Project Wedding Blog

When Maryjane from Weddingbee sent over her very cute City Hall wedding pictures, I absolutely adored the sweet simplicity of their day and the thought that went into it…. and they only spent about $1000 start to finish! Scroll down to take a peek and read their story!

‘D. and I first met when we both started working in the same department in 2007. One reason we became such fast friends? We went to highschool in the same small Minnesota town! We had similar interests and simply clicked. A year after our meeting, we were dating. And a year after that, we were engaged!

After the engagement though, we hit a wall. D. and I are both rather private, introverted people, and the idea of a big wedding (in which all eyes would be upon us) was terrifying. We had a couple of
discussions in which we mulled over possible guest-lists, dates and locations, but we kept coming back to one sentiment: “I wish we could just go to city hall.”

D. is the oldest of his mother’s sons. I’m the only child. Moms are generally not OK with their first or only-borns running off and getting married without them. So we compromised. We decided we would go to city hall, but we’d bring our immediate family along with us.

I am an unstoppable planning machine, and I hit the ground running. I decided to stick with a budget under $1000. We were saving to buy a home, and we also wanted to take a fabulous honeymoon. Our clothing, paper products, and other materials were all either purchased on clearance sales, or online with several coupon codes. I was a bargain-hunting maniac during this time. Our cake was made by a family friend (and it was absolutely delicious). And other than that? We did not have a lot of other expenses. Since there were only seven guests at our wedding, we had a nice dinner in lieu of a traditional wedding reception. We had budgeted to pay for the dinner, but a family member offered to pick up the tab (and we graciously accepted).

We loved our wedding because it was so tailored to us. We did nearly everything ourselves, only hiring out for photography and our cake.  We spent an amount of money we were comfortable spending, and only did the things we were comfortable doing. The day was private, personal, memorable, brief and refreshing.

Our wedding may not be the matchy-matchy or shabby-chic wedding of Martha’s dreams.   But it was designed with a lot of thought, love, and care. It’s our wedding, and I loved it.  Most importantly, I hope it inspires future brides out there to realize that there can a happy medium between elopement and a
100+ person weekend-extravaganza.’

A special thanks to Maryjane for sharing about the day!  Photos by  Shawna Noel Photography .

Tags: $1000 wedding, city hall wedding, courthouse wedding.