My parents tied the knot in 1971. It makes me laugh to see how, in so many ways, my life with My Sailor mimics their past.
Example:
We lived in a TINY apartment in Washington with 1 dog. My parents started their adventure in a TINY apartment in California with 1 dog.
We are throwing our wedding in August, 2 days before their 41st anniversary (didn't plan it that way - just the way to cards fell).
We are going on a road trip for our honeymoon. So did they. (Different destinations though)
My dad has the hotel portion of our road trip covered (due to lots of reward/loyalty points he isn't using). My parent's honeymooned at a hotel my dad's family owned at the time.
They've been married for nearly 41 years now, so I'm gonna just go out on a limb and say all of this is a good sign.
Unfortunately, I might end up just canceling the road trip if not now, very soon.
Most of our guests have to travel a significant distance to come to the wedding. To our surprise, more people than we expected have opted to come, which is great! We can't wait to see/meet everyone! However, that's also put a hitch in our honeymoon plans.
We have a very limited budget, and we were planning on having enough left over to cover a romantic road trip honeymoon.
That doesn't really look like it's going to be the case anymore. Let's crunch some numbers.
Here's what (realistically) we're looking at budget wise:
MIN BUDGET - $814
Includes the following:
Car rental ($280)
Gas (according to AAA estimate $80)
Hotels (Free; Thank you Dad!)
Cooler and Food ($70 approx budget, including cooler purchase)
Hearst Castle ($50)
Monterey bay Aquarium - ($54, $27/person - Active duty discount, normally $35/person)
Flights home ($250, $99/person plus taxes and fees)
Shuttle rides to and from Sea-Tac ($30 for 2)
DOES NOT INCLUDE:
Dog sitter - $100-$240 (depending on how often the roommate opts to handle the responsibility)
Lost Wages - I'll have to take some time unpaid off work to make this happen. $300
Dining out - This includes ZERO dining out.
Disneyland weekend
Traditionally, the wedding is paid for by the Bride's Family and the Honeymoon is paid for by the Grooms, but in this day and age, all of that is out the window. Besides, with travel costs alone, the Grooms family has been unable to contribute monentarily (wedding party attire aside). So since that's out of the question (and it's just stupid to try to rely on gifts that may or may not come and from the look of our untouched honeymoon registries, it's looking like we won't have to worry about a "gifts" table), we might just want to cancel at this point. Reality is, even the modest trip described above will have to come out of our wedding fund money - and it's 1/3rd of the remianing budget right there.
Part of me wants to slap myself out of it and trust that the money will be there, but (short of David Tutera showing up to rescue us) the pragmatist in me doesn't see that happening, and doesn't want to get us in an even more disappointing situation of having to cancel on the spot. So it's a decision that will have to be made sooner rather than later...
Is postponing an option?
Sure!
It'll be postponed until probably the Spring of 2013 when My Sailor can get Leave again.
Ugh.
Example:
We lived in a TINY apartment in Washington with 1 dog. My parents started their adventure in a TINY apartment in California with 1 dog.
We are throwing our wedding in August, 2 days before their 41st anniversary (didn't plan it that way - just the way to cards fell).
We are going on a road trip for our honeymoon. So did they. (Different destinations though)
My dad has the hotel portion of our road trip covered (due to lots of reward/loyalty points he isn't using). My parent's honeymooned at a hotel my dad's family owned at the time.
They've been married for nearly 41 years now, so I'm gonna just go out on a limb and say all of this is a good sign.
Unfortunately, I might end up just canceling the road trip if not now, very soon.
Most of our guests have to travel a significant distance to come to the wedding. To our surprise, more people than we expected have opted to come, which is great! We can't wait to see/meet everyone! However, that's also put a hitch in our honeymoon plans.
We have a very limited budget, and we were planning on having enough left over to cover a romantic road trip honeymoon.
That doesn't really look like it's going to be the case anymore. Let's crunch some numbers.
Here's what (realistically) we're looking at budget wise:
MIN BUDGET - $814
Includes the following:
Car rental ($280)
Gas (according to AAA estimate $80)
Hotels (Free; Thank you Dad!)
Cooler and Food ($70 approx budget, including cooler purchase)
Hearst Castle ($50)
Monterey bay Aquarium - ($54, $27/person - Active duty discount, normally $35/person)
Flights home ($250, $99/person plus taxes and fees)
Shuttle rides to and from Sea-Tac ($30 for 2)
DOES NOT INCLUDE:
Dog sitter - $100-$240 (depending on how often the roommate opts to handle the responsibility)
Lost Wages - I'll have to take some time unpaid off work to make this happen. $300
Dining out - This includes ZERO dining out.
Disneyland weekend
Traditionally, the wedding is paid for by the Bride's Family and the Honeymoon is paid for by the Grooms, but in this day and age, all of that is out the window. Besides, with travel costs alone, the Grooms family has been unable to contribute monentarily (wedding party attire aside). So since that's out of the question (and it's just stupid to try to rely on gifts that may or may not come and from the look of our untouched honeymoon registries, it's looking like we won't have to worry about a "gifts" table), we might just want to cancel at this point. Reality is, even the modest trip described above will have to come out of our wedding fund money - and it's 1/3rd of the remianing budget right there.
Part of me wants to slap myself out of it and trust that the money will be there, but (short of David Tutera showing up to rescue us) the pragmatist in me doesn't see that happening, and doesn't want to get us in an even more disappointing situation of having to cancel on the spot. So it's a decision that will have to be made sooner rather than later...
Is postponing an option?
Sure!
It'll be postponed until probably the Spring of 2013 when My Sailor can get Leave again.
Ugh.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment