The Final Numbers

Well, the final numbers are in. I was so excited that I couldn't wait until the last post to fill you all in on how we did.  Not include our wedding bands we are at. 1812.46. That's a whopping 1187.54 UNDER budget. Incredible right?

But, let's get back to talking about how you can have this wedding too. Today, let's talk about the cake. This is probably the hardest place to cut back. This is because not everyone is a cake decorator like me by trade. I budgeted 150 dollars for reception food and the cake. We went 2.12 over that budget, but I think I'm going to forgive myself on that one. I got 20 boxes of cake mix at the grocery store for .69 a piece. After tax, that put the cake mix at 14.73 cents. That's approximately enough cake to feed 480 people. That not only fed the wedding, but the bridal shower and a baby shower's worth of guests and there were still left overs. That's a lot of cake. The oil was around 2 dollars a bottle at Aldi's. I used one and a half bottles I believe. I also got an amazing deal on eggs. I bought a box, which holds 18 dozen eggs at a local food coop. That made them .75 a dozen. I counted the water and electricity as free. I got white cupcake holders at Dollar General for a penny a wrapper. I made around 300 cupcakes, so that was about 3 dollars on wrappers. If you get them at a specialty store they are about three dollars for 50 of them. The fancy ones are even more expensive. This was a place I was willing to sacrifice, because I know my family and they are more concerned about the cupcake than the wrapper and the wrapper gets thrown away anyways. I did buy an ice cream scoop to ladle out the batter, but since it got re purposed after the wedding, I didn't count it in the budget. If you want to count it, it was 5.17 after tax. All of my cake decorating supplies were in the house already. The icing cost about .75 cents a cup to make it. Pillsbury or whatever is about 2.75 a cup in the store premade. That is a huge savings because we used a lot of it. Here's the recipe:

1c. shortening
1c. butter (real butter NOT margarine, I usually just do another cup of shortening instead of butter to make it really white)
1-3 T milk
1 bag powdered sugar sifted (2lb bag)
1tsp vanilla

Use an electric mixer to mix all the ingredients except milk and powdered sugar. Mix in powdered sugar gradually or it will be all over your kitchen. Then add milk to get the right consistency.

The cake pans were actually borrowed from a friend and my mom. You would be surprised what people have that you can borrow. Just ask! They are more than accommodating if you explain to them about your wedding on a budget.

We also used fondant to cover the cake and make it look more professional. This is not something that I had done before. However, fondant is easy and cheap to make. I got marshmallows on sale for .75 a bag. The powdered sugar came from Aldi's like it did for the icing. It cost about 2.88 a batch to make. I had a double layered, 4 tier cake. It only took me to batches to cover the whole thing and I had some left over. I would say if you aren't sure, to make it as you go or plan on an extra batch compared to what you think just in case, especially if you are buying supplies as they go on sale. The recipe can be found here. The supplies needed to use the fondant came from a girl at work, so I didn't have to buy those either. The topper was actually a Christmas present from my mom. She knew we had a hard time finding the perfect topper and now Willow Tree is now making them. That was perfect for our rustic wedding. Pictures of the cake are below.

We also made sugar cookies and cupcakes. Pictures of them are also below. I have recipes for no fail cookie cutter sugar cookies if anyone is interested. These cookies are the ones my new husband actually decorated. Aren't they cute. Oh, and the blue tray that exactly matched our wedding colors, were two dollars a piece at Dollar General. We also had creme cheese mints that were actually a wedding gift from a wonderful friend were contained in little plastic bowls that looked like cut glass from the Dollar Tree at .25 cents a piece.

Questions? Need some help? Email me. :)