Looking back at your wedding - what would you do differently if anything?

Should have invited more people. Shouldnt have worried about the food so much. Everything is cooked well, People will be starving, they wont care so much.
keep suit hire to minimum, doesnt matter.
Definitely have food on arrival if you get to the hotel early, if its a typical irish wedding youll be responsible for 100+guests who havent eaten since breakfast. if theres nothing to fill a gap at 2pm and dinner isnt til 5:30 it becomes genuinely uncomfortable by about 4pm

Don't worry about paying for a toast drink. dont worry about chair covers. dont worry about a car. Noone remembers any of that. It doesnt make much difference.

Its all about the atmosphere at the party. Spend 70-80e on a box of blow up guitars and mikes and whatnot.

If theres kids, hire a clown for 200e for a couple of hours during dinner and maybe even a child minder in a room for later on to take parents minds off the kids so they can relax. Best money spent ever.

I think hotels charge 7-8e per person for finger food and usually suggest 60%. sausages and chicken tends to get eaten. However, if they troop the usual pre-made sandwiches laden with the chefs favorite mayonaise, nearly every one of these sandwiches will be thrown out. I see this night after night. save yourself a few hundred quid here. speak to hotel.

We got a friend to camera and another to do video. Some good shots on photo but was very sorry we didn't pay for a pro job here.

Noone goes to afters unless its local. I seen 2 dublin Busses turn up at a wedding last week and 1 person on 1 of them and none on the other. Maybe 20 people on the bus going home. leave bus hire til late as possible and find out whose going and where theyre going to.

edit: post wedding, we hadnt factored in getting any money at all as presents so when we started opening envelopes we were blown away. definitely spend as much on the honeymoon as possible and go as exotic as you can. youll more then likely never do it again in your lives. come home, pay off as much loans as you can and enjoy the first year or so.

Your wedding day will fly by so quickly that you won't notice most of the things you've put so many months planning. So if there are things that you personally don't place value on like a car, photographer, flowers - don't get them just cos it's part of the standard package. Same goes for the opposite - if having a gorgeous dress is a big deal to you, go for it.

More specifically, I wouldn't have bothered with afters food. I don't think it would have been missed and besides there was cake! I'd favour food at reception instead if it was a long wait between ceremony and meal.

Don't have too many gimmicks. Good food, good company and plenty of drink and people will be happy.

You don't have to have a band and a dj. If you're going to pick one for the night I'd go with dj cos you'll get more bang for your buck.

As regards recovering from 'the big spend' - for us it was fine as we planned well. We made a list of the things we really wanted from the day and as we priced things we were able to see which things were feasible and which needed to be compromised. We then had a rough figure for the wedding and worked out how long it would take us to save. It wasn't a lavish event to start with so as it turned out we gave ourselves enough time to save so that we weren't in debt but still had the day we wanted. So I guess advice would be to make plenty of lists and be as organised as possible!

I would have liked to change the wife

Good idea for a thread.

For starters, I'd give a copy of the list of photos we wanted the photographer to take to somebody in the wedding party who is familiar with the people and scenes we wanted photographed. Get them to liaise with the photographer and ensure he took all of those photos, not just 5% of them.

Set out what is a priority for you and work back from that...as I can see varying opinions on here

important for us:
good photographer - see full wedding albums before booking. so many friends disappointed with theirs. i'd be raging. defo have a few formal snaps.
good videographer - a very last minute decision & so don't regret it. she was unobtrusive as can hardly remember seeing her but results were brill.
fine food - do tastings with hotel..we went through 16 courses and totally worth it.
fine wine - sample the wines!
generous with drinks
good band/DJ - we had these to suit our music taste and nearly didn't have a band as don't like 'wedding bands' we didnt have too many 'oldies' at our wedding so never felt need to cater to their taste.
decent bar closing time - don't have it close at 12.30 or something!
flowers - dont go mad, just basics. take flowers from church to venue.
invite who you want - not who anyone else wants
make a tableplan
if having church wedding, make mass booklets/pamplets (note scroll type are noisy)
church music - take time to pick tunes.
speeches -defo liked having them & weren't too long. I got paddy power sweepstakes kit which went down well on tables that used them (I like doing the speech betting at weddings!)
time - allow time to be with guests pre dinner & post dinner. the day flies & if your music is good you will spend the night on the dancefloor
minimoon - we didnt go away on a big trip straightaway so had a short break...do not advise city break...go lie down somewhere in the sun.

Not important to us (some in hindsight!):
favours - I did them & regret it.
car - last minute we booked one that my dad paid for as he wanted to reclaim his car. it was nice but could've gone without.
chair covers - waste of money
expensive cake - I made ours
drinks reception music - no need for band or 'entertainment' ...I made a playlist for ipod, guests are chatting & don't want to have to pay attention to something.
who speaks at speeches - traditionally fathers speak, ours were not keen so didnt make them. my bro and the best man spoke (so 1 from each family)
cameras on tables - a really nice idea but most photos dont come out properly/poorly taken so ended up waste of money (developing costs ) ...v cute to see my 4yo niece looking for the photo on the back

In my own experience it may be wise to consult with suppliers about what happens in the event they can't show up hair/make up/photographer etc.

Most of all enjoy the day and don't sweat the small stuff especially in the run up - think this was said already but it is so true!

wexford12 wrote: »

As an owner of a wedding car company im surprised with hearing people saying the car was a waste of money. When a bride and groom book with me I have never heard anything but how much the car was worth every cent. They all agree that the day goes so quickly and its the only time they get to spend alone with their husband with no pictures been taken and time to relax together.
This cannot be done if your brother friend etc uses their new Merc you will feel the need to talk to them and hence loose the moments alone that day.

I got married last year and yes it can be costly but if your careful and work with your budget it will all work out. The only thing we would of changed we would of invited more guests its the best day of your life make the most of it and spoil yourselves.

I thought a wedding car would be a waste of money too. My dad paid for it on the day as a surprise and it was actually really nice being able to be alone with my dad on the way to the ceremony and chat, and for him to calm my nerves and then to be alone with hubby on the way back to the hotel after the ceremony. Also, the style of the car meant it was REALLY roomy in the back, which was definitely needed because of my wedding dress. And we got to enjoy champagne in the car together on the 30 minute drive to the hotel

It would have been better if I did'nt turn up.

Jellicoe wrote: »

The main thing, if you can, is to hint to family/friends/guests that you'd just prefer a cash present to help cover the costs, like most country weddings do, most guests will give you approx. €75 a head / €150-200 a couple, depending on your extravagance, you'll at least break even on the function etc. With this system large country style weddings come close to paying for themselves. That’s the way it was with ours. You shouldn't worry too much about keeping the numbers down, or letting your folks invite their friends etc. and about 10-20% won't be able to make it anyway. The key is to keep it simple, people are no longer impressed by the bits and bobs and frills and novelties/fancy food etc. these days, large or small crowd, just keep it simple and stick with the tried an tested, nothing too fancy or out of the ordinary. These unfussy/busy weddings always turn out to be the best craic/most successful anyway. Don't skimp on the music/band/d.j. though whatever you do. Everything else is not really noticed/remembered much by guests, but poor music will be. Couple of guests with guitars etc. for the late bar sing song is also highly recommended.

I wouldn't advise anyone to rely on money they do not know they will get yet. Not everyone has the cash these days and it is not unheard of people to pool together now and get one present/cash present or get an actual present. We had 60 people at our wedding, and the cash presents came no where near to the total costs of the day. We were lucky that we were not expecting any cash or relying on it, so it was a nice bonus to get which we put into our credit union account. We got 4 cash presents, 2 of them being quite large (€400 and €500 respectively, but the others were €100 and €150) and the rest of the guests gave us actual presents.