Weddingbee

We are having an intimate 80-90 person wedding in two months. The invitations were mailed last week. Because of our desire to keep the event small-ish and the size of our reception location, we did not include “& guest” invitations, and only invited husbands & wives / extremely long term significant others.

Last night we received a phone call from FI’s uncle, requesting if his 23-year-old daughter’s boyfriend (of six months) could come. See, said uncle is viewing the wedding as a family reunion (as we had previously agreed to toast to FI’s grandparent’s 65th-wedding anniversary at the rehearsal dinner). He said that this would be a good opportunity for the family to meet the new boyfriend and “we should at least invite him to the rehearsal dinner.”

I’m completely torn … angry and feeling very imposed upon, wanting to stand my ground since we’ve had such a hard time with the wedding thus far, but also hesitant to be termed “the bit&#%%”.

HELP! (And, just to give you an idea of how out of control this has gotten … our rehearsal dinner invitation list is already 60 people due to the fact that FI’s mother is inviting everyone to celebrate her parent’s anniversary)

Emily

Dear Weddingbee:

I just got engaged 2 weeks ago.  We told my parents that weekend and they are ecstatic. My mom and I already started planning for a wedding we said would occur late next summer.
 
The FI’s parents are a slightly different story.  As immigrants that aren’t fully assimilated into the American culture, they were never ecstatic that he was dating a girl that wasn’t the same ethnicity as him (even though we are both East Asian.)  The FI has been dropping hints that he’s getting married, as he hasn’t been able to tell them fully yet, but the vibe he got back was “not now.”  After suggesting that he was thinking of getting married next summer, his mother stated that it was too soon and she would prefer that we delay it until 2009 so that she can “get to know me” better; even though there hasn’t been much of an attempt the last few years and she’s grown accustomed to her only son dating someone outside of their ethnicity.

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We had engagement pictures done at the beginning of May, and I just received my prints yesterday that I ordered. There were several things that occured during our experience with the photographer that I am becoming increasingly upset about - and I’m wondering if anyone has any advice on whether or not I should say something to her, complain, write a letter, etc.

1. I chose this photographer based on a kiosk in the mall. I really liked what I saw and picked up the brochure that was there. In the brochure, it stated that if you spent between $0-$250 on ordered prints, you could buy the “proofs” for $49. There was a $100 “creation fee”/sitting fee. So, going into this, I figured, okay, we’ll just buy the proofs and this will cost us $150 total. Well, we went in to see our proofs, and told her we were basically just interested in buying those. Well, IN FRONT OF US, she grabbed the brochure and crossed out the $0, then told us we would have to spend $250 in order to even BUY our proofs FOR $49! We were totally thrown for a loop and ended up walking out of there not even ordering anything. After some prodding, she printed out a thumbnail print of each photo that I took home to order from later (even that was like she was going out of her way). Read more…

Hi,

My sister and I got married a few months apart but had very different weddings. I got married in a hotel ballroom in New York while she got married in Asia. I planned my whole wedding while she had to rely on others for advice and planning. Recently, she confided in me that she was unhappy with our mother’s lack of interest and participation through her wedding process and on her wedding day. My experience was different because I had complete control of my wedding and I delegated tasks to everyone in the wedding party. My sister, however, felt like she needed guidance because she wasn’t familiar with wedding traditions in Asia and our mother simply did not step up to help her even after she asked.

A good friend of mine got married last year and I noticed that her mother stayed behind the scenes. What are the duties or what kind of expectations do brides have of their mothers? How involved were your mothers? I usually hear stories of brides complaining about their mothers or their in laws getting too involved and not the other way around.

A

Suzi asks:

My father insists on walking me down the aisle, but refuses to have a father-daughter dance. I don’t want him to participate in a tradition I find outdated nor want (him giving me away) but not participate in a tradition that I’ve looked forward to since I’ve gotten engaged.

Would it be wrong of me to ask that he dance with me at my wedding AND walk me down the aisle or ask that he do neither?

Amy asks:

How do I tell a very close friend who expects to be a bridesmaid that she will not be part of my wedding party? Or is it just wrong to ask someone who I’m not as “close” with, but I think will do a much much better job as a bridesmaid instead? The basis of my decision is b/c I work a ridiculous amount of hours and need my entire wedding party to lend a helpful hand.

Our venue requires liability insurance from our vendors. Is this standard for most places? Our event coordinator says it is. If anyone has gone through this process I’d really appreciate some suggestions/advice. Do most vendors carry liability insurance?

WP

I would like to plan a traditional church wedding with a reception following in the fellowship hall. In my head, I would love to have music and dancing. (Nothing that would be unappropriate at the church of course.) However, I have had people comment to me that you should NEVER have music or dancing at the church, even in the fellowship hall for a reception. I wanted to know what others thought about doing this. Did you have music and dancing at your church wedding. It’s a Christian church not belonging to any denomination.

- Amanda

Dear Weddingbee,

We’re having a huge church wedding and reception, but would still love for everything to look beautiful! Unfortunately neither of us have an eye for design so we were considering hiring an interior designer to create a cohesive vision for us. We know that floral designers often handle the decor, but a fellow church member is doing our flowers for us and while they’re great with flowers, they don’t have experience with the details that pull an event together.

How are you putting together an overall vision for your wedding, especially if don’t have an eye for design? Are you designing your wedding yourself or enlisting the help of an interior designer, florist, wedding planner, friend, family member?

Thanks!

ec

Since the beginning of my relationship with FI over 3 1/2 years ago, his brother and (now) sister-in-law have been rude and horribly disrespectful to me. About a year and a half ago, they started attacking FI’s parents and FI, making cutting remarks and excluding them from their child’s life and major events/holidays/etc. FI tried talking to his brother dozens of times over that year about how he and his wife treat us, but he blamed his wife and made some excuses. Nothing happened. We decided to try ignoring their poor behavior– we invited them to holiday gatherings and gave gifts to them & their child for birthdays and holidays. I guess you could say we took the route of *kill them with kindness* and hoped they’d come around. They didn’t and things just went from bad to worse.

Then, five months ago, FI’s brother and wife made a very sudden, very public scene in front of FI and all his friends. They screamed at him that they hate me, that we are trying to make them look bad, that we’ve spread rumors around to friends about them. Nevermind that it wasn’t true, they just kept screaming some pretty unforgivable things. FI and I decided after days of tears that they would not be welcome in our home or at our wedding. We told FI’s parents and asked that they respect our decision. At first they did, but recently I found out that they didn’t. They’ve been bringing it up to FI when I leave the room, when he’s at work, or when they know I’m not home. FI told them to stay out of it, that the decision stands, and that if his brother had a problem with it *he* should be calling to talk (since he hasn’t called in over a year). Yesterday, FI’s parents rescinded their wedding gift (which we were using to help pay for the wedding).

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We decided on a Sunday wedding to save money. It’s an evening wedding, because the reception venue won’t let us start any earlier than 5 pm. Originally, I was fine with the possibility of guests leaving early, because I know our closest friends and fam are cool with taking Monday off from work. (And guests leave early from Saturday weddings, right?) But now I’m starting to have “Sunday guilt.” Will people see our wedding as an inconvenience?

Jen