Old fort, sometimes it is not a question of not having the money. If my son’s wedding is far away, I will have 5 relatives attend, and I will be paying for 3 of their flights and hotels. If his friends attend, I want to pay for their hotel rooms. I will host a local meet-and -greet locally. I don’t wish to contribute $25,000 to a one day affair. I’m still working almost full time, as I know son will need a new car and a down payment for a future home.
Had my son married his long term s/o, I know her parents would have planned a beautiful affair, without going over the top. I would have trusted them without any hesitation. I cannot predict the future.
I feel pleased that I did a lovely luncheon Bar Mitzvah for my son, and a 50th anniversary for my parents, both at country club. I was in control of the details. Hard to admit, but I loved all the detail work. For example, for the Bar Mitzvah, my dad asked for 2 servers. I had a favorite Israeli salad that I brought to their staff, and they duplicated it. I chose an ice cream sundae bar but eliminated the cappuccino bar. Take home gifts were chocolate laptops and CD cases. My mom’s favorite flowers were included.
I guess it is hard to turn over control to,an unknown.
I was going through my mom’s financial papers and I came across the bill from my wedding reception circa 1979.
150 meals @ $6.50
150 toasts @ $0.40
With tax the entire meal was just over $1,000. Open bar was not customary in our area back then. The live band was also a bargain at around $400. Everyone had a great time. My parents hosted an after party at their home that went until 4AM. We still tell stories about that weekend.
Fast forward to 2015 - we wanted our DD to have a wedding to remember too. She did. It just cost a bit more.
I do think it is common for the bride and groom to pay for their own honeymoon and I have seen registries in which you can gift a donation to the honeymoon. Personally I think that is a bit tacky. If you cannot afford an expensive honeymoon don’t go on one, keep it simple. Friend of younger d who is getting married this summer was telling me about having to decide on which exotic location to to to… Bali, Fiji, Australia, safari in Africa and so on… the flights alone are a fortune,
When one of my friend’s sons got married, she was told by the bride’s father and stepmother that she and her husband were responsible and I am not making this acronym up… FLOPS… flowers, liquor, orchestra, photographer and as they are Orthodox, 2 shetels (wigs) for the bride. one for everyday and one for dress. Given that it is separate seating, flowers are only placed on the women’s tables, not the men. There isn’t any social dancing or mixed dancing so it is very specific orchestra that is needed.
I know i could do a fabulous dinner for 25-30, catered in my kitchen w/ wait staff, toasts, bar the whole she bang for not a ton of money…I’ve done it twice. Once for a couple we knew who got married (for the second time and that one included a tent in the backyard and a jazz trio) and once for my parents 50th wedding anniversary inside no live music. Frugal doesn’t have to be tacky and frugal doesn’t have to be low-brow. You just have to be good at pulling stuff like that together. I’ve got 4 sets for 12 of china, silver, glassware and linens that my H keeps trying to get me to sell to get it out of the house - you gotta do something with all of that. Too bad the boys don’t read this.
I wish I could cook. But that is not in my skill base. I can throw a heckuva party. But its only good if I make very little of the food personally. Can do appetizers, h’ors d’oevres and some desserts. Main courses-- nope.
old school traditional: rehersal dinner and flowers; groom pays for the honeymoon.
new school: come on folks, help out as much as you can. Most brides and grooms these days are not marching from graduation to the church next door for a wedding. Most are working adults and paying a lot themselves. But the wedding business has just gotten out of hand. Believe me, I know. I have all sons and my oldest and his fiancée are in the throes of wedding planning and my eyeballs are rolling out on the streets as I speak. I’ve already encouraged them to elope. =P~
Well, as a guilty fan of SYTTD, I say, it’s not responsible for over-the-top venues, destination weddings, bridal parties bigger than college football teams, pre-reception receptions, rehearsal dinners held at gourmet restaurants, catered morning-after-breakfasts or diamonds bigger than the Ritz. It’s just one tiny part of the insanity. Which you can later sell on Ebay.
Wow, my parents were very generous. They paid for everything, including the girls bridesmaids dresses and shoes and our honeymoon. Even an after reception party at our neighborhood clubhouse, until 4 in the morning. The only thing they didn’t pay was the rehearsal dinner. They were happy to do all this. I think 32 years ago it was around $15,000.
Now that I’m on this side, that just sounds so extravagant…but my Dad was really into appearances, so that was part of the reason.
I guess when it’s our turn, we will be fair as we see it.
My wedding was lopsided guest-wise, and H had about twice as many people attending (we were living in his home state, so all of my guests had to travel a distance and needed flights and hotels). We also had a much larger, more formal wedding than I would have had on my own - had envisioned a garden style wedding. MIL liked to do things a “certain way” - which was okay with with me, and the wedding was lovely but pretty over the top. Because of all this, H’s family very graciously paid the wedding catering bill, along with the rehearsal dinner. We paid for the venue, flowers, orchestra, programs, invitations, etc.
H also arranged and paid for the limos, which I thought was traditionally the groom’s responsibility? H arranged and paid for the honeymoon, not his parents - the details were kept secret from me until we got on the plane, which was very cute of H.
I love this approach, and it’s our plan with our two daughters for both college, weddings, etc. "Here is X dollars; do with it what you will. Just keep me in the loop (ie I want to go wedding dress shopping with them!)
Now it would be awesome if the eventual groom’s parents took the same tack. I’ll probably let them know how we roll and hope they want to roll in the same (or similar) direction.
@m0minmd I agree on SYTTD. Why do all of those folks need to see and have an opinion on your dress. I have two daughters, and I hope , if they get married, that we are the only ones going dress shopping, and perhaps a maid of honor. I like the tradition that no one sees the dress before the wedding.
At first blush I was like, oh, that’s horrible, what a skewing of priorities!
But then I thought about it for a moment and it makes sense. Most of us are not made of money. We have X saved for college, we have X saved for retirement and we have X saved for a rainy day (weddings, illness, etc).
It’s a finite amount. I think it’s practical to say to the kid(s) look, you eat up X for college and need more, you’re digging into what we have saved for a wedding and/or a downpayment on a house (I know older D would probably do a very tiny wedding and take most of the cash to put towards equity in a house. Younger D wants a blowout wedding in WDW).
I obsessively watch Say Yes To the Dress (especially the Atlanta version as I am a local), but it’s because I love dressmaking. I"m telling you, some of those dresses probably cost about $200 to make and they’re selling them for $5000. Some of the dresses are a good value in terms of material and labor cost, but it’s crazy what the markup is for them.
Veils are a straight-up ripoff 99% of the time. $1000 for some tulle and sparkle. OMG.
We tend to hit consignment shops for fancy dresses, and I’m hoping this behavior I’ve inculcated in the girls leads them to at least consider a consignment dress when they go looking. I wish I had consigned my $2500 (in 1993) Lazaro organza gown immediately after the wedding instead of dragging that enormous sucker with me all over the globe for the past 23 years :D. The girls have no interest in wearing it, and I certainly won’t wear it again (even though I still think it’s the most gorgeous dress I’ve ever seen). It cost me 30% of the entire wedding budget! ($7400). Young and very bad with money, I was.
I will definitely encourage them to consign their wedding dresses. Keep the veil-I’ll do a shadowbox of it with a big photograph of them, or something artistic along those lines.
So much of wedding styles depend not only on budget but community/culture but even age of the bride and groom. DD is in her first year of medical school, fiancé in grad school. They are young and incredibly busy. It’s up to me to plan the whole wedding, I get occasional feedback. It’ll be a large, traditional wedding which they wanted. Our community tradition includes the whole shebang. Although we tried to stay within budget, expenses crop up that we weren’t expecting. Fortunately this is something we can do without too much discomfort, although as she is the first of three girls, we know we will have to repeat this two more times. I agree it’s a joyous event we want to share with our friends and family.
No offspring weddings in sight, but I’m really enjoying this thread! I catch “4 Weddings” on occassion at the fitness center during my elliptical workout. The over-the-top-ness of some of these weddings and the cost(!) keeps me charged up for the entire workout session!
I was married in my late 20s with Hubby a bit older. We’d been working and self-sufficient for years. We picked up most of the costs for our modest affair ourselves. We were married in the city where we lived and worked which was not the in the area either of us was raised. It wouldn’t have occurred to us to ask for or expect big parental contributions, but both sets of parents expected and wanted to take on some of the “traditional” costs. My parents paid for the reception dinners (with limits on the per plate $$$ firmly, but appropriately stated) and DH’s family paid for a lovely rehearsal dinner that included all out of town relatives and special friends as well as bridal party. These costs were well within bounds for the respective parents’ bank accounts.
I guess given my experience, I’d be very comfortable gifting some funds to be used as the couple wishes. I certainly hope I don’t have to deal with a situation where the parents of the “other half” has different expectations for my contribution. That could be difficult!
@alwaysamom I know thats a part of the show. My point is now with brides not on the show, everyone expects to go dress shopping. I would like that to be a special moment with my daughter and me, and perhaps a maid of honor, not inlaws, etc.
(ie I want to go wedding dress shopping with them!)