How depressing that a wedding is reduced to a spreadsheet!!!

might be depressing but it is realistic. Money matters especially at the moment.

Prinz, if the OP is confusing spending and organisation I can understand to a point. A lot of people feel they have to spend in order to keep up with the Jones and "put on a show" for family, friends & neighbours. You can also get very caught up in the "I only do this once" mentality which is bad thing when doing it once equates to having the big dress, venue, band etc but not the nuptuals.
We have attended 6 weddings since our own, 5 of which I really enjoyed as they were about the marriage, a celebration of the couple and a chance for everyone to get up and dance the night away. The one that stands out in my mind as bad had almost 500 people, most of whom the bride and groom didn't know and had only met in passing but were invited to keep up appearances for the parents. There was a free bar all day/night which meant that most tables were empty for the meal as many were at the bar drinking like fish. By 8pm most people were locked, there were 3 fights we witnessed before I decided I'd had enough of the chav fest and went to bed. This wasn't a celebration of the marriage it was an excuse to get locked and messy. Disgusting behaviour but I heard so many people that day say it was the best wedding they were ever at!! The mind boggles

Ickle Magoo wrote: »

Not sure if I'd agree with that. We had both the wedding and ceremony at a hotel but still organised and designed everything ourselves, from rings to the dress, to the menus, to the cake, orders of ceremony, flowers, table decorations, band, everything - the hotel just provided the rooms and the staff.

Well when it comes to having to order knives, forks, spoons, plates, bowls, organising kettles, teabags, sugar, salt, pepper etc etc it's the little things that add up when you're organising from scratch, making preparations that when you're heading away on honeymoon that all those table settings etc are acounted for, cleaned, boxed and returned etc etc.

I do understand those folks who want "Hello!" wedding, although that has never been my cup of tea....but I truly don't see the point in getting debt for it?

Got married 2 years ago, and we did it (by choice) for absolute pennies.

We had a civil ceremony in a registry office in the morning.
Hubby hired a wedding suit locally.
I went dress *shopping* in Dublin, found the *perfect* dress for €4k (!!!), watched eBay in Ireland & UK like a hawk, and then bought the exact same dress, in the right size, for under €100...
We just had family and a couple of close friends on the day.
Essentially took over a small country house B&B for the weekend.
We did our own catering for an afternoon meal. A fabulous, yet simple, buffet that could be on servers in the fridge at the B&B ready for when we came back from the registry office.
We all went out to dinner in a fabulous restarant in the evening.
A pub lunch on the Shannon the next morning and some local sight-seeing for our families.
And another group of friends organised a party that evening in a local hotel bar.

Celebrated our wedding with everyone we wanted to, no stresses over budget whatsoever, in my eyes it was absolutely perfect...and we both, independantly commented that we wouldn't have changed a thing after the event...and if we had to do it all again, we would do exactly the same.
Friends & family all commented on how relaxed & stress-free the whole weekend was, and how much they enjoyed it...I have no reason to doubt them.