Looking for planning ideas for a smaller wedding?

Question

I am planning a wedding for next summer - Aug/Sept 2009 (Date not set yet). We are planning on having a small wedding, 2 others standing up and 50 in audience/dinner. I am looking to hear from other who had a smaller wedding and what they did to personalize it. How did you have the receptions, did you do dancing, just dinner, keepsakes, etc. Any information would be great! I am in the beginning stages and lost! :)

Answer 1

My wedding is in a month and is about the same size as yours...about 35-40 people.  We are personalizing it by having the ceremony and reception at a small, intimite place.  We chose to keep it small so we could afford to do nicer things such as an open premium bar, shuttle service to a from the hotel rooms we are paying for, 5 course sit down dinner, etc...We aren't having a wedding cake so we chose individual sweet trays on the tables for dessert.  We are keeping the tables pretty simple (no favors or anything) because we will put welcome baskets in their rooms.  Instead of a guest book, we are having people sign a silver platter with an engraving pen.  We had our good friend become ordained and he will be doing our ceremony, and we wrote our own vows too.  The possibilities are endless!  

Answer 2

My fiance and I are getting married in May of '09. We had this pretty decent sized wedding planned.. had to have at least 60 people.. was ending up costing us $8000. We just recently cancelled everything and downsized. We are having a wedding with no more than 40 people, only people in the wedding are maid of honor, best man, flower girl, and ring bearer. I think having a small wedding makes it intimate. We are having the ceremony in a garden area.. then we are having the reception in a nice smaller room at a hotel. We are having a DJ for the reception. But I def. recommend checking all around for DJ's. We thought we were getting a pretty good deal with our for $700, just recently to find one who would have done it for $300. We had looked at about 3 different DJ's who were all in the $700-$1000 range, so we thought we were getting a deal.

Also, just make sure what you find is really what you want/can afford. We made the mistake of jumping on something because it was soo nice, not thinking of how much in debt it would make us. And if you are looking to save money, try going with a Sunday wedding, that's what we are doing, most vendors will give you a discount because it's a Sunday wedding. A Saturday wedding is always more expensive.

For dinner, we are doing a buffet, even though it's not many people. I just want everyone to have a choice.

Favors.. get something that has your names on it, I think that's something special. We have a favor that is a card of wild flower seeds for people to plant. Check out www.weddingchannel.com I got all my favors from that website. They have clearance items all the time.

Good luck in your planning process!! Congrats!!