Yes it is. The Pastor said he was tired of trying to talk over air planes and getting chased by bees. He also said that he believed weddings should be held in a church so he would only do church weddings now.

When the kids were young we were regular attenders of a non denominational church. By the time our son was in his early teens the church changed alot and we along with others decided it wasn't where we wanted to be anymore. We never were able to connect with another church close by since non denomination churches are few in this area. If we'd stayed where we were the wedding/reception location would be a no brainer.

It's possible to do it for under $5000, if the bride doesn't expect all kinds of expensive stuff.

For my wedding, we planned it in 3 weeks. Yes, I said weeks. My hubby had just gotten home from a deployment in Arizona and had just gotten orders to go to Iraq for 18 months. Of course, we didn't have 100-150 people, but we did everything to cut costs and made our budget in to about $1200ish. The pastor of the church we chose waived her fees and all we had to pay for was the lady that helped clean the church afterwords. We played our own music instead of having a piano player. Our reception was at the church. We made our own food the night before and warmed it up in several crock pots the day of and it was amazing. We did our own decorations that were purchased at craft stores like Micheal's or AC Moore. I bought my dress on Ebay for $250. Thankfully, hubby already had his dress greens to wear (I love a man in uniform lol :D). For flowers we found a local vocational school with a horticultural program and paid basically for the cost of the flowers. I bought my tiara at AC Moore and a simple veil there too. Instead of going to an expensive cake shop, we just went to a local bakery and got an "altar cake".

Just to give you some ideas of different ways to cut costs. Maybe check with your favorite restaurant and see if they cater? We were going to have food catered from my favorite BBQ place but decided to make Rigatoni instead. Hahaha re-reading my post makes my wedding sound awful, but it really was nice.

Her groom will wear his dress greens as well. Thanks for mentioning the floral place I totally forgot about the school of floral design we have here. I will give them a call.

I also thought the iPod instead of a DJ was a good idea. We have a family friend taking photos.

We can't take our own food to this place they don't allow it.

I'm seriously checking some of these things out so keep the good ideas coming!

Our son is Catholic and Daughter in law Lutheran. Yep that is Minnesota!
However, I am one of those beer drinking Episcopals!
Anyway, They had a Lutheran pastor, they found on short notice that was very willing to do an outside ceremony (only one plane flew over)!
If you would like his name just PM me. He did a very good job and I think they just had to meet with him for a few classes, no requirement on joining the church.

They took the classes at the church we originally thought we were going to have the wedding at before the groom was deployed to Iraq earlier this year. I don't know if they will want to pay the fee and take the time to do it all over again when he gets back before the wedding.

However I decided to collect all info that could be helpful and put it in a file. That way if it does turn out we need it I will have it handy. So if you don't mind I'd love the name of the man who did your son's wedding.

Thanks everyone!

I think your wedding sounds great I'd love to do something like that.