The flowers are beautifully arranged. The ambient lights are lit just for the ocassion. The soft music of the wedding march fills the entire church as the visitors excitedly anticipates your arrival. You get off the white wedding car adorned with white tulips. Curious bystanders outside the church admiringly cheers. You walk towards the closed doors. Slowly, the coordinator opens them up dramatically and you appear before your friends and family adoringly gazing upon you, awed in your beauty. As you walk towards the altar, there he is, your groom, awkwardly smiling, tearful but happy. All these happening on a fine Saturday afternoon on the month of June.

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Every woman's wish. Every little girls' dream. If you're a woman reading this, feeling dreamy yet? If you're a guy wanting to get married, ready for the big day? Moreover, are you ready for the big $pending?

I have a friend who side lines as an event coordinator. Most of his gigs are for weddings. Just a week ago, he coordinated for a Php700,000 worth wedding. I have a friend who had a Php 500,000 worth wedding. That was just an estimate and that was about five or six years ago. My wedding on the other hand cost only Php 100,000. And some change. Impossible? Nah. Challenging, but doable.

If you're planning on getting married, the first thing you'll have to check - aside from making sure if you are marrying for the right reasons - is if you can afford the kind of wedding you want to have. You and your future spouse need to agree on the budget you are both willing to work around with. Of course you have to make realistic targets. You have to make your dream a reality, but you also have to adjust it to your reality. If you're dreaming of a wedding that ends with a heart-shaped fireworks display and a lot of "wow!" and thousands of likes, you got to be ready so shell out hundreds of thousands of pesos. As for me and my husband, we only have one hundred thousand of pesos.

When my husband and I agreed to get married, it got me thinking. All my girl friends already have a vividly detailed vision of how their weddings should be. Me, I don't even know what I want to wear on the day itself. When he told me he wanted to get married, there were only two things I know: I wanted to get married with him and that the motif should be green.

So how did I budget Php100,000 for our wedding?

The Plan

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First, you got to have a plan. Ask yourself - and your future husband (of course) how you want your wedding to be. As for my case, all he said was "Ok" to all my questions suggestions.

Do you want it grand, do you want the presence of all the people you met, do you need a planner amd coordinator, do you want BackstreetBoys to sing your wedding march, etc. Being that I don't really know how I want my wedding to be, I opted for just the standard one - in front of the priest, with him by my side and just the closest of our friends and family to witness our union. We both agreed that we want our wedding to be simple because simple is cheap and cheap is not that bad at all.
I didn't opt for a wedding planner but I hired a same-day coordinator. It's hard to get married and coordinate your wedding at the same time.

The church

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When he asked me where I wanted to get married, I responded "I dunno, beside you, I guess?" Of course I was just using one of my pick up lines on him. I've been saving that one for when he finally asks me to marry him. Woot woot!!!

You got to choose the church you want first because that would determine the date you are gonna get married. There are couples who choose the date first, then look for a churh that has that date available for them but for most cases, the church comes first on the list.

I chose to have a church wedding because I figured out I haven't worn a gown in my entire life. I didn't have a grandiose 18th birthday, I didn't experience JS prom on high school because our school decided to cut off the expenses by not having those kinds of parties during my junior and senior years. It was very unfair because after we graduated, they decided to bring back the prom in our school.

Anyways, the second reason I opted for a church wedding is because my parents and his grandma are all religious people. I didn't want to deal with their interogations.

We then went ahead and reserved our wedding date. That's Php10,000. It already includes

• candles
• flower arrangements
• lighting (I didn't know I needed to pay them do they would turn on the lights for us. I should've chosen the package where we wouldn't need the chandeliers because we got married on an afternoon)
• Wedding singer
• Pianist
  They let me walk on the red carpet on the day itself. Again, I didn't know that had to be paid as well. I don't mind walking on an uncarpeted floor anyway.

The Number of guests

This is very crucial when planning for your wedding. This will determine how much you will be spending for your wedding. You will have to feed them and of course seat them comfortably.

My husband's clan is really tight so we had to invite all of them. From his grandmother to his youngest cousin. That's 50 people already. My family -aunts, uncles and cousins - on the other hand are all in the province. So I decided to just invite my closest of friends. I have 30. (Believe it or not, I'm a very friendly person and that's really my circle of friends.) I have 14 family members.

We planned on 80 guests but we ended with almost 120 heads. When plannig for a wedding, don't forget to put your parents' and in laws' amigas into consideration. They are just proud of you both and they also want to share their happiness with their friends.

The Venue

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Once the headcount is settled, you then look for a place where you can eat and dance and party comfortably. My husband sourced our reception. He was able to find the one we chose just near the church where we got married. That's another good choice because we won't have to worry that much about the transportation.

It's a good thing that our venue already has a catering service. The owner of the venue was really nice and offered us an affordable price.
For a seating and food for 120 pax, we got a deal for Php 60,000.

I already forgot the menu but we had rice, vegies, viand and dessert. They have also included the wedding cake, wine and dove.

Overall, the setup was wonderful, they followed my motif - shades of green, the decor was on point, and the food was awesome. Because of them, my favorite dessert now is inutak.

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The outfit

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I didn't buy my own wedding gown. I borrowed one from my colleague's wife. It was really nice of her. But if I could go back in time, I would have just bought a Php 1000 worth of gown to have inconvenienced her. Cost-wise, I had to have it dry cleaned before and after I used it so overall cost was Php 3000.
My husband wore a traditional Barong Tagalog. So did his and my father. We bought our moms their dresses as well. So we covered for the outfit of our family members. As for the entourage, I just asked them to wear any formal clothes that are in the shade of green.

Over all cost for the clothes: Php 10,000 (give or take)

The Ring

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We wanted our ring to be very simple. To reference, it looks like the ring in The Lord of the Rings. We are not the jewelery type of people because we think those are just thief magnets. If we could get married with no rings, we would. But again, that would ignite a lot of questions especially from his super old-fashioned grandmother. So we went out and bought our ring. I was seriously considering buying silver rings but we ended up buying yellow gold rings just so it could resemble the LOTR one.

Cost: Php 4500

The flowers

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I'm not the roses kind of girl. I just don't find it romantic. But since the occassion asks for it, I had to have flowers. I asked my highschool friends to sponsor the flowers for me. The bouquet, the corsage, the boutonniere and all that.

Cost: Sponsored

The Photography

A friend of mine who got married said that for her, the photography cost for her wedding is non negotiable. It could be costly but she just want to make sure that when she looks at her pictures, it would look awesome. As for me, I didn't really mind. I opted for an amateur photographer because it's cheaper. I tried looking for seasoned PnV but the cheapest I found was Php25,000. That package doesn't have videography services. So I settled for mediocrity for this one. Not a good choice because I have other photo-enthusiast friends who could have taken better pictures but nonetheless, it still didn't cost that much.

The cost for mediocre photography services: Php 7,000 Php

The souvenir

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My college friends sponsored the souvenirs I gave away for the godparents. My husband and I are both environmentalists so we chose plants as our souvenir. For our other visitors, I just picked a cartoonish looking memo holder.

Souvenir cost: Php 1000

The Coordinator

I asked my colleague back then who also side lines as an event coordinator to be my same day coor. She knows how I do my work so it was easy to explain my plan for the day. She even added some more input for the day like the missing pieces of my programme. She brought her two trusty hosts to give life to the party. They were funny and organized and versatile. If I'll need party hosts again in the future I will surely look for them.

Coordinator & Host Cost: Php 2000

Transportation and Bridal car

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My family lives far from the church and venue so I rented a van for them. As for my bridal car, I borrowed a friend's car, placed the floral arrangement in front of it and there ya go, I have my bridal car. Had I been an uber user that time, I would've just booked a ride to the church.

Transportation cost: Php 2000

The Invitation and other miscellaneous

I DIY-ed my invitation so the cost there was less than a thousand. We also had to process legal documents in the city hall and in the church registration.

Overall miscellaneous cost: Php 5000

Other expenses

On the wedding day itself, we both weren't able to eat properly so we ordered McDonalds.

I think that was more or less Php 500

That was I think a total of Php 102,000. If I could go back to my planning stage, I know I could make that figure a little lower. There are stull some other parts of my wedding that I think were unnecessary.

I think my husband and I did just fine with how we executed our plan for the wedding. Our number one goal was to make sure there will be no payables - no debts, no remaining balance - after the wedding. We did not want to start our first day as a married couple with a negative amount in our bank account. When I see couples planning for their weddings, I always give them my unsolicited advise.

It's not the wedding day that's important. It's the marriage itself that matters

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