Affordable Utah Weddings

I have to admit.  I didn’t feel much like looking up a wedding vendor today.  So today’s post is all about me!  ha!  I was just thinking back to my wedding today.  There are so many things that I would have done differently now that I know so much about what’s offered in this area.  But there are a few things that I definitely would have done the same.  Today I’m going to share one of them.

When I was engaged, both of our parents were having some serious troubles at work.  My fiance and I however were both blessed with great jobs.  In consequence, we ended up paying for quite a bit of our wedding ourselves, which is something I will forever be grateful for.  It’s amazing how much more you appreciate things when you were the one who put in the extra hours at work to pay for them.  It’s also amazing how much more thought you’ll put into a purchase after those long hours of overtime.  A lot of our wedding purchases fit into this category but today I’ll  just talk about our tablecloths.

Tablecloths.  I know, it just sounds like such a small detail that it’s dumb to even bring up. And yet, wow can they cost a lot of money!  We were so lucky to be able to borrow our white tablecloths from a friend (saving us literally hundreds of dollars… and lot of overtime hours at work) but I still wanted a little something on the tables to add color to the evening.  After a bit of thought I came up with the perfect idea (if I may say so myself). I just kept thinking that it sure was a lot of money to pay for just one night, so we planned out our tablecloths so we could use them well after our wedding.

Instead of buying 11 matching table squares out of a fabric that I would never use again, we went to the home decorating section of the fabric store and picked out about 8 different coordinating fabrics that were just beautiful. (I suggest going to either Home Fabrics which is a chain located throughout Utah and Idaho or Design Company Fabric’s outlet store located on 196 West 12300 South in Draper, UT.  Both locations have amazing clearance sections where you can almost always find amazing home decorating fabrics for $2-$5 a yard.  We got all of our fabrics at Home Fabrics for $3/yard)

We used them as table squares for our wedding (see the top picture to check out how they looked on our big day).  Then, after our wedding I used them to decorate our apartment.  I made curtains and pillows and even used them just as tablecloths to cover boxes and ‘create’ furniture since we couldn’t afford any real stuff. (The middle picture shows our newly wed apartment.  I know, it’s still nothing extraordinary- but I was SO glad to have all those different fabrics to use while we were getting started.)

Now we’ve been married for a few years and have built up enough furniture that I don’t have to stack boxes and cover them with fabric (though we still have a couple of those fake tables around the house… what can I say- they don’t look too bad and they sure are great for storage!) which left me with a pile of beautiful fabric to use again.  This past Christmas I took it all and made beautiful bags that we now use to wrap our Christmas presents (see the bottom photo to check out how they turned out).  It saves SO much money on wrapping paper, is much ‘greener’ than throwing all that paper away, and they just look so pretty under the tree!  Not to mention the fact that they were our wedding tablecloths so they have an extra special meaning to us when we use them.

So, the point of this very long story is this- as you spend money on your wedding reception, stop and think about ways you could spend the money on objects that can be reused.  You could  get beautiful fabric for your tablecloths that could be used for years to come.  Or instead of paying for ten matching centerpieces you could buy ten coordinating ones.  That way you can use all of them in your new home after the wedding without having too many of the same thing.  Or have your center pieces be something that can double as your bridesmaid gifts.   You could pick jewelry that can be restrung into a necklace that you’ll actually get to wear again, or one that could be restrung into several necklaces that you could then save to give to your daughters one day. As you pick out a backdrop, look for one that will be pretty to put in a garden later on.  Serve your food on platters you’ll be happy to use as you and your new husband entertain your friends in your new home.

With a little extra thought you can not only have the wedding of your dreams, but plan for your future.  You’ll feel better about the money you spent because it will be on things you’ll use for years to come.  And on top of everything, you’ll have items in your new home that you’ll cherish even more because you used them on the most romantic day of your life.