The Wedding Planner's Guide
Welcome to Wedding Planning on a Budget!
Let us help you plan the wedding of your dreams without breaking the bank!
We wish you the best!
Tim and Lisa Spooner
Authors of Wedding Planning on a Budget
Plan Your Dream Wedding Without Nightmare Costs
by Tim and Lisa Spooner
Contrary to popular opinion, beautiful weddings can be achieved while spending little to none of your (or your parent's) money. We should know! We planned our beautiful dream wedding on less than $2,000 and want to share a few insights to help you plan your dream wedding on a tight budget.
The first thing you need to understand about planning a wedding is that the budget is your foundation. That is why we call it wedding planning ON a budget. Before you do any planning, you need to sit down with your fiancé and figure out what you can afford to spend. Consider what type of help your parents will be providing and what you have available in savings. The amount you are both comfortable spending is your wedding budget.
Once you have a set amount of money earmarked, it is time to figure out how you will achieve your dream wedding without spending more money than your budget permits.
You and your fiancé should develop a vision of what your wedding will look like and write it down. Ask yourselves the following questions: What aspects of your dream wedding are most important to you? What would make your wedding day a dream come true? Don't be shy about flavoring your wedding with touches that reflect your personality. Personal touches not only add meaning, but make the occasion more memorable.
At this point you have two clearly defined goals: - A budget that tells what you can reasonably afford to spend. - A summary of how you envision your dream wedding.
Keep these written goals in a prominent place in your wedding planning folder and refer to them throughout your planning experience.
Now it's time to save the big bucks! There are several websites that feature discounted wedding products and services. A search using keywords like "discount wedding ideas", "discount wedding products", or "wedding planning on a budget" will present hundreds of sites to browse for products and services that may suit your vision.
Discounted wedding products and services may not be enough to help you achieve your dream wedding within your budget. In addition to discounted products and services, you must follow strategies that will produce FREE wedding products and services for your wedding.
Learn how to get these FREE wedding products and services. Download the wedding planner that reveals how we planned our beautiful dream wedding on a $2,000 budget. Discover our proven step-by-step system for planning a dream wedding on a tight budget!
Show your wedding budget who is in charge: Download the Wedding Planner
The first thing you need to understand about planning a wedding is that the budget is your foundation. That is why we call it wedding planning ON a budget. Before you do any planning, you need to sit down with your fiancé and figure out what you can afford to spend. Consider what type of help your parents will be providing and what you have available in savings. The amount you are both comfortable spending is your wedding budget.
Once you have a set amount of money earmarked, it is time to figure out how you will achieve your dream wedding without spending more money than your budget permits.
You and your fiancé should develop a vision of what your wedding will look like and write it down. Ask yourselves the following questions: What aspects of your dream wedding are most important to you? What would make your wedding day a dream come true? Don't be shy about flavoring your wedding with touches that reflect your personality. Personal touches not only add meaning, but make the occasion more memorable.
At this point you have two clearly defined goals: - A budget that tells what you can reasonably afford to spend. - A summary of how you envision your dream wedding.
Keep these written goals in a prominent place in your wedding planning folder and refer to them throughout your planning experience.
Now it's time to save the big bucks! There are several websites that feature discounted wedding products and services. A search using keywords like "discount wedding ideas", "discount wedding products", or "wedding planning on a budget" will present hundreds of sites to browse for products and services that may suit your vision.
Discounted wedding products and services may not be enough to help you achieve your dream wedding within your budget. In addition to discounted products and services, you must follow strategies that will produce FREE wedding products and services for your wedding.
Learn how to get these FREE wedding products and services. Download the wedding planner that reveals how we planned our beautiful dream wedding on a $2,000 budget. Discover our proven step-by-step system for planning a dream wedding on a tight budget!
Show your wedding budget who is in charge: Download the Wedding Planner
Make Your Tight Wedding Budget Your Greatest Asset!
by Tim and Lisa Spooner
Tight wedding budget got you down? We know what you mean! As planners of our own beautiful wedding on a budget of just $2,000, we understand the challenges facing you.
Planning a wedding on a tight budget need not tie your stomach up in knots. In fact, your tight budget can make your wedding truly remarkable!
Do you want to know how to make your tight budget a major ally instead of your adversary? How would you like to stop hating your budget restrictions and start appreciating the advantages you have over other wedding planners?
To know this freedom, you need to know the positives to planning your wedding on a tight budget. Then, simply make the choice to major on those positives to achieve the wonderful wedding of your dreams. Focusing on the helpful aspects of your budget will lead you to the amazing side benefits that you never knew accompanied your wedding budget.
In this article, we look at several of the great assets your tight budget can give your wedding planning.
Right at the top of the list we find the value of increased creativity that comes with your tight budget. As the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention. The needy wedding planner discovers her inventive, creative wedding planning skills. Your wedding will not turn out like another "cookie cutter" wedding. Instead, your budget will force you to think outside of the airtight box that suffocates most weddings.
So go ahead and let those creative juices flow! Instead of planning an ordinary wedding, plan an extraordinary wedding!
As a wedding planner who must abide by a tight budget, you will not find yourself ordering straight out of the wedding catalog. Instead of simply ordering a pre-made, one-size-fits-all wedding, you will choose to piece together a wedding that truly reflects your personality. Your wedding will truly be YOUR wedding!
Relax, let your hair down! Allow your personality to permeate your wedding planning. Welcome to your wedding! Traditions and magazines know about weddings in general but they don't know about your wedding!
As a wedding planner on a strict budget, you will have good reason to rely on your family and friends for support. Instead of simply plopping down a chunk of change and letting the professionals handle everything for you, you will benefit from working with your family and friends to bring your wedding dreams into reality.
Every wedding event requires a community for its success. Your budget will help you keep your community involved all the way through the planning process to your wedding day! With your friends and family involved in your wedding planning, you will find your wedding to be extra special to you and your community.
Since you cannot afford the fees charged by the professionals, you carefully plan your event to reflect your personality and keep your family involved. You also put lots of your own creativity into the wedding. Your creativity, personality, and community all infuse themselves into your wedding planning and two more advantages emerge from your tight budget...
A sense of ownership pervades your planning experience. Your wedding really feels like your wedding to you since you created it and poured yourself into it. Your sense of ownership will in turn produce a great sense of satisfaction in you as you realize that you created a great master piece - your wedding day.
In the end, your budget can help produce for your wedding these five assets: creativity, personality, community, ownership, and satisfaction. By focusing on these five positives, your budget will take its place among your most powerful wedding planning aids. You must live with your budget limitations anyway - Why fight it? Let your budget work for you!
Look on the web and you will find many helpful resources out there, such as our blog and book, just waiting to help you make your wedding budget work for you. Do not settle for anything less than the beautiful wedding of your dreams!
----------------
Show Your Budget Who Is In Charge!
Download Tim and Lisa's eBook, subscribe to their blog for daily advice, and see how they planned the wedding of their dreams for just $2,000!
Visit Today -> www.weddingplanningonabudget.com
----------------
Planning a wedding on a tight budget need not tie your stomach up in knots. In fact, your tight budget can make your wedding truly remarkable!
Do you want to know how to make your tight budget a major ally instead of your adversary? How would you like to stop hating your budget restrictions and start appreciating the advantages you have over other wedding planners?
To know this freedom, you need to know the positives to planning your wedding on a tight budget. Then, simply make the choice to major on those positives to achieve the wonderful wedding of your dreams. Focusing on the helpful aspects of your budget will lead you to the amazing side benefits that you never knew accompanied your wedding budget.
In this article, we look at several of the great assets your tight budget can give your wedding planning.
Right at the top of the list we find the value of increased creativity that comes with your tight budget. As the saying goes, necessity is the mother of invention. The needy wedding planner discovers her inventive, creative wedding planning skills. Your wedding will not turn out like another "cookie cutter" wedding. Instead, your budget will force you to think outside of the airtight box that suffocates most weddings.
So go ahead and let those creative juices flow! Instead of planning an ordinary wedding, plan an extraordinary wedding!
As a wedding planner who must abide by a tight budget, you will not find yourself ordering straight out of the wedding catalog. Instead of simply ordering a pre-made, one-size-fits-all wedding, you will choose to piece together a wedding that truly reflects your personality. Your wedding will truly be YOUR wedding!
Relax, let your hair down! Allow your personality to permeate your wedding planning. Welcome to your wedding! Traditions and magazines know about weddings in general but they don't know about your wedding!
As a wedding planner on a strict budget, you will have good reason to rely on your family and friends for support. Instead of simply plopping down a chunk of change and letting the professionals handle everything for you, you will benefit from working with your family and friends to bring your wedding dreams into reality.
Every wedding event requires a community for its success. Your budget will help you keep your community involved all the way through the planning process to your wedding day! With your friends and family involved in your wedding planning, you will find your wedding to be extra special to you and your community.
Since you cannot afford the fees charged by the professionals, you carefully plan your event to reflect your personality and keep your family involved. You also put lots of your own creativity into the wedding. Your creativity, personality, and community all infuse themselves into your wedding planning and two more advantages emerge from your tight budget...
A sense of ownership pervades your planning experience. Your wedding really feels like your wedding to you since you created it and poured yourself into it. Your sense of ownership will in turn produce a great sense of satisfaction in you as you realize that you created a great master piece - your wedding day.
In the end, your budget can help produce for your wedding these five assets: creativity, personality, community, ownership, and satisfaction. By focusing on these five positives, your budget will take its place among your most powerful wedding planning aids. You must live with your budget limitations anyway - Why fight it? Let your budget work for you!
Look on the web and you will find many helpful resources out there, such as our blog and book, just waiting to help you make your wedding budget work for you. Do not settle for anything less than the beautiful wedding of your dreams!
----------------
Show Your Budget Who Is In Charge!
Download Tim and Lisa's eBook, subscribe to their blog for daily advice, and see how they planned the wedding of their dreams for just $2,000!
Visit Today -> www.weddingplanningonabudget.com
----------------
Bride, Groom: You Can't Afford to be Average!
by Tim and Lisa Spooner
More than 1/3 of couples getting married in the United States pay for their own weddings. Even more couples in the U.S. pay for at least a portion of their wedding expenses.
If you are a bride or groom reading this article, then you are probably one of the couples who are paying for or at least helping to pay for their own wedding.
Even as more couples get involved in planning for and paying for their dream weddings, the wedding price tag continues to grow more forboding. In the year 2007, according to CostOfWedding.com, the average U.S. wedding cost was $28,800. This figure is expected to steadily rise in years to come.
Today's bride and groom have become so desensitized to the incredible expense of planning a wedding that they hardly stop to think about how much money that really is. Let's take a moment to put that $28,800 price tag in perspective and look at a couple ways to make your wedding more affordable.
First, let's consider that $28,800 is more than most brides or grooms bring home from work in a year.
Now, suppose a couple wants to save up for their wedding so they don't go into debt. If they are saving for a $28,800 wedding, they should consider how much they should feed their wedding savings piggy bank each month. If they can only afford to save, say, $300 per month, they should plan on saving for a full 8 years ($300 x 96 months [that's 8 years]=$28,800). What engaged couple is willing to wait 8 years to get married?
We haven't even considered that it takes considerable discipline to save $300 each month. Some might need to wait longer as they can only save $150 a month or even less.
Most couples choose to get married within a year or two of their engagement. If they are paying for their own wedding as more than 1/3 of couples do, they often plan their expensive wedding courtesy Visa or Mastercard. That saves them the trouble of budgeting and saving for all those years before marriage. Instead of saving before marriage for their wedding day, they spend those delicate first years of marriage after the wedding day struggling with debt and living uncomfortably frugal lives together. Their credit card company keeps them under its thumb for years as interest piles up on interest and the poor couple barely scrapes by.
We wish that we were exaggerating here but all too often this is the scenario in which young couples find themselves. All so they could glory in one splendid day marking the beginning of their marriage. Hoping that somehow the perfection of the wedding day would somehow rub off on each succeeding day of marriage, the couple had poured a year's salary into that big day. The reality is that the expense of that wedding day is paid for day after day of their married lives and they realize all too late that financial stress is the number one killer of marriages.
Americans with their individualistic attitudes tend to believe that they are special and that the rules do not apply to them. Likewise, couples planning their weddings tend to think that they will be the exception. That they will somehow spend less than most spend or that they will somehow be able to pay their credit cards off later without much problem.
Well, if you are not careful, you will soon discover that you are not exempt from the norms and that you are all too average. You will discover yourself in a quagmire of financial stress and marital disharmony day after day for years all for the sake of a wedding that was bought at a much too high of a price - we regret to say that it could even cost you your marriage.
What should you do? Stop being average. Stop planning your wedding the way most young brides and grooms plan their weddings.
Set a realistic spending allowance for your wedding - a spending allowance that you and your lover can live with. Go into your wedding planning with your eyes wide open.
You really can have a wonderful wedding day on whatever price you are able to pay - whether that be $5,000 or just $500. You would be amazed at how far that money can go when you are committed to planning your dream wedding on your chosen budget.
We were personally willing to spend no more than $2,000 for our wedding. We worked out a strategy that allowed us to stay under budget while planning a very memorable and special wedding day that is on par with any other wedding we have attended.
We have written a wedding planner to guide you in your wedding planning. In the wedding planner, we guide you in creating a reasonable wedding budget and show you step by step just what you need to do to see your dream wedding come true while staying under budget.
You can't afford to be average. Instead, be amazing!
Wedding Planning on a Budget is available as an instant download which can be read on your computer or printed at your convenience. To get your copy of this powerful wedding planning guide visit the Wedding Planner Download Page
We wish you the best and hope that you have an amazing wedding and a wonderful marriage together for the rest of your lives.
----------------
Show Your Budget Who Is In Charge!
Download Tim and Lisa's eBook, subscribe to their blog for daily advice, and see how they planned the wedding of their dreams for just $2,000!
Visit Today -> www.weddingplanningonabudget.com
----------------
If you are a bride or groom reading this article, then you are probably one of the couples who are paying for or at least helping to pay for their own wedding.
Even as more couples get involved in planning for and paying for their dream weddings, the wedding price tag continues to grow more forboding. In the year 2007, according to CostOfWedding.com, the average U.S. wedding cost was $28,800. This figure is expected to steadily rise in years to come.
Today's bride and groom have become so desensitized to the incredible expense of planning a wedding that they hardly stop to think about how much money that really is. Let's take a moment to put that $28,800 price tag in perspective and look at a couple ways to make your wedding more affordable.
First, let's consider that $28,800 is more than most brides or grooms bring home from work in a year.
Now, suppose a couple wants to save up for their wedding so they don't go into debt. If they are saving for a $28,800 wedding, they should consider how much they should feed their wedding savings piggy bank each month. If they can only afford to save, say, $300 per month, they should plan on saving for a full 8 years ($300 x 96 months [that's 8 years]=$28,800). What engaged couple is willing to wait 8 years to get married?
We haven't even considered that it takes considerable discipline to save $300 each month. Some might need to wait longer as they can only save $150 a month or even less.
Most couples choose to get married within a year or two of their engagement. If they are paying for their own wedding as more than 1/3 of couples do, they often plan their expensive wedding courtesy Visa or Mastercard. That saves them the trouble of budgeting and saving for all those years before marriage. Instead of saving before marriage for their wedding day, they spend those delicate first years of marriage after the wedding day struggling with debt and living uncomfortably frugal lives together. Their credit card company keeps them under its thumb for years as interest piles up on interest and the poor couple barely scrapes by.
We wish that we were exaggerating here but all too often this is the scenario in which young couples find themselves. All so they could glory in one splendid day marking the beginning of their marriage. Hoping that somehow the perfection of the wedding day would somehow rub off on each succeeding day of marriage, the couple had poured a year's salary into that big day. The reality is that the expense of that wedding day is paid for day after day of their married lives and they realize all too late that financial stress is the number one killer of marriages.
Americans with their individualistic attitudes tend to believe that they are special and that the rules do not apply to them. Likewise, couples planning their weddings tend to think that they will be the exception. That they will somehow spend less than most spend or that they will somehow be able to pay their credit cards off later without much problem.
Well, if you are not careful, you will soon discover that you are not exempt from the norms and that you are all too average. You will discover yourself in a quagmire of financial stress and marital disharmony day after day for years all for the sake of a wedding that was bought at a much too high of a price - we regret to say that it could even cost you your marriage.
What should you do? Stop being average. Stop planning your wedding the way most young brides and grooms plan their weddings.
Set a realistic spending allowance for your wedding - a spending allowance that you and your lover can live with. Go into your wedding planning with your eyes wide open.
You really can have a wonderful wedding day on whatever price you are able to pay - whether that be $5,000 or just $500. You would be amazed at how far that money can go when you are committed to planning your dream wedding on your chosen budget.
We were personally willing to spend no more than $2,000 for our wedding. We worked out a strategy that allowed us to stay under budget while planning a very memorable and special wedding day that is on par with any other wedding we have attended.
We have written a wedding planner to guide you in your wedding planning. In the wedding planner, we guide you in creating a reasonable wedding budget and show you step by step just what you need to do to see your dream wedding come true while staying under budget.
You can't afford to be average. Instead, be amazing!
Wedding Planning on a Budget is available as an instant download which can be read on your computer or printed at your convenience. To get your copy of this powerful wedding planning guide visit the Wedding Planner Download Page
We wish you the best and hope that you have an amazing wedding and a wonderful marriage together for the rest of your lives.
----------------
Show Your Budget Who Is In Charge!
Download Tim and Lisa's eBook, subscribe to their blog for daily advice, and see how they planned the wedding of their dreams for just $2,000!
Visit Today -> www.weddingplanningonabudget.com
----------------
More Wedding Planner Articles...
Save a Fortune on Your Dream Wedding!
Tim and Lisa, who planned their own wedding on a budget of $2,000 and wrote a downloadable Wedding Planner called Wedding Planning on a Budget, offer their thoughts and insights on wedding planning.
Fetching RSS feed... please stand byWedding Planning Books and Resources
We are always on the look out for superb resources... see what we found!
Once you check out our instantly downloadable wedding planner be sure to consider these other helpful wedding planning resources:
Wedding Planning For Dummies, Second Edition
Amazon Price: $13.59 (as of 07/14/2009) 
The Everything Wedding Organizer; Checklists, calendars, and worksheets for planning the perfect wedding
Amazon Price: (as of 07/14/2009)
by TimandLisa
Planners of their own elegant wedding on a budget of just $2,000 and authors of book - Wedding Planning on a Budget, Tim and Lisa share their expertis...
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