"Going rate" for wedding expenses

sarahd

Tue, Sep 05 2006, 8:59 am

Rifky wrote:

sarahd wrote:

Marry someone in-town, then you have no airfare. Very Happy

Not always practical Sarahd! What if you live out of town, where there are limited shidduch choices?

(Didn't you marry an out of towner????)

1) That was a joke
2) I waited to marry that out of towner till we were old enough to pay for our own tickets and our family's too. Wink

(we paid for our own wedding and furniture too, btw)

tziviakayla

Tue, Sep 05 2006, 10:23 am

Funny story: While we were discussing the menu with my then future in-laws..my FIL said that he wanted to have a salad course. A salad was $10 a person. With 200 people attending, my dad said there was no way he was going to spend $2000 for basically lettuce! (My parents paid the entire catering bill) My dad then said to my FIL (who is very serious) that it would be cheaper to hand everyone a head of lettuce at 69 cents each!
My FIL actually thought my dad was serious and started to explain why it wouldn't work! Very Happy

shabbatiscoming

Tue, Sep 05 2006, 10:30 am

Rifky wrote:

sarahd wrote:

Marry someone in-town, then you have no airfare. Very Happy

Not always practical Sarahd! What if you live out of town, where there are limited shidduch choices?

(Didn't you marry an out of towner????)

or of course there are the ppl who meet ppl in other countries or continents from where they are origionally from. so then there are a looot of plane fares...........but what can you do, right?
its the same thing with a shaddchanits rate. they charge if a match goes through to marriage and well, as my mother put it, the money that you spent (meaning me) on the shaddchanits price was well worth it, I mean, I got a wonderful husband, BH, from her, so.......no complaints......

chen

Tue, Sep 05 2006, 1:05 pm

klotzkashe wrote:

video.

ALso, do you need flowers on EVERY table? pple here borrow centrepieces from gmachs and some won't put flowers - maybe they'll have just ivy instead.

we had no centerpieces at all. There is so much stuff on the tables already, and half the time the flowers get in the way of seeing the people across from you, esp. if you're short. I preferred to invite a few more people and do without the centerpieces, so all we had in the way of flowers was my very modest bouquet and corsages or boutonnieres for the wedding party. we ordered from the cheapest florist in our neighborhood (I compared prices). We picked everything up from the florist and brought it to the hall ourselves.

Marion

Mon, Sep 11 2006, 4:17 pm

We had friends make the 1st night sheva brachos, and Shabbos lunch WE invited friends to the shul and had a "potluck" sheva brachos (everyone brought 1 dish...).

I can't speak about the offruf, but the Shabbos kallah was very, very simple...I don't think I spent more than 100 shekel on nosh!

Airfare, well, my family had to come from chu"l, but my sister was already here for the year, and the other sister came on a summer trip and just extended her ticket. For guests we created a "convention fare" with the airline so they could have 10% off.

My sister in law did the artwork for our invitations and bentchers.

We skipped the videographer and asked one of DH's uncles, who loves to fiddle with that kind of thing, to create something for us. It turned out great. We also didn't get a fancy album...eventually I might do something with the negatives and create something that's not just a collection of proofs.

I had a bouquet; my sisters and sisters in law each carried a single long stemmed rose. And only DH and the 2 fathers wore boutonnieres.

My FIL was the mesader kedushin.

Our bedroom set, dining room set, sofas, and refrigerator were new (but on everything except the bedroom we got 17% off because I was a new immigrant still, so I had "rights"). We bought a small 2nd hand stove/oven (which we passed on to my SIL when we moved and got a standard size), and 2nd hand "youth bed" so we could have guests. I already had milchig dishes and pots and Pesach dishes put away. We registered for everything else, and got most of it that way. We made a list of what we wanted and when people would ask we'd either direct them to the registry or we'd choose something off the list.

chocolate moose

Thu, Sep 14 2006, 10:18 am

I didn't read this thread until last night, a friend told me, that she paid $500 for her daughter's Shabbos Kallah (a few weeks ago) to be professionally done. (she also said what a waste it was)

And...she paid for someone to "run" the wedding, I don't know how much. It's a new thing, so you can enjoy your party.

So I thought I'd share that with you all.

mimsy7420

Thu, Sep 14 2006, 2:56 pm

SaraG wrote:

And...she paid for someone to "run" the wedding, I don't know how much. It's a new thing, so you can enjoy your party.

We had a family friend do that for free. But I know people do pay for that. They have a list of the seating in case there is a problem people can bother her, and not the parents who are busy enjoying the simcha. She was also there earlier to make sure everything was delivered on time and set up properly.
You just need someone who is organised and on top of things, you don't need a professional (although she is a professional but did not charge us).

batya_d

Thu, Sep 14 2006, 5:37 pm

DefyGravity wrote:

Quote:

And...she paid for someone to "run" the wedding, I don't know how much. It's a new thing, so you can enjoy your party.

The guy that ran the hall did that for us.

We also had someone from the hall do that for us, it was included, but a friend recently told me she was given the option of having a "butler" to follow the kallah around and make sure she's in the right place at the right time. Sounds like a waste of money to me, the Maitre D' can really take care of anything that comes up if it's a good hall.

ChavieK

Thu, Sep 14 2006, 8:03 pm

We just made dd wedding. someone from the hall/caterer made sure things ran on time, we discussed it all beforehand. A great friend of mine came early & took control of my lists(her dd got married 2 yrs ago). DD's shomeret/really great friend did EVERYTHING else. Makeup, hair consultant,babysitter,therapist......
Also if s/t is imp to you don't skimp on that. My dd wanted al-hamichyas printed in addition to benchers. My dh is very into music so he added 2 pieces to the band that chossons parents got.(gam zu l'tova b/c a fuse blew & the band unpluged & came out onto the dance floor.Great that we had the extra percussionist & violinist. Oh but I think there is another thread about what went wrong at weddings!!!![/I]