Ooooops, just done a budget spreadsheet (Champagne lifestyle, lemonade pockets)

My budget increases every day, I’m not sure how though?!

I’m about 2k over my original predicted budget. But that is mainly because my dress was more than i anticipated. I save in certain areas’ but the budget still goes up and up.

I think it’s time i get my budget bride head on too, not that i have exactly splurged.

Yeah thats the thing i dont feel i have 'splurged' either....

Poor me, poor me, POUR me a drink. Wedding planning is fun but expensive. Geez.

I am about 2k over at the moment too. ?

We are about 4 grand over our original 'ideal budget' and we haven't even allowed for honeymoon yet. We have overspent on the big stuff too like catering, suits and photographer so we can't exactly claw it back. We are both happy with what we have picked though and it isn't going to cripple us (too much). OH just keeps saying 'well we've spent this much so whats a little bit more?' then I have to rescusitate him when he looks at his spreadsheet. Oh yes - he has a spreadsheet and we have to look at it everyday.

I started off with a spreadsheet. Then abandoned it. It was more out of interest, than budget necessity anyway.

I have only a vague idea of what our wedding cost.

At the start of the planning, I definitely told Boy we could do it for £10k. We didn't.

I've never met a bride who hasn't gone over.

I am over by almost £2k at the moment & have already cut down as much as possible!

The OH's parents are yet to give us their contribution but I don't know how much it will be or when they'll actually give it to us!

I'm not stressing, I'll just have to put even more on the credit card ?

? We haven't! We are still within budget & it didn't have loads of padding to start with either. And that was before FILs said they were contributing a hefty sum.

We're under by about 3k at the moment and that is after booking pretty much everything we could possibly want. Still have the men's suits and a bouncy castle to sort out but it looks like we'll be able to have a honeymoon which we weren't expecting... or we may take the children to Disneyland!

We don't have a budget as such - we have savings but I'm not spending it all on one day. I had an idea of what sort of money we were going to spend and we're under 'budget' at the moment I've done lots of hard work keeping costs low and bargain hunting.

From when we first started planning our wedding my overall budget had DOUBLED! and im pretty sure by then end of it all it will be over budget. I plan on being misleading with the truth until after the wedding. Maybe break it to him when we are sipping cocktails on the beach ?

He did say i can have anything I want. He will regret it!

xxx

I'm over, I don't know by how much, I've given up, I haven't spent money we don't have, but I have spent more than we meant to.

We haven't paid for much yet as the catering will be the biggest cost and we don't even have a quote for that yet. OH's mum is paying for the marquee which is the other biggest cost.

OH didn't want to spend more than 6 grand when we first started talking about weddings and couldn't understand why it should cost anymore. Even with a reception in the garden so only venue cost is marquee, and a BBQ supper we will be spending closer to 10 grand. That does include honeymoon which was nearly 4 grand.

We are being quite careful as we know we want to keep back a certain amount of savings so we can have a deposit for a decent mortgage.

We don't have a budget... which I sort of worry about thinking maybe we should plan more, but we're just buying odd bits for the wedding each month and putting a little bit of money aside each month where we can. I think we're probably going to end up with a few skint months as we get closer to the wedding!

We have budgeted £6000 and we have £1500 left :-)

My OH is monitoring our spending very closely - everything has to go in the budget planner and if it's over - then something has to be cut elsewhere. he's being very strict but it's good as if I was left to it i'd be committing to all kinds of things that would make us over spend ? We're over what we initially thought we'd spend but that was before we realised that actual cost of things. We've got the big things booked and secured and everything else we've got fairly realistic quotes for so as long as neither of us go over the top we should be ok (there's a long way to go for extra spending though!)

It's worth trying to negotiate with suppliers, along the lines of "we really want to use you, but the budget doesn't stretch that far - what could we change to bring the cost down?" OH got our caterer down by about £5 a head by changing some menu choices, and got the beer price reduced just by asking - "so that's the price for one barrel, how much if I buy three?"

We've never fixed a definite budget, just had an idea of roughtly what we wanted to spend. We're a little over that (and intended to pay for everything ourselves), but last week Dad said he has some money to give us, and PILs have also mentioned contributing.

Budget? What's a budget? ?

We went waaaaaay over what we initially 'guessed' we might spend - but we didn't have anything we couldn't afford, or get into any debt. I have to say, I am SO glad we didn't get a credit card/loan for any of it, as the thought of having the wedding 'come down' coupled with having to pay off hundreds of pounds a month would leave me pretty miserable I think. One of the best things about the wedding being done now is that we have all of our money back every month.

We spent too much on flowers, which ultimately don't matter at all (at the time it felt like they did, though). We spent a lot on photography and my goodness was that money well spent, the photos are absolutely AWESOME.

Consider what it is you really want. Do you want to go more informal? If so, you can still retain that element of style and class but without breaking the bank. Might just require you thinking outside of the box a little more. Catering really doesn't need to be the biggest cost.

Good luck