How to Outfit Your Entire Wedding Party on Ebay

As a single, working mother, I found it quite amazing that I was able to find love a second time. It was even more amazing to find it ONLINE a second time (see my article Meeting Mr. Right Online for that info).

When my husband proposed to me in December, I knew that we wanted to get married quickly and move on with our lives together. I believed strongly that we should be married before we lived together and wanted to set that example for my 3 year old son. Being an avid fan of EBAY I knew that I could handle outfitting the entire wedding party for less than rentals except for my husband's tux. I had heard of others buying wedding dresses, flower girl dresses, and tuxes for boys at a steal. I knew that I was savvy enough to do that and pull off my wedding in two months.

We were married on February 13^th and the picture with the article are outfits all bought on EBAY except for my husband's which we rented. I did the entire wedding for about $2500. I think it was absolutely beautiful and hopefully you'll agree! For those on a budget I've included my favorite EBAY sellers that allowed me to have an incredible day for a fraction of the cost. Read further to find these great buys and how to create your own fabulous ensemble.

The first thing you'll need to do is set up an account with EBAY if you don't already have one. The website will take you through that process and it's fairly quick and painless. Next you'll begin searching for the items you need. Below I have put together the easiest way to search for the dress of your dreams and narrow the results down to find your winning match...

Searching for your wedding dress

- Start by typing in a description such as the following: Size 14 White Strapless Wedding Dress. This allows you to put in as much info as you can about the type of dress you want. If you know it HAS to be strapless be sure to include this in your search criteria. Always include the size because you certainly don't want to fall in love with a dress that isn't going to fit.

- You can either do a "buy it now" where you just pay the price on the screen or you can look for "auctions" which means a better deal at times but also the risk of losing the dress if you really want it.

- Always compare shipping costs between sellers. Though a dress might seem impressively less than another, the shipping costs may more than make up for the discount.

- Make sure you are buying from a "Power Seller." These sellers have sold A LOT of dresses and you can check their "feedback," which is the number next to their name, to make sure they are a good seller. The higher the feedback number and rating, the better your experience will be with purchasing the dress.

- Make sure the seller has measurements that tell you what sizes will be appropriate and measure yourself so that you have that information handy when searching online. Some dresses are not returnable so it's essential you find the best fit. You can always have a bridal store near you do the fitting and adjustments to your dress so it isn't a deal breaker if it's not perfect.

Finding the dress(es) for your flower girl(s)

- One of the EBAY sellers I like the most for flower girl dresses is http://stores.ebay.com/Butterflyxc. This is a great Power Seller whose dresses are inexpensive but still high quality. You can basically buy dresses for the whole world on this site!

- Again make sure that you have the measurements for your flower girls. You can get away with a bigger dress vs. smaller and then they'll also grow into it and use it again if they are in between sizes.

- Try to stick with basic colors. Sometimes the magenta on the computer screen is not the same magenta that is delivered. White, Black, Pink, etc. are better basic colors.

- Some dresses come with hair accessories others do not. If you need to find those do the same search criteria with color and type.

Finding little boys tuxes

- My favorite power seller for boys' tuxes is http://stores.ebay.com/PacificPlex. They have darling 3 piece tuxes under $30.00.

- My favorite color is black for tuxes but they have a great white tux and some other fun colors depending on your wedding colors.

- You may also want to do a search for ring bearer pillows. You'll find some cute styles at http://stores.ebay.com/ANGELS-BRIDAL-SHOP. Angel's shop also has great slip skirts for under your own wedding dress.

Now that you have everything you need for the wedding make sure you allow 4-6 weeks to order and make sure that everything fits and to handle returns if necessary. The best thing I did when my wedding was over was to sell my dress the next day. I know this sounds sac religious but honestly it was the best thing I ever did! The dress was very popular online when I was bidding on it and I knew that there would be hungry buyers. I actually made more money than I paid for it originally. You must remember this was my second wedding and having watched my first wedding dress yellow in the closet and end up being ruined I knew that keeping it for the daughter I may never have who surely would have a style of her own wasn't worth the closet space!

Hopefully this information will have you on your own to finding a lot of your wedding needs online. I even know people that have bought their ring on EBAY so anything truly IS possible.