the table runner, all these things can be found cheap enough if you know where to look.

For my wedding day and evening invites I used my local HobbyCraft store, They also have a good wedding section instore where you can make everything from invites to your own tiara's, be warned though if you are anything like me a quick "i'm popping to the hobby store" will turn into a two hour shopping trip,I found my chocolate organza ribbon for my table runners in this store and they were pretty cheap as well, they have funky little hole punches in a variety of shapes, I used a heart shaped one on my invites, a small detail but adds to the effect.You can look online at their store finder http://www.hobbycraft.co.uk/

To make yourself invites you will need

A4 card in the colour of your choice, Ribbon if you are going to make ones like mine, a hole punch for threading the ribbon round to tie, then wording design of your choice, Scissors,Glue, a paper guillotine, the one I bought had a variety of cut styles plus a corner section to make the square edges curved, then any little flowers or gems you want to put onto your invite, let your imagination run free, they do take a while to make but they are worth it in the end and not only do they add a personal touch when people receive them they are cheaper than buying flashy ones from the high street.

PLACE CARDS

You can also make you name place cards yourself, you can either cut them to size yourself which I found a bit of a pain so bought them pre cut from the hobby store then printed the names on my pc in some fancy font, printed it onto to some Ivory old style paper , cut round them with funky shaped scissors then stuck that onto the front of the name card then finished it off with a gemstone heart.

TABLE PLANNER

If you are having a sit down meal you will need to make a table planner , this again comes in a kit from the good ole Hobby store, with this you go to a site on the package download a template fill it in with your guests names for each table then print it of, again I did this and used my funky scissors before sticking it all on the pre made board, you can also add decorations to this as well, I had some little hearts like on the name cards and two little orange bows in the corners . You will also need numbers for your table , there are some very nice holders about once again on e bay or amazon, I used http://www.confetti.co.uk/ for a lot of my wedding pieces.

GUESTS FAVOURS

Favours aren't expected but they are a nice gesture to your guest for sharing your day with you, they can be made very easily with organza and some ribbon, simply choose a selection of sweets to place in your favour, lay about 5 or 6 depending on size in the middle of your organza then gather the organza up around the sweets and tie a length of ribbon around the top to seal it off, or if you don't have time for that like I didn't have you can buy pre made favour boxes , they have a varied choice for men and for women and also for children, you could also get little kits for the children to have on their table to keep them occupied i.e make a fairy kit for the girls or make a rocket kit for the boys.

GIFTS

After your speeches it is a nice thing to give a little token gift for the people that have helped you out in your run up to the wedding, you can also give a little gift to the flower girls and best man, we gave our flower girls some home made bracelets which I found on e bay which were made from pearls and had the flower girls names in them, they came in a lovely little satin bag and were very cheap indeed. Flowers or choccies are always a hit for gifts for mothers or friends that are being thanked.

One last thing make sure you have a pen and paper for when you are opening your cards and gifts to note down who gave you what, there is nothing worse than going to write out thankyou cards and not remembering who gave you the wine glasses and who was this Voucher from .

I hope my idea's have been of some use to you, and if you decide to plan your own wedding I hope you enjoy doing it and get as much satisfaction out of it as I did.