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Okay. I spent a total of $500 on my wedding: dress, minister, reception hall, food, tux rentals, etc.

Hispanic families in South Texas have a tradition where they "sponsor" costs for these kinds of things. Rather than a wedding gift, one couple paid for our cake, another paid for flowers, another for decorations at the hall, etc. Our reception wasn't "catered" - several friends volunteered to put together a barbecue feast. Even the photography services were provided for.

It was wonderful! I had my semi-formal wedding (lace gown, two brides maids, a ring bearer, a flower girl, two groomsmen and tons of tuxedoed ushers) right before lunch and had a very rowdy, friendly reception afterwards.

I got married about 3 years ago. We're not religious, but my Grandma's church was the most logical place to hold it. It was the most convenient for everyone to travel, and we could have the wedding there for free. We only had to pay the organist and the sound guy. My dad is a former cop and still has friends on the police force, so they reserved the Police Lodge for us to have our reception. That cost us nothing, and there was a kitchen, so my Dad asked his friend, a former restaurant cook, to cater our food (she bought appetizers in bulk at Sam's Club and ordered stuff from Swiss Colony). She didn't charge me for her services...just for the cost of food and supplies. And we got married at 1:30 in the afternoon, with the reception immediately following, so we only served appetizers and dessert.

My stepmom had friends who did floral arranging and baked specialty cakes, so she enlisted their help for a very low cost. The flowers cost less than $200 and the wedding cake was only $50 (and that included a tiny 3 tier cake just for us and tons of cupcakes, as well as two sheet cakes for the guests).

My aunt is a photographer, so she agreed to do the photos.

A friend of mine works at a salon and day spa, so she offered to do my hair and makeup.

My Dad had a huge stereo set-up, so he burned a bunch of music onto CDs and played DJ himself.

I did the centerpieces and most of the other decor myself. And I'm not very crafty, but we had a fall themed wedding, so I just took mason jars of various sizes and tied autumn ribbon around the rims and put candles in them. Those were the centerpieces (which, I should add, got a lot of compliments for their simplicity). I also did the favors. I did my own invitations too...they have some nice invitation kits at crafts stores, and you can print them out on the computer. Much cheaper than ordering them.

As for my dress...I bought a simple white dress off the rack at Jessica McClintock. It was $150. I bought my accessories off eBay mostly...and I got a tiara for $12 at Claire's. Even though the dress itself was inexpensive, I dressed it up to make it look really really nice (I bought the dress when we were planning on getting married in Europe, since my husband is stationed here in Germany, so I was never looking for anything fancy to begin with...then we decided to have the wedding in Ohio where my family lives). My husband got married in his military uniform, so there was no cost there.

We didn't have alcohol at the wedding (that can really run up your bill), but I did buy a few bottles of champagne for the toast, which seemed just fine to everyone. We only had about 30-35 people at the wedding.

After the reception, several family members went to my Grandma's anyway, where she served a huge dinner. It was an all day celebration, and I would say that our wedding didn't cost us more than $2000. Everyone had a great time, and apparently, people are still talking about it three years later.

Wedding photos are at http://www.lanceandkaryn.com if anyone is interested in taking a look.

I'm sure not all of these suggestions are helpful...after all, not everyone has the connections my father apparently has...but hopefully there are a few things here that are useful. <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

[color:"orange"]Edited by management for TOS violations[/color]

Have an elegant, later-evening champagne-and-dessert reception. As long as you are clear about the nature of the reception (i.e., people will make sure to have dinner before the ceremony, which could be at, say, 8 or 8:30 pm), it's literally less than half the cost of a dinner reception.

I had a chamber music agency for seven years and only saw a few weddings (out of 100s that we played) which had this setup, but every one of those that did were elegant and memorable. Amp up the desserts in terms of number and richness...have more than one cake; hire a coffee-only specialty caterer to serve capuccinos and espressos, etc; have a chocolate fountain (or two! One for milk, one for dark chocolate!) with fruit for dipping; have champagne and sparkling cider, not a cash bar; have little favors (served in little chinese takeout containers, tied in ribbons coordinating with your colors) with chocolates and customized fortune cookies. You'll still save a bundle over having a full meal.

If you put "champagne dessert wedding reception" into a seach engine, you'll get a couple of good sites.

Good luck,

Elise