#4 Tightening our belts

Hands up if you are tightening up your belts because of your wedding!
Wedding are really a lavish affair and i have known some people who spends at least $30,000 on a void deck wedding.

I hope i am not going to spend that kind of money on my wedding.
Not because i cant afford to, but i just don't want to.
I want my wedding to be memorable and nice and pleasing to the eye but i am also practical.

I believe with proper budgetting, i definitely can do it! What's my budget you ask?

S$15,000 for a combined wedding for at least 800 pax.

I know some of you will go
"Huh????? Dekni biar betul! aku peh catering je dah nak dekat S$12,000!"

It is possible because my parents are gonna be cooking for me, together with some of my relatives. It was their request and i would gladly accept that. lol

I am after-all big on the "gotong-royong" spirit.

For 800 pax, my budget for catering will be approximately S$2,000 and that is including the drinks and some desserts which i would order.

See, i saved S$10,000 on catering alone.

The next thing i know that is in your head will be "Can her parents do it?"

Yup! Last 2 weekends, my mom and dad single-handedly cooked for 800 pax at our 4-room flat.
Trust me, it was not even chaotic. Just imagine, just the two of them cooking for 800 pax at home.

That's because my uncle had a small budget and asked him for help.
My Dad did it with a $1500 budget.

So, yes... u can have a smaller budget wedding if you can round up your relatives to help you.
But don't force them to do it lah! My relatives were kind enough to extend their help even before my father mentioned it to them. haha

So, my parents would probably help with the before-event preparation and then my relatives
will help during the event itself.

Me and the boy are quite lucky in that sense.

But, of course we are not taking advantage. My parents don't wish to take any payments for us.
They only want us to fork out the $2,000 for them to buy the barangs2 and we were thinking of getting them a Travel Package to Jakarta or something to reward them for their hard work. :)

So, anyway, i have drawn up a Wedding Budget just to be clear on the things that i am supposed and not supposed to spend
my hard-earned $$ on.

So far, we are still far away from the budget (thankfully!) but we are just preparing ourselves
for other ad-hoc payments etc.

Wedding Budget for Multi-Purpose Hall - 800 pax


Catering: $2000.00
Mak Andam: $1500.00
Void Deck Deco: $1800.00
Room Deco: $300.00
Photographer: $800.00
Videographer: $500.00
Wedding Favors: $800.00
Cards + Posters: $200.00
Stickers for Favors & Invitation: $50.00
Wedding Gifts: $1000.00
Cakes: $200.00
Henna: $100.00
Kendarat: $500.00
Kompang: $300.00
Booking of Multi Purpose Hall: $100.00
Wedding Marriage Course: $150.00
ROMM Registration: $39.00
Kadi: $100.00
Table & Chairs:
Kitchen Tentage:
Toilet:
Cutlery:

Subtotal: $10, 439.00

The budget above is not inclusive of the rental of Table & Chairs, Cutleries, Portable Toilet & tentage for cooking etc. I figure the amount will come up to $2,000 plus.

Phew! Budgetting is so exhilarating.