I am thinking about packing it all on this wedding lark, get married October 2012 and need to save about £7,000 but every month something comes up, last month MOT £350, this month 4 family birthdays, October my best mates 30th birthday, I just cant seem to be able to save a penny

I know the feeling hon, we were supposed to have started saving by now, but nothing has been put aside :/
And next month it's the MOT and the month after it's tax!
£7000 is a lot of money to save in such a short time, do you think you'll make it? Maybe try a "penny jar", we've got one that we drop any spare change into, and it does save us a little bit every week xx

What's your current plan, cfox? Have you costed everyhibg out or are you basing it on averages? Have you booked anything? Maybe we can help find more affordable alternatives x

family birthdays... spend like 10- £10 on each and ure mate sbirthday get load sof old pics n make her sumting special! u just gotta rein in and people will understand

I have told my family and friends that we are saving up so they don't really ask us to do anything and for christmas I have told my mum to let people know that we cannot afford to spend so much this year so people don't sbuy me anything and i will just buy for my son. No takeaways, taking food to work, no nights out unless it is really important like a wedding or something. My partner is working all the overtime he can get too so hopefully we should have about 3 and half grand by May.

If you are getting married in a church you'll need ushers and it's quite popular to ask them to hire themselves or, do what I'm doing, make them all wear black suits, most men own a black suit, and just hire/make them waistcoats and ties/cravats! Or they could just wear the same colour suits and not have waistcoats just matching ties!!! (The vicar's tend to like ushers there!)

Bm's dresses are usually cheaper in winter time and you could always go for short ones that are cheaper as they aren't classed as bm dresses! Hope that helps!

Loads of good advice here cfox - going to steal some of the ideas myself! I'm sure you'll manage to get the money saved with some brilliant ideas like these :-) xx

and if i am honest if my partner was not stuck on a ship in libya i dont think we would be able to save as much as we are! as he likes to spend and he likes to spend a lot on stupid things lol x and with him not being here i dont do take aways or going out for dinner once a week. (there has to be some pros to him being away as i miss him so so much) x

Just had a bit of a wobble, we have 6 months to go and need £1,930 and we have £1,000! That includes everything so it's not so bad but after rent, bills and petrol we have about £300 between us to last the month which I know is more than some but my car needs a new tyre £40, my MOT is due next month £50 then the car tax in December £120!

I've just done a breakdown of what needs to be paid for in what month and we can put about £200 a month away after the car stuff which should be enough but got a bit panicked. Theres Christmas coming up as well! Phew...and breathe! Lol.xx

Well, even though it doesn't practically help it's a comfort that people are in the same boat-if you know what I mean. I think it's time for even more belt tightening and fingers crossed! Thing is my wedding isn't even big budget (only £2,500) and we've paid for some stuff and it's in a special wedding account and I seem to be missing about £400! I'm sure that I must have withdrawn too much at some stage and not put it back in as I'm the only one with access to the account. H2b NOT good with money!

Aah well, keep calm and carry on as the saying goes. Good luck Krazykitty!xx

Krazy Kitty I know how u feel hun, smething always comes up plus it doesnt help my htb does martial arts and is forever getting Injured which means time off work and loss of wages, I know it's not the greatest thing to do but Im getting a small loan from my bank for £1500 thats to pay for wedding venue, ceremony, cake and chair covers and than the money Ive saved can get other bits we will have the money to pay back the loan yet we dont have the money to save cause we know we have to pay the bank back or get in alot of trouble where as Just saving and putting money away we always dipping into it, I never thought it would stress me out but it has big time, all for about 15hrs on a wedding day, I have felt like walking away and Just staying as we r and not get married but I know I would be gutted than come the day I was due to get married and it never happened xx

I saw a leaflet for delivering catalogues in the newsagents by work. I might give that a go now MrsH2B!

Look at ways of saving money. If there are things you haven't yet booked, think about how you can reduce your costs eg make your own stationary and invites, don't bother with decorations and favours, if you haven't bought BM dresses then ask iuf they'd buy their own instead of getting you a gift, etc.

Then look at your outgoings. Are any insurance policies/contracts (like mobile phone/gas/electric) coming up for renewal any time so? If so, shop around; you can save hundreds by switching companies. If you have non-essential things like Sky, and can cancel without paying a charge, then cancel. Cut back on all non-essentials: that means things like takeaways, the pub, nights out, the cinema, etc. Look at what you spend on things like clothes, and again, cut back. Look at your weekly food shop, and switch to cheaper alternatives where possible, and plan ahead; the WORST thing to do when food shopping is to not have a p[lan of meals for that week, I promise you you'll overspend and buy things you don't need that might get wasted. Shop for toiletries and cleaning products in places like Wilkinson's/Poundland/Savers etc. As far as birthdays and Christmas goes, tell people you're strapped for cash this year. With friends, maybe do a secret santa with a max spend of £10; with family, say you really can't afford gifts and that you hope they understand, and that you aren't expecting anything from them. Anyone with any common sense will understand.

Once you've done all this, think about how much you can realistically save, and factor in a contingency fund. The WORST thing to do when saving/setting a target is to think about what you can save provided nothing else comes up; you need to factor in emergencies/unexpected expenditure to get a true idea of what is doable. If once you've worked all this out you are still not going to have enough, then you might need to consider either scaling back, or else postponing; it's fine to say you need to save £7k, but if you can't you can't, and the last thing you want to do is start married life in debt.

I agree with the coin jar idea! Helping us to save.x

We're planning on moving out around the time of our wedding as we want to be with each other then but can't afford it at the min. Saving for the wedding and the house, H2B doesn't have a job even though he's applying for everything. I can't work anymore as i'm a student, and study all week and work all weekend. getting things for as little as we can and some family members helping with the wedding.. still wondering how we're going to do it.

I have a change jar, not for very long, added it up and there was £80 in there, so in time that'll add to it :) just hope he gets a job soon so he can be adding to the money :)

I'm sure something will come up soon hun. My h2b was made redundant from 2 jobs 2 years running. With all this no work crap its really hard especially on those who WANT to work.

Theres a girl at work who has been off 4 3months...but she's the bosses mate so do u think she's getting in trouble 4 it?!?

ive been worried recently about money.
we only started saving up about a month ago and we have just under £1k... BUT thats because i put nearly allll my student loan in.
were quite lucky in the respect that my parents are paying for the evening reception, and h2b's mum is doing the cake so thats the biggest thing paid off straight away by mum and dad and saving money on cake.

were hoping to have £5k to pay for decorations, flowers, dresses, bm dresses, accessories, cars photographer, dj/band... grooms outfit and best man (ushers can pay for themselves...) blinking heck this list is never ending :( xx

We are having a pay-as-you-go wedding too.

i have managed to sort out the table decs and centrepieces really cheap but it the big things like photographer and venue that are getting us down! Our venue does a package that is £3500 which includes the photographer we want but then we have to pay extra for the album or the disk plus the first dance etc (although am debating if that needed) but do i pay the extra £1000 for the photographer or do i go with his package which is about 400 cheaper (the package at venue includes other things too) aaaargh!!! Am getting srtessed just thinking about it!! :( my problem is the money comes in and then goes straight back out again and the money i should have left over isnt there because it needs to go straight back out to pay the bills!! never ending circle!!

still positive thinking!!! lol

ooh and i am doing the invitations myself and we have his aunty sorting out our flowers so they will be cost price but it just everything else!!

Does you h2b want to do one for me too??? Lol! x