My husband and I are celebrating our ten year wedding anniversary this year! Like many couples, our road has not been easy and we have had many difficult journeys which have made us only grow in love and learn to appreciate and respect each other even more.

We wanted to do something really special for our ten year anniversary, but didn’t have a huge budget to do so. We also felt strongly that we wanted our daughter to be a part of whatever we did. We decided to renew our vows on our annual vacation to a beach within driving distance from our house. We usually rent a condo right on the beach, an inexpensive option to staying at a hotel.  We ended up spending only a few hundred dollars on everything from our outfits, to the cake, to the ceremony itself. Here is how we did it!

First I shopped around and found us really nice beach wedding attire for a low cost. I bought this dress at a local boutique for a mere $23.00, 70% off. 

I bought my daughter’s dress at a discount at Burlington Coat Factory and found a matching ivory shirt for my husband, 60% at Macy’s. When I first researched bouquets I realized how expensive they were. Also we just needed small bouquets which are hard to find at a florist and still really expensive. So I found a video on YouTube on making bouquets and bought the flowers in the local supermarket. I made a bouquet for my daughter and I the night before and refrigerated them. They came out perfect!

They came out perfect!

We planned to recite our vows at sunrise right outside our condo on the beach.  We hoped doing the ceremony at this time would give us an extraordinary view and a beach without crowds. But, we needed an aisle to walk down.

The day the before the ceremony, my husband and I went to a local Dollar Store. We bought ten vases and a bag tea light candles.  We also bought bamboo sticks traditionally used to help keep tomato plants up. We made an arch to stand under with the bamboo sticks. We filled the vases half way up with sand and put a few tea lights on top and made an aisle out of them.

To get a minister to come for five minutes and help us recite our vows cost hundreds of dollars! So we just wrote a little something and stood in front of our daughter as we renewed our vows. What we did splurge on was a photographer to come and take family pictures of us on the beach. When we were all done, we had a picnic on the beach with some sparkling lemonade and a homemade carrot cake with white cream cheese frosting. After looking into the price of cakes and realizing how expensive they were, I just made a small cake before I went I left for vacation and put it in the freezer when we got to the condo and thawed it the night before. 

Our vow renewal was something we will never forget. My daughter, who is four, had a wonderful time and truly enjoyed the experience also. I am looking forward to the next ten years of our marriage and beyond!