Did you regret DIYing things for your wedding?

[bluejeeeansbaby]

Was it worth the time and expense and personal hassle?

e.g. invitations. We're getting married next May so it's still too early to do, but a lot of the lovely online ones need to be 'booked' (apparently). I have looked at Canva and Zazzle etc- but what if they're shit looking and I waste all of that money and time?

I DIYd my invites, I bought card blanks, printed the info on them using a regular black ink printer, then used a stamp and ink to decorate the front (I think I bought one which said "wedding invitation" and one with swirly hearts) and tied ribbon around. It worked out incredibly cheap and no canva designing or colour printing involved. This was a long time ago though!

DH did the order of service. I learned how to do calligraphy and did place names. My sister and I did the really large floral arrangements for the castle and to go on the table where we signed the register. My sister made my wedding bunting to hang in the reception venue. I made bridesmaids tiaras with materials from Hobbycraft. I also ordered favour nets and put 3 Belgian chocolates in them. Also we bought a large plain rectangle party sponge from Asda and had a photo of the castle put on to the icing. I bought my 3 tier wedding cake from M&S and arranged it on the pedestal with fresh flowers. I don't regret doing any of it myself. I really enjoyed doing it all. I did the place cards for my nieces wedding too and my DD's wedding place cards. My other sister made them both wedding cupcakes too.

I used vista print for the invites, 60x day invites, 50x evening, 30x menus for the tables came to about £100 (in 2013!!) including postage, but they looked great. Paying more for the linen paper made a big difference.
We did some of the decorating ourselves, made the table place settings and cards. Some things looked great, some could have been better. I bought a badge maker and made little pin badges for guests. I still use it now so that was a good investment!!

The biggest cost we had out of everything (bar food and drink) was the photographer. He was amazing and it was money well spent. I thought about doing my own makeup but thought it might stress me out on the day.

I loved the whole day, and loved the planning of it, but then it was very relaxed. I think it all came together really well, in fact we were entered into a competition in one of those bridal magazines by our photographer, but we didn't know until it was too late to ask people to vote for us to win the prize!

I DIYed so much. Even the dress! (Part of it). I was given a dried flower bouquet as a gift and we had caterers but most of it was DIY by me and it was great. We did electronic invites through punch bowl.

I made the invitations (25 years ago so no Canva, moonpig etc) but I did print the inserts from the computer using very high quality paper and made the outer card with a stencil and embossing powder/heat gun. It was a small wedding though and we only needed 25 or so of them. Loved doing it.

Did my own make-up, as did my bridesmaid as both of us favour the natural look and don’t wear much normally, so it was very light touch. We didn’t book a hairdresser which I regretted (I had very short hair and thought it wouldn’t matter, but I bottled it and asked my aunty who was a hairdresser to do it, only took 10 mins but looked far better than I used to do it).

DMIL made my dress, she was a qualified dressmaker and offered.

Things we didn’t want to DIY - photographer, flowers, any decorations (I do love crafting but didn’t want to pressure myself and we didn’t want it too fussy, bunting, chair ribbons any of that stuff)

I DIYed a lot - it was very time consuming which I slightly regret but years later, no regrets

Invitations were done by a friend of a friend though who liked making cards
I also scrapped favours, got some glass pebbles on Etsy with our photo on + the date of the wedding

Did my hair and makeup following Youtube tutorials, didn't need much practice and still happy with them. Lisa Eldridge's wedding look is very easy to do.

Made the cake, did rose buttercream icing which looks clever but is very easy to do.

I also made my bridesmaid dresses (age 3-7) - my big regret is that I wasn't confident to make my own as their dresses were a lot nicer than mine.

I DIYed everything I could to keep costs down. Cake, flowers, decor, hair, make up. I had a big advantage in that I’m quite artsy and a good baker so this was all stuff I could do in terms of my abilities but it was still a massive ballache and I wish I’d just paid for stuff!

Just do the invites via email on paperless post

We didn’t DIY anything . My MIL was really pissed because her other DIL had DIYd the table gifts / place settings etc and had like a girly night with the 2 mums / maid of honour doing it and I think she hoped we would do the same .

I used Etsy for the main invites as wanted something specific to us.
Evening invites and table stationery I printed myself. Oh Etsy had editable order of service and info wedding program that was like £10 for the template and then I printed off.
Hair and make up is expensive but worth it for it to look that extra special on the day.

Oh I also made cookies as favours to keep costs down. Went down a treat and also much better than other things that people just throw away.

We DIYd it all, the invites, catering, venue, transport, cake, flowers, dress

It was very chilled, some things went wrong, but it didn’t matter at all. We got married and are still married 35 years later. It was brilliant because we got married, the events of the day were not important aside from the marriage. The day had highs and lows, but it really wasn’t worth spending more money on it, because everything extra on top of the marriage ceremony is frippery.

I DIYed my hair and make up. I hear my trial!

MiL made our cake. She is an excellent baker and went on a sugarcraft course so she could be confident in icing it.

We got our invitations printed at a local printers, the type of place that does flyers for takeaways. They looked excellent and cost a fraction of the wedding stationery specialists.

100% Yes! I look back now and think how much work I put into preparing for the day and actually how much it all ended up costing! Wish I had just paid someone to do everything... worst part of all = the clean up the next day, when we had the worst hangovers of our lives! 🤢

Honestly, nobody cares. All the little details you think are important and that people will notice, they won't.

Think of the best wedding you've ever been to. What do you remember about it? The stationary, the centrepieces or the fact you had an amazing day?

I've just received an invitation for my friends wedding that they ordered on an photo printing website. They added a bit of ribbon and a wax seal sticker. They're lovely. Do the job perfectly. I spent a fortune on custom made, hot foil pressed on fancy card bla bla bla. And as lovely as they were I bet nobody could tell you what they looked like now.

We spent most of our money on food and entertainment. Ultimately that's what your guests will care about.

Ok- I confess- I am a paper and stationery geek and I love getting proper invitations!

We got a v decent package which includes cake and flowers so that's that box ticked. I'm really trying not to add on any extras.

Husband designed invites, floor plan, thank you cards etc
Friend did flowers
Mum and auntie sewed bunting
Dad made some lethal rhubarb wine!
Uncle procured a tree trunk and cut us log slices
SIL mate did the cake
Mate did the photos
Family friend provided hay bales to sit on outside
I made decorations, sorted favours, hired caterer and generally planned everything

All in 6 months! Don't regret a thing and work colleagues still rave about the fun we had at the evening do. We had a BBQ, band and BYOB in the village hall. My colleagues son and daughter were my 'bar staff' (manning the makeshift bar with all the booze I bought as I was scared we'd run out....we totally didn't).

Our only big extravagance was paying for an indoor marquee liner but it was worth it as it made the big standard village hall look like a proper venue.

What do you mean?
Canva is free of there is a paid plan.
You can literally pick form hundreds of invites and just change the info, save and download and get them printed from any online shop.

Design it on canva, download the print quality file and print on bananaprint- it's a really reasonable printing option.

Our wedding was very inexpensive (and small). Basically did everything ourselves except our clothes, and we got some friends of my daughter in to put out the food, clear up and wash up.

Did our own:
Table decorations
wedding favours
catering (all prepared in advance - hot food heated up on the day by our two helpers, plus cold selection. Cake from M&S with a sugar flower topper bought from Amazon)
invitations (used one of the business card companies)
Flowers (Waitrose)
Arranged a humanist celebrant (register office, no guests, first)
Hair and make up
didn't have an evening do, just a lunch

it was lovely - very relaxed (I am very organised). With the cost of the venue and our outfits it was about £600 in 2016.

We went for what felt like a half way house between cost and effort and used an Etsy seller where we had to personalise the template. That came to about £300 for all stationary (invites, table plan, menu cards, place names) and glad we did that, because it looked nice and don’t think actual DIY would be massively cheaper by time we bought everything.

We did DIY favours in the sense of decanting gin into little bottles and labelling them, seriously regretted that half way through as it took all day!

My friend got married a few months before me and just went to Costco the day before and bought 4 cakes instead of a professional cake, the venue put them on a nice stand and genuinely don’t think anyone really noticed!

If you can DIY it prior to 48 hours before the wedding, go for it.

Anything beyond laying things out on tables/ putting up a bit of bunting/ etc in the 48 hours prior to the wedding - don't do it.

Anything you're thinking can be DIY'ed once the wedding is in progress - absolutely not

(Said from experience of having to step in when the happy couple had massively ever estimated what can be DIY'd)

I regret DIYing things for my wedding. Not that I had any choice because I couldn’t afford it. I did my own hair and makeup, I didn’t buy a brand new dress, and I looked awful to the point that I can’t stand to look at the photos. I skimped on the photographer and booked someone who was half price, and the shit photos mean I basically have no memories of my wedding to look at. And I DIYed a cupcake tower(because I couldn’t afford a cake) which was just disappointing for everyone because the bloody venue put the cupcakes out with the buffet food, so I didn’t even get any photos.

If I got married again, I’d save up an extra £4-5k and just get a decent dress, professional hair and makeup and photos, and a proper cake.

I think it depends what you care about.

Most of our money went on the venue (huge dance floor) a band and a DJ. We still spend most of our money on live music 😂

I didn't really care about table centres, stationary, the cake etc so diy'd everything with varying levels of success, but I'm not that interested in those things, so it didn't bother me, when they were not quite perfect.

If you love stationary, then spend the money on that, because if you love stationary, you will be pulling it out every so often and feeling glad you went with what you wanted.

I do really care about photography, and was persuaded by dh to go for the cheaper photographer, and still regret that now.

So figure out YOUR priorities and spend the money on stuff that you care about.

I did my invitations on Papier. Very high quality and good price, everyone loved them