This weekend we’ll be headed out of town for one of my best friends’ wedding, and it’s got me thinking back on our wedding a few years back, and how simple it really was.
We had a vacation planned, and though nobody knew it, we were determined to get married on vacation, just the two of us. And it was actually pretty easy and cheap to have what I consider one of the best weddings in the world.
Mr. PoP befriended a boat captain who agreed to take us out on his catamaran and marry us. We’d get the ceremony, an hour or two of snorkeling, and a sunset cruise. At the last minute the captain’s wife and kids came along, so we even had a photographer as well as a audience of two tiny witnesses. After, we ended up at a little restaurant where we had amazing food in a lovely outdoor restaurant and watched as one of the best pianists we’ve ever seen played along to classic silent films that were projected on a screen behind the piano. All in all, it was a pretty amazing evening.
So what did it cost?
- I did buy a wedding dress – $35 for a white sundress at the Ann Taylor Loft outlet.
- The boat was $150 for the whole evening – snorkel gear and photography services included.
- Dinner (including a generous tip for the pianist) was about $50.
Grand Total: $235* for a night that neither of us will ever forget. (Click to Tweet this!)
Because of this, I have a hard time when it comes to brides complaining about all the money and stress their weddings are causing. My answer is easy. Skip it all! It’s cheaper and you can still have an amazing once in a lifetime experience.
* I tend not to include our travel and accommodations in the total since we would have taken the vacation with or without the wedding. But for what it’s worth, the airfare was about $650 and the tiny rental apartment was about $150 for the week we were there.
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I just wanted to tell you I found this through your post on LearnVest and I enjoyed it very much. I’ve read some more of your blog and I’ll be checking it regularly. You write very well.
By the way, your wedding sounded absolutely lovely, no matter what the cost!
Thanks for the compliments on the blog and the wedding! The wedding really was one of our all time favorite days, and the blog has been a blast so far, too!
Definitely keep coming back as we’re just getting started here. =).
That’s such an awesome idea!!! Both my bf and I are not really wedding people and all that unnecessary stress that goes along with it. I feel like my family would be upset that they weren’t invited. Ideally, I would want a small intimate wedding, but there’s a lot of relatives on my dad’s side. But maybe if we did get married on our own, just have a big party afterward!
I get what you mean about not being wedding people. Mr and I get pretty embarrassed when we’re the center of attention (even blowing out birthday cakes makes me blush!). So they weren’t too shocked when we went off and did it by ourselves.
But, we made it up to everybody by having a housewarming/belated wedding reception a few months later. It was about 20 people – mostly family with a couple really close friends. Still a little stressful to be the center of attention at a party for me, but I don’t look back at my wedding day as being stressful at all.
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