Some little girls dream of their wedding from a young age; imagining their big white dress and the Prince Charming they will one day marry. While I wouldn’t say this was me; when Josh & I got engaged, I did have an idea of what type of wedding I wanted us to have.

Undoubtedly though, there have been things I looked into when wedding planning that I didn’t realise would be completely out of budget, or simply wouldn’t be possible because of our location or type of venue we have booked. Even though I went into wedding planning with a ‘feel’ for the day I wanted to achieve, there have been some things I’ve had to admit defeat on.

Exclusive Venue

If there was one aspect of the day I had got my heart set on, it was an exclusive use venue. The idea of our guests having the run of a beautiful venue, making a full weekend of our wedding, completely relaxed without so many strict timings & probably most importantly; no strangers looking in on you – just seemed like the perfect day to Josh & I. Yet, the more we looked into it, we realised it was simply out of our price range. One exclusive use venue I fell in love with started at £35,000 with a basic food package. Considering our entire wedding budget is less than half of this, I suppose it makes sense now that an exclusive venue would we out of reach. The only way I could see around the issue was a marquee, which was one of my first ‘I don’t wants’ when thinking about planning our wedding, so out of the question for me.

Expensive Invitations

I got it into my head early on that our invitations & Save the Dates would ‘set the whole mood’ for our wedding. Yep, I seriously said that to Josh. I see now that that makes me sound a bit jumped up, but when you read bridal magazines & websites it’s just this type of thing the creeps into your head. Just after our engagement I started ordering sample packs from all over the web & found some outstanding designs. In fact, I talk all about the good, the bad & the ugly of wedding invitations in THIS video if you’d like to check it out. I, of course, fell in love with one of the most expensive ‘wedding stationary’ companies out there. Josh, however, hated the design. Fair. So, although I had to let this one go, at least it was for a good reason; input from my future husband. In the end, we compromised on price & found a design we both loved.

Fine Wine

This again was probably something I saw in a bridal magazine.  But I wanted to pick our own wedding champagne & it be a drink both us & our guests actually like. I also thought it would be a nice touch if Josh & I were able to rebuy a bottle for special anniversaries & relive the memory. But, alas; corkage. Our venue, as with most venues, charge an ungodly amount to bring in alcoholic drinks. So the price of the corkage (I think around £21.00 per bottle if I remember correctly) plus the cost of the actual bottle made this idea a complete no-go from day one.

Our Wedding Cocktail

When looking into venues a wedding cocktail, cocktail bar or a special wedding drink seemed to be the ‘in’ thing. Venues made a big thing about their creativity behind the bar; some included options in wedding packages & many had additional Gin Bars or Pimp your Prosecco stations as add-ons to your big day. I actually really like the idea as it provides a unique touch to your wedding, it’s something for guests to do & talk about, as well as being something memorable. So I was shocked to find that our venue doesn’t offer this at all. We toyed with the idea of bringing in a vendor to add this into our day but as with the above, corkage made this impossible.

Wide Food Choice

If I’m honest, this is the one thing that I am really worried about with our venue. When we were looking at venues we became accustom to having a huge variety of foods available. But now that we have booked a package with our venue we in fact have to choose between menu A or B for our wedding breakfast. This was always a worry of mine when we booked the venue, but we decided that we could say ‘no’ to a wider food choice in favour of a more beautiful setting & more space for our guests. We have our menu tasting next week, so I will fill you in more on how that goes, but like I said: it is the thing I am really worried about.

Designer Accessories

My mum is treating me to an outstanding designer dress for the big day! I am head over heels with it & cannot wait to share it with you! But when you venture into bridal accessories, we had to draw the line somewhere. Veils, hair pins, jewellery, hairpieces, shoes, garters, handbags, ‘something new’…the list goes on! I think it wouldn’t be hard for the bride herself to easily be wearing £15,000 if you went all out on the accessories. So I’ve said ‘no’ to even contemplating designer bridal accessories & am having fun looking for more affordable, but beautiful, alternatives. And let’s be honest: it’s the dress that everyone always remembers.

The truth is, these are all probably only things I will worry, know or care about for our wedding. They are all things that A.) I didn’t realise would cost so much B.) Do not offer value for money when I’m looking at the wedding budget as a whole & C.) Are so not important. Everywhere we look brides to be are told what they ‘should’ & ‘shouldn’t’ have at their weddings, couples are put under huge pressure to spend more & if there is one things I’ve learnt in my year of wedding planning it is: weddings get out of control quickly. Very quickly.

Sam