Reception Tips

Choosing the venue for your reception can be difficult and costly. As with choosing a wedding dress, “thinking outside the box” is important! When you’re trying to plan a low cost wedding, where you will be doing most of the work and planning yourself, you can run into problems with “reception venues”. What you find often is that venues that carter specifically to wedding receptions are not always keen on you bringing in your own food and décor. That was one of the most disheartening things I came across when planning my wedding. The places that I wanted to host my reception would not just rent out their space; you had to purchase one of their catering packages. But their loss was my gain! I found a great location for free (more about that later).

Look into parks. Many local parks have community centers/recreation halls, or even covered outdoor spaces. You can usually reserve a space for a nominal fee; sometimes just a deposit is required which you get back as long as you clean up afterwards. Also with parks, you have a lot more freedom over what you can do. You can decorate as you please (for the most part), bring in your own food, some even allow you to pitch tents. The problem with parks is that you have to book very early because of the demand. If it’s a busy park and you get an outdoor space, than you run the risk of party crashers. It’s not something I hear about often, usually people are pretty respectful, but just bare that in mind. Also, many parks close at sun down, so plan your schedule around that.

Do you know anyone with a sizable backyard? Large or not, you can turn a backyard into a beautiful wedding wonderland. If you’re working with a small backyard, don’t go with the seating arrangements. Chances are that you won’t have enough space to lay out tables to accommodate everyone. Make it more of an informal reception, this way guests will mingle and dance more. This will also save on food since you won’t have to provide a formal dinner – – finger foods and a dessert bar would be perfect.

Community clubhouses and recreation centers are great. If you don’t have any in your neighborhood maybe a friend or family member does. Remember I said I got my space for free, here’s how . . . a friend of my mom (call in favors where you can) owns a condo and her building has multiple indoor and outdoor space you can rent. For owners, it’s free to use any of the spaces, so our $60 deposit was refunded after. What’s great about recreation rooms and clubhouses is that many have kitchens which are important if you are providing food and beverages yourself and not getting it catered. I know some people get turned off by clubhouses/recreation rooms because some aren’t always well kept, but you’d be surprised what a trip to a fabric store and a craft store could do.

Photo Books

With everything going digital, this was only inevitable. Picaboo is a service that allows you to turn your digital images into quality printed photo books/albums. It’s scrapbooking gone digital. This is especially great if you are going to be taking your own photos. Even with a professional photographer, you’re going to want this. You can completely customize your book, from cover, to background, to text and even the material. This could make an excellent thank you gift for your bridal party and family. It can even be used to create a custom guest book. The software also allows you to make cards – – so you can send customized thank you cards (and even invitations) to all your guests.

It’s very easy and affordable to create the photo book. You download the software for free from Picaboo. Then simply add your photos, customize layouts, backgrounds and texts. You can choose a theme to get started (there are hundreds of themes from weddings, to birthdays, to graduations and more) or start with a blank book and customize every aspect yourself. Once you’re done creating your photo book, have it printed or you can send the digital version to friends and family for them to view and enjoy.

Books start as low as $9.99 and cards at $0.79. It’s free to create your photo books, you only pay for your print jobs.

I wish I had known about this before because I did not have a professional photographer at my wedding. All my photos are digital and in my Google-Picasa account. I love Picasa, because it’s easy to share you images with everyone, but of course you can’t customize the layouts and design like you can with this software. I sent my photos to CVS for printing and put them in a standard album we got as a wedding gift. When you look at it, if I had to buy the album myself, plus the cost of prints, it works out to about the same as if I had created a custom photo book. It’s too late to send to guests but I’m going to create a few customized albums for myself and family. It’s also going to come in handy for birthdays and graduation photos. Not to mention when I have my first child.

Easy Asian Themed Wedding

If you’re having trouble deciding on a unique theme for your wedding, consider an elegant Asian theme. An Asian theme is fairly easy and affordable to do. Check out some of these options below.

Mini Lucky Bamboo

Bamboo is a symbol of strength and resilience, these minis can be grouped and placed on a platform and used as your table centerpieces. Or place them individually around your venue to decorate your dessert bar, drink bar, or where ever needed. Tie a personalized ribbon around the stalks for a bit of customization and at the end of the day guests can take them home as a great favor. As low as $4.75, and comes in square or round, and a variety of colors.

If you don’t want to go with the minis, here is a great use of the bamboo as a centerpiece. Ikea carries the square vases and bamboos at ridiculously affordable prices. You can also get large smooth stones from them that you can place at the bottom of the vase to hold the bamboo in place and add some color to the vase. The additional flowers you can get from a florist. This is a gorgeous centerpiece than you can replicate very affordably.

Engraved Chopsticks

A staple of any Asian themed event, these personalized engraved chopsticks make a great favor. As low as $3.75 for laser engraved wooden chopsticks with your names and date, or $1.75 for non-engraved, lacquer finished chopsticks. Customize the basic chopsticks by tying with a personalized ribbon.

Asian Paper Hand Fans

Also a great favor option. As low as $1.25 or can be personalized for $1.90. You can also opt for the silk instead of paper for a few dollars more. A great way to personalize this item yourself is with a metallic ink pen from a craft store. The pens come in a variety of colors that can match any color scheme. It is a great cost cutting alternative to the custom printed ribbon if you or a friend has great hand writing.

Paper Lanterns

Paper lanterns make for gorgeous décor. They come in a variety of colors and 3 sizes. As low as $2.00, but be aware that the lighting mechanism is not included in the price of the lanterns. A great alternative is the battery operated LED lanterns. You can also get the lanterns in different shapes but be prepared to spend more for the other options.

Shoji Screen

My favorite! A gorgeous shoji screen is a beautiful backdrop for the head table. Place the screen behind you and your groom, attach flowers to it, and you have a beautiful background for pictures while having dinner. Or you can place a few screens around the room to create a more authentic atmosphere. Better still, if you are having the ceremony and reception the same place, this is a great way to divide up your space and is applicable to non-Asian themed weddings also. Starts at $18.40 and comes in 4 sizes, price includes hanging mechanism.

Take Out Box

What would be an Asian theme without take out boxes right? They are great for holding candy and cake, but a different take on the take out boxes is to place flowers in it and use as a centerpiece. The porcelain take out boxes which are ideal for a centerpiece start at $8.50 while the vinyl ones are only $.80.

Recc Lantern

I love what this bride did for a centerpiece. Unfortunately, (well for us) the lantern was handmade by her parents. The most affordable alternative I found was $29.99. I’m sure you could get the base at a reasonable price, and the floating candles and flowers are also doable.

ThemeNaps

Surfing the web today I came across a VERY cool site – – www.themenaps.com! They took doodling on napkins to a whole other level.

Check out these cool bride and groom napkins:

They have quite a variety of designs to choose from. The only problem is that I didn’t see any pricing or ordering information. There is a sister website – – www.jerseynaps.com – – that carries the sports themed napkins. On that site you can order online; a pack of 8 napkins is $3.49. That can add up depending on the number of guest you anticipate. If you are having a larger wedding then you can probably incorporate the napkins into the centerpiece designs instead of having one per person. Add it to the flowers or candles, or whatever your table centerpieces are. Or you can use it stand alone AS the centerpiece. Have a bride and groom napkin surrounded by rose petals in the center of each table. $7 ($3.49 ea for a pack of brides and a pack of grooms) plus tax and shipping can take care of 8 tables. Then just get a few bags of rose petals and you’re on to something. If you can do it one per person, then it would look great on the place setting. The website also has them hanging with balloon, as well as the ways I mentioned before. Visit www.themenaps.com for more info.

The Art of Cakes II

I just watched The Style Network’s “The Art of Cakes II” and OMG I wish I could have a wedding do-over. I know I couldn’t afford them but those cakes are so beautiful. The show featured some famous cake artists like Sylvia Weinstock and Ron Ben-Israel, as well as some bakers featured in Martha Stewart Weddings

Cake by Sylvia Weinstock (yes it is a cake)

There were also some cool ideas on how to lower the cost of the cake without sacrificing the beauty of it. For one, you could have faux layers => layers of fondant covered Styrofoam between layers of actual cake. So you have a layer of cake that you cut into during the reception and just use faux layers to build height and size. Of course if you do that then you would need a separate cake that is already cut for guest to eat or boxed to take away.

Cake by Ron Ben-Israel

Another great idea is the dessert bar. It’s pretty much what it sounds like – – a bar with mini cupcakes, truffles, jelly beans, cookies, etc. This is something that you could do on your own without much effort. You can get customized cookies made fairly inexpensively, or just use ready-made decorative cookies, jelly beans, truffles and cupcakes from places like Crumbs here in NY or whatever your favorite desserts are. Get some beautiful jars and plates to display your desserts (some restaurants/bakeries/party planners do rent) some flowers/petals/table clothes to decorate the display table, and you’re on to something.

The cupcake tower is also great for the dessert bar, and it’s a great alternative to the boxed cake, especially if you’re going with the faux cake. It’s also a great alternative to a traditional cake.

And I can’t forget the groom. We don’t usually think of the groom when talking about wedding cakes, but special cakes for them are becoming a popular trend. The show featured some cool themed cakes, specific to the grooms interests – – hamburger shaped cakes, camping themed for the outdoors man, the couch potato cake for sports fan.

Favor Me This!

One of my favorite places to get ideas on wedding favors – and gifts in general – is Beau-coup (www.beau-coup.com). I’m a big fan of personalized gifts and think that favors should not only be pretty but functional. Give your guests things they can use, and personalize it so every time they use it they are reminded of your day.

Some of my favorite favors are the personalized tins and jars.

They are so easy to do and won’t break the bank. You don’t have to order it ready made. Choose your style of jar (or tin, or box) then design your label. You can then go to your local discount store and buy a few large bags of candy to fill the jars. Or, another great personalizing touch is to get personalized M&Ms from www.mymms.com.

I did this for mother’s day and everyone loved it. The M&Ms can jack your price up a bit so if its not in the budget just use good ole jelly beans, or whatever (non-melting) candy you love.

Best of all, when the candy is done, guest can choose to refill with their choice of candy or find another use for the jar/tin.