If you had to do it over again...would you spend as much as you did on your wedding?

[Anonymous]

Sure. My dad and his new-found wealth paid for it as a way to ease his conscious for being an absent father my entire life. Wish I could have spent more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sure. My dad and his new-found wealth paid for it as a way to ease his conscious for being an absent father my entire life. Wish I could have spent more.

Me too! Except it was my mom.

[Anonymous]

Not at all - although it wasn't as much as I wish I could have spent. In any event, I love my dress so much I keep offering it up to other brides but no one wants it...not sure if its because my dress was ugly or because its used. Anyway Amsale still sells it so it can't be that bas but I wish it could bring someone else as much joy as it brought me. Hate to see it just sit in a box!

[Anonymous]

We spent a lot, and I guess I don't regret it, but only because we have the money. We are fortunate/lucky.

I think that every couple should be forced to look at what their wedding budget, invested in a diversified portfolio, would be worth at the time they are paying for college or retiring. It is eye-popping. If we were two kids just four or five years out of school, it would have been a completely different wedding, and I would have had no regrets whatsoever.

It is fun to do it up, but a wedding is special because of the couple and the people who come to celebrate it. Everything else is nice but not necessary.

[Anonymous]

We spent about 5K, and it was perfect! I would do it again!

[Anonymous]

Absolutely not. We paid for our wedding ourselves and it was torture. I wish my DH would have had the balls, at the time, to stand up to his overbearing, opinionated nasty parents. It is a miracle we stayed together and I actually went through with it after all the unnecessary drama.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow. Good question to ask on Sunday afternoon--which is probably the day of the week most people here got married and if you're are spending this beautiful afternoon inside on DCUM like me, right now, there is big trouble in River City...

fighting with DH at the moment, so yes I regret having my family shell out the obscene amount of money they did 14 years ago for me to marry my passive agressive, infuriating as hell DH. Yes. But ask me tomorrow when the kids have gone back to school and he and I are both at work and I will have calmed down and be willing to do it all over again.

ah no---only Jews usu. marry on Sundays. Saturday is the day Christians wed ( traditionally speaking).

[Anonymous]

Nope. Had a blast, loved it, but at this point I think we'd prefer to have the cash.

[Anonymous]

Ours cost about $8K. My parents insisted on paying for most of it; it would have been less if we had to cover it all (out of necessity). I don't regret it; sometimes experiences (wedding, travel) are worth a lot more than things. The caveat is that no one is going into debt or spending beyond their means to pay for it.

[Anonymous]

Great wedding and we spent around $1,000.00. Small morning wedding followed by lunch. DH and I were back in our hotel by 2 or 3pm and most of our guests went to an O's game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:... I love my dress so much... I wish it could bring someone else as much joy as it brought me. Hate to see it just sit in a box!

Hate to hijack the thread, but have you thought about donating it to http://www.bridesagainstbreastcancer.org/ ? It's a great charity, and it would probably make someone very happy!

[Anonymous]

I've never added up the numbers, but it was well under $5k. Ceremony and champagne in friends' living room, lunch for 25 at a nice but reasonable restaurant, small party at a bar, and then brunch the next morning for most of the guests. This was in the DC area 3 years ago.
We don't regret a thing. While I'm certainly happy about the saved money (which allowed us to put $250k down on a house), I'm even more happy about the saved time - we both haaaaaate planning social events.

[Anonymous]

Yes. Every penny.

I don't consider the cost to be only the wedding. It was months of planning and having fun with both sides of our family and an amazing Honeymoon. I think it was somewhere between $30K and $35K. It was mostly paid for by our families (both sides), which is why we made all of the decisions with everyone. I think that people who plan alone are missing out, but I realize that I'm lucky to have had a Mom and MIL that were interested in what we wanted and not what they wanted just because they were paying for it.

[Anonymous]

Well it was my second wedding but I loved it. Used a JOP and went to the Fairfax Museum on a Monday at 1PM with about 12 people in attendance then we went to Colvin Run Tavern in Tysons for lunch (paid for by a family friend; no parents attended) and it was phenonomenal and beautiful... we had a cake, did a few speeches but all in all it was just a nice day among friends and family. Biggest difference was my first wedding which had a lot of unecessary drama and ultimately helped to kill the marriage. I am in a better place and have no contact with my evil parents.

[Anonymous]

Nope. But we didn't spend more than we could easily afford the first time.