Firstly, you dont need to spend a bomb or get yourself into debt to have a special wedding day. Your wedding day is what you make of it. At the end of the day, its about you & your man & the love that you have for one another and your DS.

Secondly well done for not going down the whole personal loan track, to pay for a wedding. That is such a bad move, especially for a young family. You dont need to be starting married life with a debt like that over your heads. Unfortunately alot of people get trapped.

A registry wedding to me sounds absolutely beautiful. I have heard some lovely stories. We almost went down that track ourselves, as like you we just wanted to get married, we were over the planning, cost, family input & on & on... You can make it so special.

Otherwise, I'll give you a quick run down on our plans & that could give you some inspiration. We are having a backyard casual affair. Will you have a nice backyard where you are moving, or could you use the MIL's backyard? We have organised a caterer for 60 people its just under $1000. Otherwise you can so easily cater for it yourself....so so easy I just didnt want the hassle on my wedding day iykwim. After our ceremony in a park not too far from home, everyone will rock up at our joint & we've organised party hire (chairs, tables etc) & we will dance the night away lol. Apart from food and alcohol, one of our bigger expenses has been my dress.

So onto the dress, would you consider a second hand dress? Otherwise you can get a stunning dress 'off the rack' in a bridal store, this is what I did and my dress is a couture that was marked down from $2,200 to just under $1000.

We arent using a photographer. Its a huge expense and all of our family & friends have cameras, so they will take plenty for us. We have even though of buying ourselves a new camera to use on the day & at least at the end of the day we will have stacks of pics & a camera that we can use again!!

We are also making our own cupcake wedding cake.

Another idea is an afternoon tea wedding. Pick a nice location & use a celebrant (we found a beautiful park right on the river, and I have hired it for 2 hours free of charge through the local council - there are plenty of free locations around) get married, go back to someones house & provide arvo tea foods, ie cheesecake shop, tea, coffee & nibblies. By doing it this way, its small, intimate & the budget is kept down but its still a classy wedding iykwim.

Invites, I dont know if I am allowed to mention the website here so I will FB it to you, they were $60 all up & are perfect.

What date are you hoping for? I hope you can get it to all come together for you. If you need any tips please feel free to ask me here on on FB, I've done so much wedding research I am going bonkers lol. Otherwise my wedding day is March 7th so look out for my pics for inspiration & ideas!!

At the end of the day, let me just say, my parents were married in a registry office, my dad had to borrow a smart pair of pants from his mate & my mum wore a simple dress from her wardrobe, they have one shocking wedding photo lol, YET they are still together.