Dream Weddings

Ok so I realized real fast that all little girls have a dream wedding that sometimes seems really out of reach. And if you have a family like mine or am in a position like me you are forced to choose between dream and reality. Or that's what it seems. I come from a lower middle class family and am considered upper lower class myself. I make less than $5000 and my fiance' is just barely pushing $20000 with two jobs and side jobs. Though my father has two nice paying jobs as well he also is paying mortgage and other important bills. My mother runs her own cleaning business and lives well but not with much to spare.

But my dream wedding is expensive.... No my dream venue is. It runs at $7500 + tax and that doesn't include anything like catering or photographers or any of the things you may think would be in a price that high. It does however have history and priceless pieces of art and beautiful statues and use of the art museum on it's property and a consultant and two hours use of all 17 anchors (give or take) for photos and security and clean-up. But more importantly to me it comes with memories I have with my father, my sister, and my soul mate.

We went to look at it this past Saturday and needless to say it just made me fall in love with it all over. But let's face it. If I saved every penny from my paychecks all year it still wouldn't be enough and there are still other costs to a wedding. But how do you just turn away from your dream?

Here's a word of advise to other brides out there facing a similar problem, if it's the venue, a caterer you love, the perfect dress, or something as simple as a hair piece for your flower girl, Don't give up just because it seems out of reach. There's a reason we don't get married a week after our engagement. It's to save! It's to get all the pieces together for that one perfect day when a little girl becomes a woman and a wife.

Now I'm not saying to over look the price and go into debt. ALWAYS have a back up plan and a back up plan for your back up plan. But don't just settle for less than what you deserve because of a price tag. Sometimes you can get around it and trim it just enough. One of my best friends offered free cleaning service to a club for two months to bring the venue price down to just below her budget for it. One of my best guy friends babysat seven kids at once for a year in return for their father both a videographer and a photographer and staff.

My mom and dad and I are creating a joint savings account so none of us can touch it without one other of us being there to help save and me and my mom are planning on doing a few bake-sales and car washes to help. I am also offering a special for other brides looking for bridesmaids dresses and flower girl dresses. Since I make them cheap to begin with I am now going to be doing them for only $3 per hour plus cost of material and shipping. I am actually going to be making a second page on this blog just for that to give more information.

Money is tight and the dream wedding takes a lot of it some times, but it is reachable.

By the way if you are wondering the picture above is my dream venue. It is the Ringling Brother's Museum of Art founded by John and Mable Ringling. The couples house is also on this property along with a museum for the circus John ran with his brothers and a beautiful rose garden that Mable started literally one hundred years ago. I first visited this amazing place thirteen years ago and have loves it ever since.

Well that's it for now. Remember if you're in a pinch and need help with lowering you wedding costs, please check out my second page. The dresses are all custom made and help me get a little closer to my own dream wedding

Dresses... Solutions for Shallow Pockets

So today I really want to talk about bridesmaids dresses. I started looking the day after I got engaged for something affordable that fit the theme of the wedding. Chances are unless your made of money or only have one bridesmaid you can spoil, you won't have enough money to pay for the dresses of your dream. But that doesn't mean there aren't other ways to get them.

The first option I looked at was the girls paying for their own dresses. Of course this pissed off my sister since she didn't think she'd have to pay for anything. And that's something to think about and talk over with your girls. Can they afford to pay for dresses? Do they even like the dresses you want? Cause face it if they hate it the won't be willing to cough up $100 or so to pay for it. Or are you going to let them choose the style as long as it matches the colors?

No matter what having the girls pay for their own dresses can help you out in the long run. Just remember it can also cause problems for your girls.

My next idea was better. I found dresses that I liked. Twobirds classic gowns were beautiful, fit the theme, and gives each girl a look of their own while still having the same dress. The two problems with this. First the dress does not come in the color I want (nor one close enough that also looks nice) and the price. At $310 a dress it just isn't possible for me to pay for 3 of them nor ask my girls to pay for their own. I was stuck until I realized how simple the design actually was. If you know how to sew or know someone who does then you can easily make the same or close to the same dresses for only a quarter of the price. I will be spending around $150 on the fabric for all 3 gowns and it will only take about a month to make all of them. This means I can easily ask the girl to pitch in some for their own dresses, get the dress I and the girls like, and pay less than most single dresses cost for all 3.

Now I'm not saying don't spend money on buying the dresses for the actual shops, but if you just can't swing it and neither can your girls this is a good alternative to look into.

On the topic of dresses I am also making the Flower girl dresses for my two nieces. This is also really simple to do and if you want to know how listen. It's called a tutu dress and here are the things you need to make them.

~A piece of elastic that measures the same length as the girl's bossom.
~5+ tubes of 6in x 25 yds tulle in the color you want
~Ribbon
~Scissors
~A sewing machine
~A piece of cardboard or anything else flat to wrap the tulle around
~Any extras (ie: fabric flowers, gemstones, glitter, ect.) If you use extras you may need a glue gun to apply them to the dress.

1. Line the ends of the elastic up and sew about an inch to 2 inches in (a straight line does the trick so you don't need to be a pro seamstress to do this)
2. Take the tulle and the cardboard. The length of the cardboard should be the length you want for the dress. Wrap the tulle around the cardboard until no tulle is left on the tube. Then take your scissors and cut through all the layers only at the end you started wrapping at.
3. The pieces of tulle will be twice as long as your desired length. Fold them in half. Take the first piece and stick the folded side through the top of the elastic so that there is a loop coming out from the bottom. Pull the rest of the piece through the loop and pull, tightening the loop as you need. Repeat this for the rest of the pieces.
4. If you want a second layer you will do the same making sure to have the top layer over two knots of the bottom layer.
5. Once you are finished there you can do anything from adding sleeves or a halter to adding flowers.
     -Sleeves take a piece or tulle and tie it in the front and back of the dress. You can either have two or one sleeve and you can also cross them over each other or have one that crosses to give a greek look.
     -For a halter you are going to take a single piece of tulle and loop it through two sides of one piece of tulle already attached to the dress. Then you just have to tie it around the neck of your flower girl.
6. To create a waist line or just make your flower girl that much cuter take the ribbon and wrap it just under their bosom and make a bow. This pulls the tulle together to help bring the look of a dress together.

And if you don't have the time or patients to make one yourself you can always write me at flamewolf092@yahoo.com and I can make your flower girls the dress at decent prices. I work with budgets which is always helpful.

See no reason to stress over the dresses for your bridal party.... Who am I kidding? No matter what you'll find something to stress over. I know I am. Ha! Anyways that's it for this post. I hope I helped some and who knows maybe tutu dresses will take the wedding world by storm now.

Please don't forget if you want to help me reach my dream wedding you can do so by donating HERE. The donations go to getting the venue we want and helping family from out of town by getting rooms for them.

And So The Chaos Begins

So this is my first post to this blog. And to kind of tell you what it's about here's quick and simple summery....

I'M GETTING MARRIED!

Yep so that' it. I'm engaged and going to take you along the wacky road of planning a Greek themed wedding. This is also to give advise on what to and not to do during certain parts of the planning process as I learn them.

Isn't this exciting! Of course it is! But it's also frustrating. I'm only a few weeks in and I'm already going crazy. Mostly because I have a year and 10 months to plan and I'm worried about not getting things done in time and getting them done too early. As of right now I have simple things planned like the first dance song and the colors. Here's my advice on these things.

When picking the song you are going to dance to with your new husband (or wife) do not go traditional lovey dovey just because that's what people expect. Me and Roger are going to be dancing to Never Gonna Be Alone by Nickleback. Mostly because it's our song and the lyrics really fit us as a couple. And don't let others talk you out of the perfect song. It's your wedding not theirs so if they don't like it they don't have to come.

As for colors... Well here's what I did. I picked my favorite and his. I love silver because of the moon and because silver looks better than gold on me. And Roger loves blue and really so do I. So we decided on a deep sky blue and silver wedding that complements our overall theme and ourselves. But I know one of my cousins choose the colors of their high school because that was were her and her husband meet. Heck you don't even need a color scheme if you don't want. Go traditional and be black and white. As long as the colors reflect who you are as a couple.

Also I found out that if you are struggling with paying for your big day there are some websites to help you start a fundraiser. Me and Roger are actually fundraising to hopefully get our dream ceremony and reception venue, The Ringling Museum of the Arts. If you would like to help us any amount helps and you can donate at the link I will provide below. If you're looking for a fundraising website I recommend gogetfunding.com. It's free and there's even a section specially for wedding.

Well that's it for now. I'll update later this week with more about this exciting time.
Bye

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