DIY Wedding Preparations

Planning a wedding budget is a very challenging task especially if the couple has limited financial resources. I don't want to say this but, money speaks volume in the wedding industry nowadays. Every move demands certain cost.

Couples like us who couldn't afford to tap more suppliers resort to DIY wedding preparations. It means we do things on our own. No supplier involved just pure labor of love 😀  Here are the things that we DIY-ed. 

Invitation

The husband knows how to Photoshop so we decided to do the invitation on our own. The envelope was also DIY, and the front sticker too! We bought the special board paper (250gsm) at National Bookstore (Cubao).  

Ours was inspired by Chito and Neri Miranda's wedding invitation - content wise. We also did it in tagalog 😀  We're so proud of our invite. It perfectly reflects our personality as a couple.

Items for the Ceremony 

Match boxes were styled with burlap and a tiny felt rose on top for the rustic look. We provided the wedding cord and secondary veil. Although we had a free secondary veil with Desino Dulce, I wanted it with lace so that it will look pretty in photos 😍 We bought the secondary veil at VC Trading in Farmers, Cubao while the wedding cord and arrhae at Carolina's Glorietta, Makati.

By the way, we took of care of printing the missalette provided by St. Therese.

Wands

My friend volunteered to help us out in creating 30 pieces of wands for the recession. We bought the wooden sticks and ribbons also at VC Trading in Farmers. The ribbons we bought were fuschia and baby pink.

Items for the reception

Fans

We bought it at 168 Shopping Mall at 10 pesos per piece. Since our wedding fell on a summer, we thought about providing fans at the reception. We also placed mosquito repellants at the registration area. 

Buffet/Welcome Snacks

We had appetizer with M Catering, but we wanted to put up a buffet snack during cocktail hours. We had candy buffet, cookies and pretzels, butchi, empanada, muffin and chicacorn (yes! chichacorn!). We also served Sola Iced Tea as welcome drinks. For the kids, we served Magnolia Chocolait. 

We bought the cupcake stands at divisoria (buy 1 take 1). We provided the cookie jars which we bought from Landmark. M Catering was kind enough to provide us a buffet able with cover. They also took care of setting up the buffet snack area. 

Reception and directional signages

We bought green and black board with frame from National Bookstore. We placed the signages at the buffet snack table, mobile bar (for the list of cocktails and drinks), registration area, photobooth and "guess how many" game table. 

For the directional signages, my husband had few pieces of parchment plywood at home so we thought of recycling it for such purpose. I just used permanent market for the writing. My penmanship was a little rusty. He he.

Our easel stands were also a DIY. We bought 1"x2"x4' wood, nuts and bots, hook and abaca string.

DIY-ing is really fun and exciting especially if the couple is on the artsy side. If not, it's best to seek the help of friends or relatives with crafting skills.

Tips:

1.  Your DIY snack buffet table should look full. Make sure you will have enough food items on the table or else it will look sparse. Food presentation matters a lot. Buy cookie jars in various sizes so you can fill spaces. You may also want to decorate your table. Paper flowers are available in Daiso (which by the way are extremely charming). We also found cheap cookie jars in Japan Homes and 88 Store.

2. Take advantage of Pinterest and various crafting websites and blogs. They posts free patterns for various project.

3. Focus. Focus. Focus. Separate your wants from your needs. Remember, the reason why you're DYI-ing is because you want to save. Strategize. Spend wisely.