Did you find an engagement ring under the Christmas tree this year? Well, then expect at least several months of frantic planning as you prepare for your big day. But even the smartest, most on-top-of-things couple can make mistakes during wedding planning. Here are some things you should keep an eye on before saying I do.

1. Blowing off your wedding budget. It costs a lot of money to throw a wedding. Many times, excited brides start booking vendors and making purchases without having a real budget and then are shocked to discover they’ve already spent all of their money (or parents’ money) and don’t yet have half the things they need. Make a budget and keep track of your expenditures so you won’t be walking naked down the aisle.

2. Messing up the marriage license. There are so many rules surrounding marriage licenses. Research the rules well in advance, so you know what you have to do and how long you have to do it..

3. Ordering your wedding dress too late. If your heart is set on a couture wedding dress, be sure to order by the six-month mark, since your dress will be custom-made and, many times, made overseas. In addition, most off-the-rack wedding dresses will require alterations, so make certain that you have enough time to get the gown fitted properly. The same goes for the bridesmaid dresses.

4. Booking hotel rooms too late. Brides often leave blocking out hotel rooms for out-of-town wedding guests until the last minute. If you’re marrying during a busy time and you don’t investigate hotel availability in advance, you can end up with literally not a single room for your guests to stay. Be sure to include hotel information in your save-the-date cards or invitations.

5. Inviting too many wedding guests. Make sure your guest list and your reception site capacity match up numbers-wise. You can’t invite 400 people assuming only 250 will accept. Analyze your guest list from the get-go, assume 80 percent will respond yes, and limit your guest list accordingly.

6. Last-minute beauty treatments and crash diets. Thinking of tanning the day before your wedding? Think again: you may end up with blisters instead of sun-kissed skin. Last-minute beauty treatments can lead to breakouts, mistakes or, even worse, serious infections. Same goes for crash dieting in the weeks leading up to the wedding – after all those gown fittings, your dress may not fit! Stick to a long-term beauty regimen with lots of rest, a good diet and safe over-the-counter beauty products.

7. Underpaying invitation postage. You’d be surprised how many brides just stick a regular stamp on their invites and drop the whole batch into a mailbox. All but a few wedding invitations require additional postage – sometimes up to 55 cents. Get one invitation weighed – at the post office – before purchasing your stamps.

8. Ignoring religious restrictions. Inappropriate attire for the church or temple, or skipping the pre-canae, may keep your officiant from marrying you when the big day comes around. Take your religious restrictions seriously. Be sure to meet with your officiant within one month of getting engaged. Ask him or her about religious rules, such as: Do you need to complete a pre-cana course? Can you write your own wedding vows? Do you need to cover your shoulders? Is secular music permitted?

9. Trying to go it alone. If you are a bride lucky enough to have been offered help by friends or family members, by all means take it! Too many brides try to do it all – and this isn’t a good idea. Delegate and use all the resources that are available to you.

10. Forgetting to focus on what’s important. Keep in mind that you are getting married and starting a life together, not just planning a wedding. Brides, be good to your grooms. And grooms, be good to your brides!

How to Have a Fairy-Tale Wedding on a Real Budget

Weddings are infamously expensive. From the rehearsal dinner to the ceremony and reception, the average wedding now runs around $28,000. That price tag can put a damper on a fairy-tale time.

But for newlyweds Natalie and Gene Taylor, saving a ton of money on their wedding — $16,000 worth — did not mean giving up their dream day.

Like so many other young couples, the Taylors did not have a fortune to spend on their wedding so extravagance was out and creativity was in for their 200 guests.

Here are some tips that “Good Morning America” received from the Taylors and from other viewers.

Saving on Your Wedding

Get married in the fall or winter. Summer weddings are the most popular. By getting married off season, the venue cost may be cut in half.

Order invitations online. The Taylors saved around $1,200 by ordering their wedding invitations online and picking out the perfect style for their price.

Look for discounted wedding dresses. Just because wedding dresses can be inexpensive does not mean they sacrifice quality. Natalie found her $1,100 dream dress for $100.

According to Jamie Zanzinger of Real Simple Weddings, off-the-rack dresses from places like Anne Taylor, J. Crew and Target are the way to go.

“What they’re doing is picking these really high-quality fabrics and then not embellishing them so you can go and buy your own crystal beading or gorgeous lace and have a seamstress make it into an overlay for you,” Zanzinger said. “You can make it your own. Make it look like a really high-end designer dress.”

Ditch the florist. For the Taylors’ ceremony, a florist was charging $2,500. Wal-Mart did the job for $570.

Find a friend or family chef. Rather than outsourcing to a caterer that could cost thousands, try to find a friend or family member who cooks. Natalie’s mother and sister fed the 200 guests for $1,000.

Pictures should be priceless, literally. Rather than hiring a pricey photographer, save around $2,000 by having a friend take wedding pictures.

Decorate with borrowed style. Ask family members to help decorate with borrowed Christmas lights, tablecloths, tables and serving dishes instead of paying a professional decorator thousands.

Eat a fake cake (not really). Buying a cake that is all fake except for the bottom layer allows the cake cutting celebration without the full cost of an elaborate wedding cake.

By ANDREA CANNING

Navigating wedding etiquette has always been tricky, but how does technology alter what has long been one of the most tradition-bound days of many couples’ lives?

Brides and grooms can use computer communication for several aspects of the big day, including e-mail invitations, access to driving directions and wedding registries and even full wedding Web sites. But what is most appropriate, helpful to guests, and easy to use?

When we asked brides, wedding planners and Web hosts that question, we learned the answer depends on the task at hand. Here are their tips for following wedding etiquette in the age of the Internet.

Web sites

The use of wedding Web sites has risen dramatically in recent years. With particular growth in just the past year, “we’re starting to see it hit the mainstream,” says John Scrofano, chief operating officer of wedding Web site provider nearlyweds.com. He cites the addition of wedding Web sites to bridal magazine checklists as evidence of this shift, but adds that creating one should be “something fun” rather than a requirement.

For brides and grooms who grew up in the digital age, that’s not likely to be a problem.

The Web sites offer a place to post pictures, directions, profiles of the bride and groom, registry information, accommodations listings, and more — all in a bloglike format.

“As generations of couples move through life, more and more have been exposed to the Internet since the very beginning,” explains Anja Winikka, an editor at wedding Web site provider theknot.com. “This is a logical way for them to pass on information to their guests.”

While most wedding Web sites are free, some require a one-year subscription fee, generally between $50 and $100.

E-mail

E-mail invites are an etiquette no-no, according to wedding planner Allison Liset of Elegant Engagements in Sandwich. “The formal invitation should always go out in paper,” she says, “but for guests who don’t get their RSVP card in on time, you can send a quick e-mail to follow up.”

E-mail follow-ups still allow guests to respond in writing, Liset explains, which can be more comfortable than a phone call if they need to decline, and offers a faster response than a mail query.

In fact, asking guests to RSVP via e-mail from the start is becoming increasingly popular. While traditionalists still say a formal RSVP card should be included in the invitation, many young couples are choosing instead to simply provide their e-mail addresses when asking for a response.

“We had guests RSVP to the wedding on a traditional card,” says recent bride Jessica Dalby of Wellfleet, “but because there were so many other events, like a barbecue and a whale watch, we put the RSVP for those on our Web site. It was really helpful, because it made the paper RSVP much less complicated.”

Winikka sees this combination practice as a good middle ground, environmentally and economically. “I don’t see e-mail replacing formal invitations, but it can really help cut down on inserts, which budget- and paper-wise is great.”

With most couples overspending by thousands, Laura Harding sees how to keep costs down

Oversized hats are selling faster than festival wellies and men every- where are off on 4×4 driving stag weekends. It must be the wedding season and “for richer or for poorer” has never seemed so apt.

Amit Bhatia and Vanisha Mittal, the daughter of steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal, managed to rack up bills totalling £30m during their three-day celebrations four years ago – the most expensive wedding of all time. But while not everyone has a billionaire budget, most couples still manage to blow their nuptials savings by almost 25 per cent, amounting to an extra £3,500, according to research by Alliance & Leicester.

A glamorous venue costs an average of £2,200, and that doesn’t come close to the bill for those Irish castles favoured by pop stars and glamour girls. Flowers will set you back over £500 and a storybook album of your big day, snapped by a professional photographer, will cost nearly £900.

Then there’s the dress – the stuff of fantasies … and financial nightmares. Even if you aren’t Coleen McLoughlin and don’t need a £200,000 Marchesa frock to make you feel like a princess, a designer dress will cost at least £1,300. Shoes and jewellery will bump up the clothes bill even more.

But it’s on the reception that most couples overspend. People tend to believe it will cost less than £5,000, when £8,000 is a much more common figure.

Richard Al-Dabbagh, head of personal loans at Alliance & Leicester, says: “The expense is greatly underestimated, and it is essential to assess your finances when budgeting for the special day. It may be sensible to opt for a low-rate personal loan.”

However, there are other ways to keep costs under control if you don’t want to start married life in debt, and planning ahead is important. For example, most venues offer a three-course meal for the wedding breakfast, but if you opt for a buffet you could halve the expense. And consider supplying your own alcohol, as buying in bulk from an off-licence or wholesaler could also reduce the bill – though check if the venue will demand a fee for corkage….[read more]

original content by: http://www.independent.co.uk/