I just tweaked the budget for about the millionth time last night. Somehow, I have a feeling that if normal people spend $X on Blah, then they just enter '$X' into the 'Blah' column of their budget and be done with it. I, however, am a bit more complicated.
So, let's say for example that I just spent $100 for a deposit on a $300 item that I had budgeted to cost $400. I change the budgeted amount to $300, put $100 as the amount spent thus far, and add the $100 overage to the 'Miscellaneous expenses' column. Then I go to the payment tracking page of the budget, list the vendor name, the deposit amount, and input the other payment amounts along with the dates they are due. At any rate, by re-budgeting every time we come in under on an item, I keep adding money back into the Misc. fund. I may be re-budgeting when we go over and having to take money out of that fund, but it keeps getting replenished every time we come in under. As a matter of fact, I think we now have MORE money in that fund than we did at the beginning.
Also, if I buy a $25 item that is 'for the wedding' but is also something I'll be using in the meantime (and afterward), then I don't put it into the budget at all because it's something I would have bought anyway. This may or may not be cheating, but I maintain that if the wedding is not its only purpose, then I shouldn't count it as a strictly wedding item.
Thus far, here's the breakdown of where it seems we will be coming in over or under the original budget (though in the current version, we're not over on anything):
Over original amount budgeted
- food and drinks
- wedding programs
- officiant's fee
- honeymoon
Under original amount budgeted
- cake
- attire
- flowers
- invitations, save the date cards, thank-you notes and guestbook
- rental items
General decor and videography are still up in the air. There is really only one videography place in the city who seems to offer hourly rates for weddings, and for the life of me I can't get in touch with them. We do not want a huge $3000 package with 3 camera people running around for 6 or 7 hours, slapping wireless microphones on the whole wedding party, and getting pointless footage of me putting on mascara or people standing in line to get cake. We just want to pay someone like $200-300 to stick around for 3 hours or so with one camera, get the important bits like the ceremony and first dance, and maybe whip us together a short DVD without a bunch of fancy editing tricks (but heck, that can always be done somewhere like the Video Kitchen, so no huge deal). Basically we just want some footage of the stuff we'll never get to see in action otherwise.
Anyone have any ideas on this front? Any professional place that will do this for us? Any friends with a good video camera, a good eye and a few hours to spare in August? Anything at all?