Written with love, by Ashly King

Has wedding planning given you grey hairs yet? Wedding planning can be stressful and expensive. We all like to cut corners and with these two simple tips you will be able to feel cool, calm, and collected. I have included in this post tips for budgeting and a DIY project for informal wedding invitations. With smart budgeting and a simple DIY project, your stress levels will greatly reduce!

For starters, let's look at the money part of the wedding. If you are having a hard time with creating a wedding budget, there is way of budgeting that has helped me from over-spending. From personal experience, I have learned that living with an organized budget really helped me. A few years back, I went through the Dave Ramsey Finanical Peace University program. What a difference it has made in my life! You can start simple, by writing down the areas of which you are budgeting. After deciding what to save for, create envelopes with the name of the items you are budgeting. An example - " wedding apparel," "reception," etc. When you get paid, follow along with your budget and disperse the corresponding money into your named envelopes. This will help you organize your money and will keep you accountable from not over-spending.

And now for the "Save-The-Date" informal invitation DIY project:

Supplies Needed:
• Design program (photoshop, indesign, elements, etc)
• Printer
• High Quality Paper
• Scissors
• Hole puncher
• Corner puncher
• Ribbon
• Small knife

Simply download a free template (Example site: http://www.printrunner.com/blank-print-templates.html) and begin typesetting your bookmark. You can also customize it with your engagement photo. Once finished designing, save it as a PDF and print.

Once printed, cut them out and punch your holes. You can add ribbon for a personal touch! If you like rounded corners, I recommend a corner puncher by Fiskars. It is fairly cheap and you can find them at your local craft store.

If you don't own a design program, you can design simple and cute bookmarks by using www.picmonkey.com or any free image editing services offered online.