I’d also like to say that I think not letting the bridesmaid stand next to you (at the ceremony or in the pictures or anywhere) will most likely offend her. She probably invested a fair amount of time into selecting a dress and a fabric, fittings, etc. She could have just gone to TJ Maxx and picked up the cheapest polyester crepe dress she saw, but she didn’t. Instead, she went out of her way to make something for your wedding that she felt was pretty and appropriate. If I were her, and I had any inkling that my dress was something you resented rather than adored, then I’d be would be upset and annoyed.
An appreciable percentage of the men in the audience won’t even have a clue that this is in any way, shape or form a problem. Heck, it took about half the thread before I was positive on exactly what the fuss was about.
Oh, and sugar and spice, I love that picture! How would you describe that color? Ash?
Sorry, Ghanima, but I’m voting with “you’re being a Bridezilla”. I think you owe your friend an apology. This is seriously silly - it’s not as if anyone is going to be confused about who the bride is - she spent time and money to get a special dress made for “your special day” - and you are being ungrateful. You’re getting married - not “weddinged” - isn’t it more important that the people you care about be with you and everyone have a good time versus what color a dress is?
She didn’t quite leave it up to her. They discussed it and she believed the bridesmaid said the dress would be pink top and print skirt. It turned out to not be what she believed they discussed.
Yes, you do.
Let me help:
Your dear, dear friend loves you so much and is so excited about your wedding that she had a dress specially made for it. And she’s going to be there.
And you are going to be married.
I remember how out of control wedding planning can get–I just got married a year ago. But it’s so not worth it to stress out and create these arbitrary problems. If you truly love the man you are going to marry and the people who are going to be witness, your bridesmaids could show up in potato sacks and it will still be the greatest day of your life.
My mother told me, well before my wedding, that etiquette states that, “The mother of the groom should wear beige and keep her mouth shut.” Of course, she did neither, but I didn’t mind a bit.
I find that to be a very enjoyable sentence to say out loud.
No, the bridesmaid said quite clearly that the dress was beige, which it is. We can quibble over that, but it doesn’t change my point, which is that if she had cared that much about color she should have assigned them the color.
When you leave it up to your bridesmaids to exercise their own taste and judgment in what they will wear – which I think is a lovely idea – you do kind of take your chances with what they will decide on.
I wouldn’t worry about it. The only person anyone looks at is the bride anyway. Ask any of your guests a year from now if they remember what the bridesmaids wore and odds are they’ll be clueless. Just enjoy the day.
Nowhere near a Bridezilla. That term is as over-used as ‘feminazi,’ and just as ridiculous. You’re going through a hypersensitive time, and maybe you’re a bit insecure about someone stealing your spotlight but trust me, she could be wearing white, and no one will look twice at her. At any wedding, everyone with half a brain cell can pick out the bride. Some friends aren’t the most sensitive of folk, but it depends on how good of friends you are whether or not you can talk to her about your insecurites, and whether she can do anything to assuage them, ridiculous as they may be, out of love for you and sympathy for your feelings. Only you can say.
Maybe a pink pashmina as her gift, to wear the wedding and highlight the other colors in her gown?
Bridezilla. Is the day about marrying the man you love, or putting on a color-coordinated pageant?
In the big scheme of things, it’s no biggie. You’re stressed to the max (I remember what that was like) and you’ve lost perspective.
If she said she was wearing green and then showed you a red dress, I’d understand. But the dress was always going to have a beige base, and personally I think it’ll look lovely alongside your champagne dress.
Were the pink and green to tone in with the flower colours or something like that? If that’s the case, then perhaps she could wear an organza stole in those colours?
Ha! Great minds and all that…
Yeah, weddings are highly emotional for all involved, and folks start caring about all sorts of things that maybe aren’t that important in the end. If you feel you overreacted after some inner reflection, by all means drop it, but if this is part of a pattern of behavior for her that makes you feel like she is just not tuned in to you, then that’s a whole different kettle o’ fish.
You’re being a bit of a Bridezilla, but don’t worry too much. Any woman who has gone through the whole wedding thing and claims to have never had even one Bridezilla moment or silly argument with someone else in the wedding party either has a bad memory or is lying. This sort of thing happens to the best of us.
I second this. Have some of your favorite adult beverage.
Originally the purpose of the bride’s maid was to fool looming demons about who the actual bride was so they would be thwarted in their mischief making. As such, bride’s maid dresses were often very similar to the bride’s dress, only in slightly different colours - eg, pale pink, pale yellow, beige, cream, etc.
I really don’t think your friend did anything wrong - she chose a dress that she thought she would look nice in and would look nice in your pictures. The fact that the shade is similar to your dress means nothing, and if you choose to get bent out of shape about it, you’re being petty. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you’re very stressed/excited about your upcoming wedding and this TINY thing is seeming like a good outlet for your frustrations. It’s not. It’s your best friend with a custom made dress she chose to make you happy. If you jump on her shit about it, it makes you a jerk, really.
Aww, thank you, shamrock! They did look beautiful (and the sister on the left was 7+ months pregnant!), didn’t they? It was funny, though, because both of them, plus my step-mother, were all wearing black, or black and white, and with my husband and father in black tuxes, it did look like a well-coordinated, black & white wedding, which was lovely. Then on the other side, my mother-in-law wore peach (which, btw, is the only color in the world that I actually don’t like, but she will never, ever know that!), and my sister-in-law’s dress had splashes of peach in it, in a similar style, so they also went well together. And with my father-in-law wearing a red-colored bow tie, which also kindof tied in, we looked coordinated on that side, as well.
The whole point was, everyone’s comfort and enjoyment was #1 on my list – Period. Otherwise, why go to all the trouble I went to to plan the whole affair if people weren’t supposed to have a great time being there?!
Great idea! If featherlou isn’t going to buy either of these, I say you should give them to the 2 girls as gifts. Lovely!
I’m going to have to vote for a bit of a Bridezilla, too. I also suspect that part of your anger is at yourself for not choosing the dresses for your bridesmaids so this wouldn’t happen. You can’t have it both ways; you can’t tell people to get what they want, and then get mad at what they get, pink top or no pink top.
I’m curious about the pink top; how did the dress end up not having a pink top, and did your bridesmaid know how important pink being incorporated in the dress was to you? I’m guessing she had no idea that your approval of the beige fabric was conditional on the pink being added, so she saw no big deal in adjusting that part of it.
Can you discuss it with your bridesmaid calmly, saying something like, “Your dress is lovely, and I really appreciate you having one made for my wedding, and I know I approved the fabric, but it’s beiger than I thought it would be. Can we add a scarf or shawl or something?”
To give you a little perspective, I didn’t like my own wedding dress on my wedding day. I couldn’t find anything I liked, so I settled on something I didn’t like much; if I had one thing to do over, it would be my dress. That didn’t affect my wedding or my marriage at all; we had a wonderful time, and I’m married to a wonderful man. Stupid dresses. They keep being the bane of my existence.
ETA: Heh, I was thinking about my pink shawls, too.
We had 2 attendants–matron of honor and best woman. I told them to wear whatever they wanted. The matron of honor (my sister) wore a beautiful chocolate brown velvet dress (it was a winter wedding) and the best woman (my husband’s best friend) wore a deep red velvet dress that was awesome. They were prettier than me, I think. 
I didn’t care. We had a great time.
No one’s going to mistake a bridesmaid for the bride, and, unless the bridesmaid’s wearing a white gown and a veil, I don’t think it’s anything to get upset about. It’s going to be a great day.
I called her last night and apologized, told her the dress was going to be fine, that I was totally over it, and everything was OK. She was glad to hear it. She said she spent most of the day trying on dresses at the mall. (This made me feel very loved because it showed to me that she really cared about making me happy.) I never wanted to let a dress be a big deal like that. I was just raised with the idea that you don’t wear a white/off-white dress to a wedding, so I really was surprised.
We have a very close friendship, and I am godmother to her children, as she will be for mine. We’ve been through quite a bit in the 15 or so years we’ve been friends. It was an unpleasant surprise, but if this is the worst thing that happens to me in all this chaos I will count myself lucky. Now the worst thing that could possibly happen is my husband-to-be wearing white socks with his tux. :eek:
Good for you. May your wedding go beautifully and smoothly. And post pictures when it’s over, so we can all comment on how gorgeous you look and how completely different her dress is from yours.