In October, I got married on a perfect Sunday afternoon under a flawless sky. But unlike many brides, the biggest hurdle in my 10-month planning process was not finding the perfect dress or managing my mother-in-law. For me, the part of wedding-planning that really took the cake was swallowing the hefty cost.

Even in the early stages of planning, I knew I was going to have to use every trick in my frugal-shopper arsenal to ensure that I came in well below the average wedding cost of $28,000.

And in June, I wrote a story ["I do, I do, I do (hate to pay full price)"] for The N&O about how I was doing it: making my own invitations, scouring for coupons and negotiating discounts with my vendors.

After that story, I received dozens of e-mail messages and phone calls from readers who wanted vendor recommendations, advice on wedding-planning and the opportunity to share wedding-cost stories.

I guess that makes sense. After all, a wedding is a huge event in a person's life, and it can put an equally huge dent in your bank account balance as well.

Wedding season is upon us again, so this seems like an opportune time for a follow-up.

Let me answer the most popular question first: No, I did not make my budget. I actually overshot it by a good 20 percent.

Part of that is my fault because I got a little -- shall we say -- "spendy" in the home stretch.

But part of it is that there are expenses involved with a wedding that you just don't anticipate when you sit down and make your initial budget.

In the end, I don't feel that bad about the overspending, though, because our wedding was pretty close to perfect, and we did a good job planning.

Despite going over our budget, we paid for almost everything as we went, and we had the wedding and honeymoon paid off a month after we said our vows.

And now, a year older -- and presumably a year wiser -- I'm back to share more of what I learned in the process of planning a wedding, along with a few more money-saving tips.

Why didn't someone tell me?

Here's what I know: Nothing will prepare you for planning a wedding.

It is unlike any event you may have planned before.

Especially for the bride, it's high-stress and high-pressure and requires a mind-numbing series of decisions -- any one of which could have your nuptials appearing on "YouTube" before you can slink away on your honeymoon to live down the shame.

Here are some things I wish someone had told me:

* You will lose your mind. Try as you might, your wedding will consume your life. In the months leading up to the wedding, I had so much on my mind that I forgot appointments, names and details.

I resorted to writing everything down and keeping a very detailed planner to make sure I wasn't missing anything.

* Be prepared for last-minute flights of fancy. Despite my best efforts to save money, I went temporarily insane a month before the wedding and added extras I had previously eliminated.

I called my caterer and added a groom's cake. I called my florist and added on more corsages and boutonnieres.

I almost switched to the "fancy" chairs rather than the plain folding ones -- which were $6.75 apiece instead of $2.50. Fortunately, the penny-pinching demon that lives inside my soul wouldn't let me change the chairs. And you know what?

Eight months later, I'll bet you can't find one wedding guest who could tell you what the chairs looked like.

* It's not a democracy. It's unfortunate, but the truth of planning your wedding is that it's your wedding.

I tried to solicit opinions from my mother and bridesmaids on decisions such as the dresses, flowers and jewelry. But in the end, the conflicting opinions and desire to please everyone totally stressed me out.

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