No, your wedding is NOT the most important thing ever!!

The BBQ Pit
21

Well, God forbid they freaking SLICE the tomatoes rather than WEDGE them. That makes all the difference in the world. My mistake. :rolleyes:

My mother was a Mother-of-the-BrideZilla when I got married. I was ready to run off to Vegas just to get away from her.
She wanted a traditional Emily Post/Miss Manners/Martha Stewart-type wedding, the whole nine yards with 15 of my closest friends as bridesmaids and doves and a string quartet.
I wanted a simple ceremony and casual reception. I didn’t want matchbooks and napkins emblazoned with our names, and I didn’t want a bunch of bridesmaids and I didn’t want all that “traditional” stuff. I didn’t register for gifts. I wanted it wedding-ish, but not overly-done, if you know what I mean. Simple. I didn’t want to go nuts planning it for a year or more.
It was hard, but my fiance (now husband…and yes, CrazyCatLady, he does have a name!) stood our ground and got what WE wanted. And we weren’t stressed out by the planning.

22

Can someone give me a link to this wedding board you are talking about? It sounds hilarious.

23

Sometimes it’s hilariious, sometimes it makes you want to reach through the modem and slap people, but here it is.

24

Wow. You sound like a real bitch.

25

I’m with Ginger and CMC here CatLady. There are lots of us “normal” brides out there, but they are pretty quiet on those Ulitmate Wedding boards. You can pick them out of the group because they are laughing or shaking their heads.

And we had a tv in the corner of the reception too. We’re Giants fans~! And yes, the Giants won on our special day :slight_smile:

26

Oh, I know normal people are out there on the wedding boards. There are some folks on there whom I really like and respect. There are also a lot of whiny, self-centered assholes who think any deviation from the way their family and friends do things is either tacky, rude, or both. Unfortunately, you can’t call people on overreacting there, because that’s just not supportive.

While we’re talking about normal folks on the UW, I’d like to tell everyone about a lady who goes by the name of SewDeb. She’s a seamstress in a bridal shop who has some really major problems in her personal life, but I’ve never seen her in the stress forum griping about them. She’s always trying to help folks with craft and sewing headaches, and she’s a damn fine lady. So no, I don’t hate everyone on the boards, I just get fed up with the whining sometimes, and I can’t vent there.

27

I got married last December. My first. My wife’s second. We decided to go small and simple. Nice church ceremony; me in a rented tux, her in a very pretty rented wedding gown. No attendants, flower girl, ring boy, etc… About 30 guests (family and close friends).

I took over the planning. Of course, I ran everything by “Kim” but she was cool with the plans. She was glad not to have to make the phone calls and other arrangements.

I took care of everything in less than 3 months and all for less than $1200.

I read somewhere that the average cost for a wedding is something like $25-$30K, with much heartache and stress (as evidenced by some of the stories on this thread).

I laugh at those people.

28

I think of the need to be “supportive” as something that applies to a negative, like illness, not being a self-involved, demanding bitch.

I also predict that the marriages of these types of brides will not last, because they do not have the first clue about what makes a marriage work, they are too obsessed with the fantasy.

But I do have to say that I think the idea of a TV for the sports nuts is pretty awful. If you are that sympathetic to sports obsessions, schedule your nuptials sometime there won’t be a conflict.

29

Wait a second, now, Bibliocat. You are maligning Miss Manners by inferring that she advocates big, fancy weddings. Her words:

“One’s wedding should be a heightened version of one’s best social life, not an occasion for people to attempt to play grand and unfamiliar parts in a fantasy play.”

Please, please, please never use Miss Manners’ name this way if you are not actually familiar with her work.

30

Sorry, bluethree. I just meant that my mother wanted everything to be oh-so-proper. I mentioned Emily Post, but I should have left Miss Manners out of it.

Much like divemaster said, we planned our wedding in four months. We got engaged at Christmas and planned a Spring wedding. When I told my mom that, she said, “You mean next Spring, right?” and I said, “No, this Spring.”
She was amazed that I wasn’t going to spend the next 18 months planning a wedding.
I just wanted to get it over with.

I always laugh at the women who say, “It’s the most important day of my life!!”
Well, sure, your wedding day is important, but aren’t all the days after important, too?
Are you having a “wedding” or a “marriage”? Which one is more important to you? Hmmm?

31

Our wedding was held in my mother-in-laws house. One hundred people. A four and half minute ceremony, all the booze you could possibly drink, excellent Italian buffet and dancing in the back yard till midnight. No registry. No expectations. No presures. It was wonderful. People still tell me what a great time they had.

32

I wish I had more good Bridezilla stories, but I haven’t been involved in very many weddings. My sister refused to allow her husband/fiance to wear a necktie to their wedding. The marriage lasted one and half years.

Our wedding costs were so low that they didn’t make any change in our normal monthly spending. I couldn’t even tell you what it cost. It was at my Mom’s house, and we had a total of twenty people, including the groom, the minister, and me.

Unfortunately, normal, rational brides aren’t going to show up on a message board called “Ultimate Wedding” very often.

More Bridezilla stories, PLEASE

33

Wow, major flashback! I used to hit the UIWG site when it was still on Delphi forums back when I was planning my wedding three years ago. Actually, we pushed the owner of the website, Carrie, over the edge and she closed down the delphi forum.

SewDeb is STILL there?

So, are there still fights over cash bars and …gah, I’m trying to reach into the dark corners of my brain to remember some of the other topics that would cause mass rioting.

Anyway, if you are looking for sane, rational brides, bridal forums are usually not the place to find them.

Those of us on UIWG around the same time started our own delphi forum since we liked the format better. And, yes, it does appear that those who were the most hung up about having the “perfect” wedding and being a “princess” were the first to get divorced.

34

Okey-doke.
The bride I mentioned, the one who had to go home because her fiance didn’t really love her because he wouldn’t help her choose a salad for the reception? She’d been engaged for two years.

It was Christmas 1993. Her wedding was planned for June of '94. Gotta be a June Bride, of course. Micro-managed down to the last frigging detail, weekly anxiety attacks over such crucial life-altering things like the font on the matchbook covers and the exact brand of after-dinner mints. Everyone at work was SICK of hearing about the Wedding of the Century. The day after Christmas, when we all came back to work, I was sporting a brand-new diamond ring on my left hand.

I planned my wedding for April of '94, two months before hers.
Good God Almighty, you would have thought I had said I’d slept with her fiance! Another hysterical crying fit, saying I had “stolen her thunder” by planning my wedding to take place before hers, when I knew hers had been planned for two years. She actually begged me to move mine till after hers. She even said it “wasn’t fair” that I got to get married before her, since she’d been engaged so much longer. WTF kind of reasoning is that?
I refused to move my date, because by then I had already given deposits and such.

[Catty]
The best part?
I’m still married, and she’s not. Her husband dumped her after 2 years.
[/Catty]

35

**bluethree: **

You’ll LOVE this site: http://www.etiquettehell.com/ .

Enjoy. I do. :smiley:

36

It’s threads like this that make me toy with the idea of banning breeders from marrying… they lack reverence for the ceremony itself, and are seemingly only interested in the cash and prizes!

:wink:

37

That still sounds like a fortune to me.

Two weeks and about $150 was all it took for my big day. We were married in my grandparents’ house by the mayor of my hometown. My wife’s dress was $50 and I thought it looked a hell of a lot better than those freaky, white, frilly things that most brides go for. Plus, she can still wear it.

After reading some of the jaw-dropping posts in this thread (Hell, some of this stuff would probably make Dear Abby blow chunks), I think I’m going to call my wife up at work and remind her how much I love her.

38

Wait till you see a bride add up the supposed cost of her gifts and compare it to the actual cost of her wedding…and try and figure out if she “broke even.” :eek:
(Because the gift you give a bride damn well better equal the cost of your lousy rubber-chicken dinner at the reception)

Seriously…I’ve seen girls do that. Talk about a lack of reverence.
:rolleyes:

39

Can I please make a respectful request for people to stop using the insulting term “breeders?”

40

Yeah, nuetron star, $1200 is not chump change, but we wanted a church wedding, with flowers, music, photos. Heck, we gave the preacher $150. We had a cake. Wife had the make-up/manicure treatment. Very nice gown and veil.

For “our day,” I was pleased to spend that amount. But the difference between this and many weddings is that no-one else had to foot any of the bill (attendant’s attire) or put themselves out timewise any more than a normal church service and dinner afterwards.

Our “gift registry” was “call my sister for ideas” if anyone was to ask. Plus, for my 2 best friends who came halfway across the country just to see us get married, I was more than happy to have their presence be gift enough. This was very special to me.

I’m not saying all this to put myself up on a pedastal or anything, only to contrast with what I really hate about many weddings, and that is the cash-grab mentality or at least not caring that others have to really sacrifice for what should be your shin-dig.

For example, just last night my wife received a bridal shower invitation for a casual aquaintance (a very casual aquaintance). Now, I’m not up on these things, but are you supposed to set up a registry for the bridal shower? I mean, the couple already registed at Bloomingdales for the wedding. The shower registry is Linens and Things (I think).

Now, a wedding gift is fair enough. We got them something nice although we can’t make the wedding. It’s in New York which would require a fairly good drive and a night’s stay–just too much expense, considering she hardly knows the girl.

But you know what’s worse? The person setting up the shower is also using the occassion to have one of those sales pitch gatherings. Magic Chef or something like that. “Come with your favorite recipie and watch the demonstration of fantastic kitchen tools!” (blah blah blah). Then, the point is for each guest to choose something from the catalogue that will be another gift for the bride. (Not to mention a commission for the hostess).

Why does it have to be like this? If you want a grand, expensive wedding, fine. You want to spend a year or two planning and getting every frou-frou trapping le Bridal Shoppe can con you into purchasing? Fine. Either you or your (willing) family pay for it. Guests should attend to share the joyous occassion, not as a means to recoup costs. Of course, close family usually wants to be generous with gifts, and that’s fine. But shaking down everyone who walks through the door is disgusting.