One sweet day: the price to pay

Living in the bay area, weddings do not come cheap. I was foolish to think that I can have a wedding for $10,000 budget, as this was the initial budget we set before even looking at anything wedding. Then, all we had to do is google some things wedding and realized very quickly that doesn't even cover the food. Talk about sticker shock. So, of course, we had to do a little refining to adjust the budget to a more realistic one. The final number came down to $30,000.

Now, most of the time, people do not include honeymoon and wedding bands into the wedding budget. I'm not sure why that is as they are an essential and necessary factor in any wedding. So, for purposes of the budget breakdown, I will include everything wedding related.
Budget breakdown (for 100 guests)

Invitations and other paper goods: $1,000 (see detail breakdown in this separate post)

Dressing her

• Wedding dress: $1,100
• Alteration: $350
• Veil: $75
• Shoes: $40
• Hair flower: $40
• Jewelry/accessories: $40
• Manicure/pedicure: $80
• Hair and makeup: $350 (with $50 tip)
• Wedding bands: $1,700 (for 2 rings)
• Makeup/hair trial: $180
  

Dressing him

• Suit: $400 (bought)
  
• Shoes: $100
• Accessories: $50 for tie and belt
• Wedding band: $300

Vendors

• Rehearsal dinner: $1,700
• Ceremony site fee: $1,100
• Reception site/food: $11,000
• Photographer: $5,300
• Videographer: $1,500
  
• Flowers: $1,800
• Linen/chair covers: $450
• Cake: $500
• DJ: $900
• Tips: $500

Others

• Honeymoon: $4,200
• Wedding party gifts: $1,500
• License to wed: $75
• Hotel for bride and groom: $700
• Miscellaneous expenses: $500 (to cover things I forgot or too small to mention)
  

Total: $36,530

We are over our budget by about $6,500, primarily for the honeymoon and the wedding bands. It's a lot to spend on one day, but it is an important day of our lives. If you were to ask if it was worth it, I'd say no. We could have just eloped and spent this money on a better and bigger honeymoon, or even put it towards home renovation. But since elopement is out of the question, I would do everything all over again in a heart beat, because I could not have imagined our day went any differently with any other details missing.

On a side note, we received approximately $5,000 in gifts (monetary and non-monetary). This is very very low in Asian culture, but we did not have a typical Asian wedding. In the end, we were just glad to see that the majority of our families made it to the wedding and enjoyed themselves at the wedding. We couldn't have asked for more than that.