As a teen, I was at a wedding of family acquaintances where the bride sat on a chair and got picked up and paraded around the room in it by the groomsmen and groom while the DJ played Madonna’s “Like a Virgin.” The bride (probably inebriated, which also shocked me) danced along happily on her perch.
@-)
@myloves I believe there is a Jewish custom involving the bride and maybe the groom (?) being picked up and and “paraded around” at the reception. But I don’t believe that “Like a Virgin” would be the choice of song for this.
And I’m just going to say I “liked” every comment Pizzagirl contributed to the “cover the plate” discussion and let it go. I still don’t see how ANY suggestion of what one SHOULD spend on a gift is “innocent” vs. a low-key demand, but whatever. I will never be invited to such a wedding, and if I was, and word got out about what I was EXPECTED to spend, I wouldn’t be attending.
Yes! It reminded me of that, just…um…different!
“I believe there is a Jewish custom involving the bride and maybe the groom (?) being picked up and and “paraded around” at the reception. But I don’t believe that “Like a Virgin” would be the choice of song for this.”
It would be funny, though :-).
You are referring to the hora, or chair dance, and yes, both bride and groom are put on chairs and paraded around. Typically Hava Nagila is the song that is played.
@sseamom -In my circles when I lived in NJ, word did not get out nor was there ever any suggestion of a gift by the host family. I just remember my parents and grandparents saying they wanted to “cover their plate” to wish the couple well and give the couple a good start. There was no set amount and I have not heard the term used by family in my generation, so the stated concept has died out in our family.
Things may be different in the era of the bridezilla, SYTTD and some social circles.
@my-3-sons, #585 was my experience as well…
Back to tackiness - here’s a story of someone quasi-famous dressing up for a wedding in something more suitable for a nightclub and then posting about “body shaming and bullying” as if that was the issue.
Any stories of wildly inappropriate dress?
Well, honestly, to celebrate the formality of the occasion, the bride’s brother’s GF wore all her face and ear piercings. Apparently she’s a really nice gal.
@greenwitch My issue with that dress is that I was always taught that you should never be trying to take attention from the bride, or trying to compete with her.
I know it’s become normal to wear black dresses to weddings. I wish it weren’t, because I wore a black dress to a wedding just once, and I meant it.
Rule in my family’s social circle is not to wear white to a wedding unless you are the bride. Honestly, I still remember the woman who wore white to my wedding 30 years ago.
The tackiest outfit I’ve ever seen anyone wear at a wedding was … well … On me.
It was the mid-80s, and I had gained some weight in college and it had gone all to my hips. (To put things in perspective, I think I was up to a whopping 137 lbs on my 6’0" body, but I felt fat). This was a wedding with old friends whom I hadn’t seen in a while, so I was self-conscious.
To balance out the extra weight, I decided to get an outfit with the biggest shoulder pads I could find, which turned out to be a stark white Norma Kamali shirt with football player shoulders. For some reason I thought it would be a good idea to pair the shirt with a stark white huge, pleated Norma Kamali dirndl skirt, apparently on the theory that the pleats would hide the enlarged hips. (Hmm, pleats as a slimming device? Faulty logic there).
Going with the theme, I found the highest heels that they made – on the theory that they would be slimming. They were about 5" high. And, to top it all off, I decided that my long, baby fine, stick straight blond hair was out of proportion to my new hips so I had it chopped off into a short bob and got a tight frizzy perm. 
That was a mistake.
I knew the rule was to not wear white to a wedding, but this was the only Norma Kamali linebacker outfit on sale, and I couldn’t afford full price. And I convinced myself that it looked nothing like a wedding dress, so it was okay.
I sure as hell hope there are no surviving pictures.
@nottelling - You have me laughing out loud. H just asked me if one of my imaginary friends had a good joke. I was laughing so hard I couldn’t even read your post aloud.
It reminded H of the light yellow pants and sweater he wore to a wedding in the 70s. It was the first time he was meeting most of my extended family. I married him anyway, about five years later. He still has limited fashion sense…
Yes, I do suggest changes to H’s outfits periodically, especially if we are going somewhere “dressy.” He does have trouble distinguishing green from blue and red/pink/orange tho he will hotly deny. [-(
I have had female relatives wear “bohemian” outfits to weddings and also very formal gowns, depending. I imagine it must be “fashionable,” but somehow it seems a bit much at times.
Most of the men just wear Aloha shirts and are comfortable and look fine.
Here’s a good one. My friend went to a wedding where the mother of the bride tried to upstage her daughter by wearing the sluttiest dress she could find. Apparently it wasn’t a gown and she decided not to wear underwear. This was a wedding where not only the bride was put up on a chair and danced around the room but so were the parents. So the mother was lifted up on a chair and, well, you can picture the rest (or maybe you don’t want to). We still laugh about this one.
Picture the dress in the above story only not strapless. My nephew’s fiance wore that to his grandmother’s funeral. She stole the show. @-)
See, it’s not body-shaming. It’s tacky-shaming. Shame away!!
Patsmom, I would have been so tempted to have thrown a black sweater over the nephew’s fiance! That’s so disrespectful.
To a funeral??!!
Yikes about that dress. I think people should just have ignored it, though. I wonder if she was projecting about the “shaming.” Hard to believe anyone deliberately spilled an entire beer over her.
I think she should be ashamed of taking to the internet to complain about a friend’s wedding. How will the newly married couple feel about their guests being criticized for all the world to read about?