November 2014 brides and grooms

A question about : November 2014 brides and grooms

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• Me me me! *waves hand* I'm 1st November 2014
  We have a venue here: https://www.yorkvenues.org.uk/wedding...hospitium.html - were lucky enough to get it at this year's prices as we booked so far in advance and it's absolutely perfect. We wanted somewhere that had a lot of history (it's part of an old 14th century abbey) and ideally in York because it's where we met and in between where our families live so no-one has to travel too far, but that would be big enough to take everyone we wanted there.
  Other than that and flicking through some magazines to get ideas I haven't done much though - it seems like ages yet (although I'm sure it'll go so quickly!) and we are still finalising the budget as we're waiting to find out what my parents are able to contribute. Although before anyone jumps on me I should add OH's parents have been incredibly generous and we also have some savings to be able to have the wedding that we want. I have also made a list of our priorities and our 'nice to have but not essentials' and had a look through the suppliers' guide our venue sent us as well as looking at a couple of others I found myself.
  When's your date lettice?
• The Hospitium is lovely! I've just finished a course in York, actually, but I live a bit further north (for now at least - we're moving soon). York is such a great place.
  We've found a venue, which we're visiting at the beginning of July. It looks absolutely perfect for a winter wedding so, if all goes to plan, we're going to book it! I know that it's very popular (or there are some very organised brides around!) because two Saturdays have already been booked in November. We're hoping for 15 November - exactly 17 months after we announced our engagement - but I don't mind if it's 22 or 29, to be honest. I would prefer the date closer to the start of the month because we don't particularly want our wedding to be too close to Christmas and because the sooner we get married the better in my opinion! I'll let you know the date in a week or so, I hope!
  We've had a chat about the budget too. We wanted to do everything for less than Ј10,000 but, realistically, we're looking at closer to Ј12,000. That's largely due to the cost of the venue hire and the fact that we want platinum wedding rings (easily adds Ј1,000 to our budget), and because we're paying for a bridesmaid and flower girl dress and suit hire for 2 ushers and a best man (since they are all, with the possible exception of as yet unknown best man, family members and, well, we want to).
  We don't want to scrimp too much and think we can have an amazing wedding for Ј12k but that truly is the maximum we are comfortable spending. We can save Ј1k a month between now and November so we're hoping to have saved enough for the wedding and honeymoon by then! I'm hopeful that we will be able to come in a little bit under budget as I've tried to overestimate everything. I've heard of lots of brides thinking they can do their wedding on Ј6, Ј8, Ј10 grand and finding the costs just creep up so we've tried to be as realistic as possible. I've based the catering cost on the most expensive option so we could save Ј10 per head there if we need to. We could do our wedding for a lot cheaper but we've made a conscious decision to do it this way so it's Ј12k and not a penny more. It sounds like such a lot of money writing it out like that!
  Our priorities are the venue (where we will also be having our ceremony), food, and drink since I think they are the bits people remember the most about the day. I suppose we're also prioritising photography and wedding rings too since they are going to be the next biggest outlays. We're spending on those because they are the things that last after wedding's over. I'm hoping to save on clothing. I can't quite get my head around spending lots on a dress I'm only going to wear once but it's just typical that the ones I like seem to cost Ј700-Ј800, isn't it?
  My parents have kindly offered to buy us a wedding cake (got my eye on one from M&S already!) and the wedding flowers (couple of bouquets, buttonholes, corsages and something small and pretty for each table, I should think). If my fianc!'s parents are able to contribute a similar amount (which we, of course, would never ask them for - we're planning everything on the premise we are paying for it!) then our outlay as a couple, excluding the wedding rings, will be just under Ј10k. That would be ideal but, as I said, we can pay for everything so any contributions are just a very generous bonus.
  We're inviting around 70-75 to join us in the day. Not sure on evening numbers yet, largely because we're both starting new jobs in September and by the time the wedding rolls around we might have a lot of colleagues/local friends we'd like to invite. Keeping an open mind about all that!
• count me in too please! We have booked the venue and the registrar, now just trying not to get overexcited as it still seems so far away! Have got lots of ideas for everything, but don't want to buy anything too early in case I change my mind!
  I'm also worried about the budget creeping up - we have set a budget which I am determined to stick to. The problem is, that we could afford to spend more but we really don't want to, so I'm worried that nearer the time I'll just go crazy buying a load of unnecessary stuff just because I can (and then hiding the receipts from my fianc!e ). I have a massive spreadsheet with budgets, estimated costs, spends so far etc., so I'm hoping that will keep me in line! Already got 20 free save the dates on order from thecardgallery (sorry, new user so can't post links but it's that name followed by .co.uk then look under 'sale & offers') thanks to a tip from a fellow MSEer. Also managed to get the venue to freeze this year's prices for us, so saved a few hundred there. Every little helps...!
• *waves hello to Bean83*
  Registrar is on my list actually, I need to contact them but still not sure what time I want the ceremony - they do them on the hour but don't know whether to have it at 1 PM or 2 PM. We originally thought 1 PM but as we're now planning a two course meal (rather than three) and OH wants a very basic ceremony I'm wondering if I should push it back to 2 PM so we'd still have some decent light for the pictures but equally wouldn't be keeping people waiting. Hmmm....
• Decided to marry on a Saturday as it doesn't make too much difference to the venue hire charge (Ј400 or Ј500 depending on the venue we choose) and means our guests won't have to leave early.
  One of the venues has no bookings in November yet but the other only has 3 Saturdays left. I've just e-mailed them to find out whether we can hold one of the available Saturdays pending our viewing this week so I can check that the caterers are available and see if we can get the registrar to pencil us in! Fingers crossed that they will be happy to do that for us either before or after our viewing so we've got a week's grace to check all the other details match up.
  Hoping to have sorted out the basics (wedding insurance, venue, caterers, and photographer) by the end of next week! The two venues have preferred caterers so it's just a case of contacting them to see which can offer the best prices. We've decided not to do an evening buffet - as we don't think we are going to invite any evening guests - but pay out for a really nice three course meal. We're going to have a traditional wedding cake and hopefully a cheese wedding cake too for the night in case people get peckish!
• Cheese wedding cakes are the best idea ever - we're hoping to have one for our evening buffet, depending how our attempt to haggle the caterers down goes. But then OH and I both come from families who love cheese so it was getting in there somewhere!
  Blue and silver is a good call for colours - wintry, but not too festive. I'm still considering mine; originally I wanted red, white and black but now not sure if it'll look too much like a funeral, so am now thinking of swapping black for blue and maybe doing a very loose 'Best of British' theme, but I want to run it by a few people first. And there's ages to go yet for decisions like that, although I'm fully aware one day I'll say that and there won't be!
  I haven't made any progress I'm afraid - my mum's been away so everything's on hold a bit until I can have the talk with her about budgets and then I'll sort the wedding insurance.
• I've also just put in an enquiry with a photographer I've found on Twitter - her pictures are really nice and she's very reasonable, plus it doesn't hurt to ask!
• Hi everyone!
  A little update from me and a goodbye of sorts...
  We had a look at the two venues we were considering on a very sunny, beautiful day last week. Well, to my surprise, I really liked my fianc!'s favourite choice - a lot more than I thought I would! The photos we saw just didn't do it justice. My initial favourite was also gorgeous and I know we would've had a great day there too but it felt a bit formal. What really impressed me about our chosen venue was that the ceremony took place on one floor and the wedding breakfast on another. After the wedding breakfast guests then returned to the top floor for the evening celebration. I really liked that there were two distinct spaces and the grounds were very pretty. If the weather is fine we will be able to have our drinks reception outside.
  We decided that the venue was best suited to summer weddings so we had a think and decided to book it for September next year! All of the Saturdays between April and mid-September were booked; I think we have the last Saturday of summer! We decided to book in September because even though we have to pay the peak rate it was still Ј400 cheaper than the other venue would have been in November.
  We're really excited! We've reserved the date and the venue are sending us the paperwork today! I've found the photographer and been in touch with the registrar (2.30 pm ceremony - hopefully!) and caterers so once the contract and invoice for hire arrives tomorrow, we'll be good to go!
• Glad you got your venue sorted lettice, we'll miss you over here though! Will also be keeping an eye on the September thread too
  Quote:
• *waves hello to ellesbelles*
  An arctic theme sounds ace! I've been to a couple of weddings with similar themes and it's worked really well - one that sticks in my head was one at the hotel I used to work in, where they had mainly white decorations/flowers etc with bits of dark blue and silver, and different Inuit words for snow as the table names. I thought that was awesome.
• Hi Minerva! Love love love the idea about the inuit names!!!! Hehe blue and silver are exactly what we were thinking - thanks
  Hope the job hunting going well?