Copy of Random things that cut our wedding budget in half!

Amazon affiliate links-earn commission

All that I wanted was a simple wedding spent with our closest friends and family. I wanted something smaller and something that represented us. I also knew that I didn't want to spend a ton of money because we were remodeling a house at the time and all of our money was going towards that. My mom and I got to work (at the last minute if I'm being honest) and made it happen.

Before I get started I want to say that we did most of this ourselves with friends and family who helped out A LOT. Some things decor wise we already had, lots of things were free, and we can DIY a TON of stuff. We were very blessed with all of the love and help we received.

Amazon storefront is amazon.com/shop/taylorgrace

Flowers

For flowers we didn't want to spend an arm and a leg, so we went looking on the internet. We decided to go with Sola Wood Flowers. We ordered TONS of them and dyed them ourselves with the manufacturer's instructions. Doing this cut our flower budget in half. We bought them and the fake stems on Amazon! I will link everything on my storefront above.

Pampas Grass

We live in the south so I lot of people have pampas planted in their yard. We have some great friends that let us come cut theirs down and we got a lot from the side of the road!

Flower vases, bottles, and candlesticks

Most of my vases and candlesticks were thrifted from Goodwill and other local antique places. The bottles on the otherhand were Bud Light, Coors, and more. We had to call in reinforcements for those though! The bottles that weren't brown we used a mixture of clear glue/ mod podge and acrylic paint to make them look stained!

Venue + Tent

So I knew from the jump that I wanted to have my wedding at my parents house. That was something that was very important to me. With our wedding being outside in September, we needed a backup plan. We got a tent from a local rental place and added lights all around the inside.

Arch

The "heptagon" arch on Amazon is only $99!

Favors

I bought mini Tabasco bottles and bought bulk seasoning and empty seasoning bottles for my favors for the adults. I got labels made on Etsy that said "thanks for spicing up our day"! For the kids I bought "his favorite" and "her favorite" stickers and cellophane bags off of Amazon and put candy from the Dollar Tree in them!

Handmade signs, coozies, and cups

Right after I got engaged I bought a

Cricut. It was the BEST decision for sure. I am very picky when it comes to signs and things like that and I knew I wanted them to all look the same, so I did everything myself. I used Canva for the fonts and designs and cricut design since to create them. 10/10 reccomend doing that! I bought all of the coozies, cups, and clear frames on Amazon in bulk and thrifted all of the mirrors.

Serveware and more

We bought the plates and silverware on Amazon in bulk as well. We just went with the basic, clear plastic ones for easy cleanup since we were doing everything ourselves. The wooden cake stand and other serving things will be linked in my Amazon storefront!

Custom wine bottles

I bought the cheapest wine (which is the best in my opinion) at Walmart in the color scheme of my wedding, took the label off, and created our wedding logo (that was used on the coozies) and placed it on the bottle.

Music and DJ

My brother is a musician so he played the songs acoustically as my party walked down the aisle, but I'm a pretty basic Twilight fan and HAD to have "Turning Page" as I walked down the aisle. We bought a large Bluetooth speaker to play that song. We did splurge and get a DJ for the reception and he brought the lighting and everything.

Dancefloor

I used a 10x12 rug for my dance floor! It matched everything perfectly

Custom napkins

I bought custom napkins on Etsy!

Mini cupcakes and a small wedding cake

To cut our cake budget down, I got a smaller wedding cake and added mini cupcakes. This was my husbands idea because he doesn't like a huge piece of cake and it actually cut down on waste.

Exit- flower petal/bird seed toss:

I am a photographer and if I know one thing, it's that guest dislike having to wait hours to send you off so we decided on a non-traditional exit. We got them to throw the bird seed and petals at us as we walked back down the aisle. I did these myself too! I bought the cellophane bags and stickers off of Amazon and filled them myself!

Tables, chairs, and table cloths

I got all of the tables and chairs for free. If you attend a church or have a community center near by, a lot of the times they will allow you to use the linens for free if you pay for dry cleaning and put them up after!

Cake topper and Name sign

I ordered the cake topper from Pretty Little Laser and the name sign from SimplySallieSC on Etsy.

Invites and programs

I designed EVERYTHING on Canva and used Mpix and Snapfish to order them!

Price breakdown:

photog- $1,800

food- $1,200

flowers- $500

tent and chairs- $1,200

decor- $2,500

DJ- $1,000

favors and petal toss- $150

Extra $$ here and there but nothing too crazy!

All of these products and more in my Amazon storefront! If you have any questions feel free to reach out!