Dave & My Wedding - November 1998
Well I must say that this was a really neet thing to plan. I love planning parties and things and well Dave & I are not your ordinary run of the mill type of people so our ideas and thoughts are somewhat unique as you will see in the following photos and notes that I have written.
First of all My whole wedding including the Honeymoon cost a total of $ 3579.59. Yes that says three thousand. Dave and I are not big spenders but we like to have exactly what we want and so I am a VERY, VERY good shopper. I'll break down the costs for you at the bottom of the page. You would be amazed at the things you can do when you set your mind to it.
On another note, we were also very lucky to have financial help from our family's. Our wedding and Honeymoon was completely paid for in cash 1 month before we got married. (except for the food, you have to wait until they know exactly how many people they are serving before they acually give you the bill) Dave and I are very afraid of being in debt so we made sure that this happened by budgeting and (grandma Loans)
| This is the front of our wedding invitation. We wrote them ourselves and I made and printed them on my computer using "Print Shop" and Specially made for the computer "Card Paper". For those of you not familliar with Card paper, it is a thick paper that you can feed through you printer, and it has bends in it so you don't have to guess on your folding capabilities. It comes in a varity of styles and usually comes with envelopes. | |
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This is the inside of the invitations. I also made the announcements, the inserts, I cut my own tissue/wax paper & I also made the RSVP cards which were post card size and so needed no envelope. Total cost for Custom invitations, envelopes, inserts, RSVP cards, and stamps $99.44 |
| This is me. I have gained so much weight
since High School YUCK. But anyway ............... This
is me just before going to the back of the chapple. I
have on a short dress (hand sewn) made of White Hawaiian
print fabric, all of those colorful things are leis. I
have a "Haku Lei" on my head and I have a lei
around my neck and one on my ankle. The others were for
our family members, which Dave & I gave out as part
of our Wedding Ceremony. Total Cost for Dress (fabric from Hawaii & seemstress costs) $90.00 |
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Well this is us after we listened to my
Dad sing the Hawaiian Wedding song and after giving out
the leis to our family. As you can see my husband and his
brother (Mike) are wearing shorts and Hawaiian shirts and
I didn't have a Maid of Honor I had a best man too. My
son Ricky, he also gave me away. Told you we are kind of
Unique. Total cost for the Chapple & the Minister $295.00 |
| These are our napkins. I like things to
be colorful. I bought the napkins at a paper supply store
and I had an ink stamp and stamped them all myself. It is
actually kind of nice that way because there is no
minumum of each color you have to order and you get to
keep the stamp. Total cost for napkins & stamp $42.15 |
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This is our cake. I wanted something
square not round and I didn't want it to be "girly".
So I want to this Italian Bakery and talked to the baker
and told him what I invisioned and he gave me some ideas
too. And this is what we came up with. The blus on the
bottom and crossed across the cake are pieces of fabric
left over from Dave's shirt. Total cost for the cake and delivery $130.00 |
| This is Dave's Aunt (left), Dad (middle) & Mom (right). This was another thing that we did differently, we gave gifts to our parents & grand parents & Dave's brother & my brother, at our reception. We really felt that if it weren't for all of them we wouldn't be here and so we thought that we would try to thank the in some kind of way. |  |
So I asked everyone to give me 3/4 of a yard of fabric in some kind of design that suited them, and for them not to ask any questions. They all did what I asked and so I made each of them a covered photo album and inside Dave and I put together pictures of us from when we were born until present day. I got these neet pages that had lines on the side so we could write in things about all of the pictures Dave helped alot with this one, in fact we had to go to his parents house while they were gone and steal the pictures, take then to the photo copie place and have them copied and get the pictures back to their house without them knowing. It really wasn't to hard though, just sneaky. Dave is a good rememberer and so he helped pick out the pictures and helped decide what to write about them. Everyone enjoyed their books very much.
Total cost for binders, pages, copies of photos, glue, notions, wrapping paper & ribbons for 8 books $238.00
Note: I gave these to my mother in-law when I was finished so she could wrap them for me. I put them in the boxes (taped then up tight) and wrote the names of who's they were, and she wrapped them for me in the paper I hadgivin to her. She was a big help, and NO, she didn't peek. She was surprised too at the reception.
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Here is one more gift given at my wedding. This is the gift of love. I am dancing the Hula for my Husband as my first gift to him in our new life together. My Daddy sang the song for my, "Little Brown Gal" (although I'm really not very little anymore) Dave had never seen me do the hula so I thought that this was appropriate, and he enjoyed it very much. |
Well I said earlier on this page that I would put down a breakdown of the costs and here it is with some explanations underneath.
Chapel / Minister $295.00
Reception Hall $0.00 thats right it cost NOTHING
Food (51 people) $637.50
Dress $90.00
Cake $130.00
Tami's other Clothes $40.00
Dave's Clothes (shoes, shorts, Hawaiian fabric flown from Hawaii
& hand made shirt) $55.00
Ricky's Clothes (shoes, shorts, Hawaiian fabric flown from Hawaii
& hand made shirt) $55.00
Leis (1 haku to wear, one to throw, 9 regular & one ankle lei)
$584.50
Kukui Nut leis (10 for the men) $100.00
Rings for the ceremony (these were only for the ceremony, we
bought the real ones in Hawaii a month later) $15.00
Sparkling Cider (for the tables) $40.00
Photographer $285.00
DJ $0.00 yep, it cost NOTHING
Invitations / Announcements $ 72.00
Stamps (for mailing) $29.44
Table Clothes $0.00 yes you are reading it correctly it says it
cost NOTHING
Marriage License $67.00
Napkins & Stamp $42.15
Gift Photo Albums (for Family) $238.00
Honeymoon (4 day Mexico Cruise) $804.00
Now for a little explanation ........................ We looked at about 3 or 4 Chaples and even though this particular one was the cheapest that is not why we decided on this one. The people at this one were the nicest. They had thier own Minister, they were getting ready to refurbish it and it was all made by one man years ago, as a church. It was very small it will only hold 82 people, and all wood inside & out. It had a very nice history about it and a very nice aora about it. It is set in the middle of a residential neighborhood in our town and we just really liked it once we got the stories about it and saw the inside.
We had our reception at the "Elk's Lodge" in West Covina. Well we looked into several places including the comunity center which is a very nice place, and a few different Elk's Lodge's. Also the veterans hall and some other places too. This particular lodge got our buisness by default .......... let me tell you the story. After caling all of these places and getting price for table rental, cloth rental, silverware rental, catering prices, room rental and all of that, I asked my mother in-law if she thought I could get the Elk's Lodge in Azusa which is the Lodge that my father in-law belonged to at the time. She talked to my father in-law and he said he would get some info for me at his next meeting, which he did. ......... well it turned out that they had the facilities and a place for dancing and a full bar and catering capability. Very good prices too. So I said ok, lets book it. So we did and then they gave a menu to choose from, we had choosen Baked Virgina Ham dinner. I can't remember the prices but it was something like $7.50 a plate plus $500.00 or $300.00 for the room and tables and stuff. WOW !!! We had eaten there before and the food was pretty good. So we were all set. ......... then it happened, for so reason or another that Lodge lost ots lease and were no more. This was a couple of 3 or 4 months before we got married. So back to the drawing board we go. Well my mother in-law later suggested to try another Lodge as my father in-law was now in the process of finding a new lodge to move to. They ended up in the Ontario Lodge which is very nice too and big and they have nice facilities, but I just didn't quite like this one. I think I felt that it was too far from where we were getting married in LaVerne. So we decided to go to the West Covina Lodge, they actually have a restaraunt there. So we went and had dinner and looked around and a few weeks later my mother in-law spoke to a friend of hers who worked there like a s a coordinator or something. She told her the situation and gave her the low down and we ended up deciding to go there. What we got was a small area simi closed in, near the bar & dance floor. Because my father in-law was a Elk member we could get this room for free as long as we had at least 40 people, and as long as we alowed them to cater it. What they offered for catering was a sit down meal, choise of Steak, Chicken or fish baked potato, roll Tea, coffee or water & a soup and salad bar for $12.50 perperson TIP INCLUDED. They would provide tables, table clothes, dishes & silverware & dinner and waiters. And tables for the gifts and cake and we could arang it any way we wanted and we could decorated it any way we liked. So we took it. What a bargain.
As for a DJ, well we have a friend
who was going to do it for free, but then he got really busy and
decided he had better call it off so we could find someone else,
The lady at the Lodge said that we could bring our own DJ but he
would have to stay until at least 11:00pm because this was a
Saturday night and they always provide music for dancing for the
people who came to the restaurant and we would have to share the
dance space, but not to worry because Friday was there big night
and Saturday wasn't always very crowded. But we didn't mind
sharing. I mean when you have a wedding party people usually stay
out of the way anyway, and we didn't mind if there were a few
extra people on the dance floor anyway.
Well then the coodinator lady was getting worried about our DJ
and so she was tring to get us to not bring him and she would
provide the entertainment free, with someone whom she had
entertain there before and that they liked. SO when my DJ friend
said he just couldn't do it, we went ahead and let her hire this
guy. I had told her that I was going to need to give him a tape
of our first dance and that my Dad was going to sing for me to do
teh Hula but other that that it was fine, and she saind that that
would not be a problem. ..... So anyway that is how we got a free
DJ.
Now my photographer also just happens to be a friend of mine & Dave's. He works with us at Fender adn we does photography on the side. I talked to him about doing it and he said he'd do it for the cost of the film, developing and a couple of beers. Well, I'm not stupid, I've seen his pictures before and he does good work. I didn't even have to think about wether or not I could afford a few beers, of course I could. And let me tell you the pictures came out beautiful. And I have the negatives. We set up a table for him and his wife at the reception and of course fed them. As for the beers, I don't think we got around to buying them, I'll have to ask my husband if he did.
Honeymoon ------- well, this was interesting. We were tring to decid on a Honeymoon spot. Of course we were also thinking that we didn't want to have to dish out to much money right safter the wedding so I asked Dave what he thought about a cruise and he said that would be cool, but how much does it cost ? So I checked it out and you know it really doesn't cost that much. Its about $100.00 a day per person and it includes entertainment 24 hours a day, swimming pools, games and all you can eat 24 hours a day including free room service (along with free food). The only thing the cost doesn't cover is Alchohol, gambling, and gift shop stuff. And also off the ship tours, but these are very inexpensive. So we decided on a 4 day Cruise that cost us $804.00. And what the bill came to after from gambling, alchohol, off boat tours, photos & souvinears for 4 days was $168.73. This was over the Thanksgiving holiday.
Here is the the most important thing: our family helped pay for our wedding. We had offers of help from My Mother & Father in-law, My Mother & her husband, My Father & his wife, and my Grandmother Gray who was a tremendous help and helped us to get it all taken care of before the wedding day came. All together our families paid a total of $1912.50 and we ourselves paid $1647.09. So as you can see your wedding can be what you want it to be and at the price you want it to be at. You just have to not settle until you find exactly what your looking for. Also we had 9 months to prepare.
The only other thing that is not listed here is the decorations for the tables. I'm not sure what i paid, but it was probable around $100.00 to $150.00. I boutght vases, small candy dishes & 5 X 7 mirrors at Pic N Save. I put silk flowers in the vases, potpuri in the candy dishes and I had a friend paint Hawaiian flowers on the mirrors.
Anyone needing some help planning a Wedding or a party send me an e-mail and let me know what questions you have. I'd be happy to help you out of give you some suggestions.