Weddingbee boards

Bees! In exactly two weeks from today, I'm getting married. Everything was rolling along fine until Thursday. Now I want to scream and cry and elope!

First, I got some gross chest cold that day, and have only been slowly recovering. Next, the day-of coordinator I hired back in December has been MIA. I found her through the WB Classifieds (Bees - if sounds too good to be true, it probably is!), and all seemed fine until she stopped responding to my emails a week and a half ago. She was already paid in full too. So here I am, with no money left really to hire someone else, and no DOC. Then, my mother refuses both to tell someone she insisted on inviting at the last minute that it was inappropriate of this guest's mother & her b/f to invite themselves (long story), and to follow up with another person she invited who hadn't returned the RSVP. WTF? But it keeps getting better...

So then I emailed both sets of parents this past Thursday with our final count, final guest list, final menu, upgrades, etc for their review/sign off, and said I would be submitting everything to venue on Saturday (yesterday), as our final headcount is due today. I requested that they look over everything and basically "speak now or forever hold your piece." Everyone wrote back or called saying everything looks good. So I hit "send" yesterday afternoon and off the final headcount went. I will add that our venue is a great deal for what it is, but they do make almost everything an upgrade or extra charge, so the package you get is pretty basic for low cost. Which is fine. We were initially thinking we were going to have closer to 140 people, but now that RSVPs are all in, we're having a little over 100. Based on our original estimate of 140, my FH and I prioritized what extras we wanted to add, even had a few on reserve in case a lot of people did decline. All of which was communicated to both sets of parents. But in the end, despite having fewer people than we thought, we kept things pretty much the same just on the principle of not spending money unncessarily. My mom is contributing to about 50% of the cost of the wedding, and my FH's parent's offered to contribute about 25-30%. The whole time, my mom has been constantly saying what she would prefer to have or do at the wedding. I have politely declined what we didn't want (often having to do it several times) or ignored her altogether. It has been incredibly frustrating at times, especially considering she's never been married before, and never asks me or says something in a way that sounds like a suggestion ("Have you thought about this?" or "What do you think about that?") - just "Well I would do this," or "I want to do that." She has never asked what my vision is or how I am planning to do something, only offered unsolicited opinions. FH's parents, on the other hand (who live in Maine), who we have tried to loop in as much as possible, have never once questioned our decisions or demanded we do anything. They simply said they'd contribute x amount of money to whatever we needed. And both of FH's younger sisters are married so they've been through 2 weddings already!

So this morning I get a text from my mom asking if we can add cocktail service. I wasn't sure what she was asking for, and she wrote back saying tableside cocktail service. Which by the way, the venue charges an extra $5/person for, and we are already paying +$5/person for there to be wine at guests' tables. And I've never been to a wedding where you didn't have to go the bar to get a cocktail. So the rest of the text conversation went something like this:

Me: Oh. No-don't need that. I think it's too late to add anyway.

Mom: You can still add on and it would just be nice for people not to have to get up to for something to drink if they are not having wine.

Me: No, not interested.

Mom: Not nice.

Me: I don't think it's worth paying extra for.

Mom: But it's my money.

Me: When you have a wedding, you can get as many extras and upgrades as you want. But my FH & I are very happy with what we have decided to get.

Mom: No need to be rude! And fresh!

The conversation went on from there, and rapidly deterioriated to the point where she canceled dinner plans on us tonight. This is the problem of having text conversations to begin with - everything is open to interpretation. There was not a drop of rudeness behind what I said - I was simply making a point that she was forcing something that I had already TWICE said no to. I think anything I would have said in response to "But it's my money" that wasn't "ok sure" would have been construed as rude by her. But would you have taken that as being rude? Am I totally off-base here? Yes, I'm sure I could have said something else, but I am already super stressed about this DOC bailing on me, being sick and having a ton of stuff to do, and at this point I'm so tired of her telling me what I should and shouldn't do and what she does and doesn't want. I'm two weeks away from my wedding! My FH and I have spent hours (literally) discussing the merits of added services and upgrades, and have made peace with our decision, which is what I conveyed to her. If hadn't said the bit about us being happy with what we've already chosen, yes, I might have taken the first part as rude. Ugh. UGH!!! The last thing I need to be dealing with rihgt now!

Sorry for the long rant bees! Thanks for listening!

Mrs. Grape is totally correct.  Since the OP's mother is paying for 50% of the wedding, she does have a say.  Sorry, but that's just the way it is.  If you don't want someone else's input, then pay for it all yourself. 

That being said, what the mother is requesting sounds like an additional cost not included in the original budget, so I do think the OP is right in saying she doesn't want it - unless her mother is willing to contribute more money. 

thanks y'all! believe me i totally appreciate everything my mom has contributed financially to this point. but i think having "a" say is different than having the final say. and if she were paying for the whole wedding, it would be a different story altogether. but as i said, both my FH and his parents are paying the balance. but both she and FH's parents are contributing to the venue costs, food, etc., so i feel like we are allowed to ultimately disagree with her. especially since this a last minute request, and yes, this is an add-on that was not in our original budget at all. as i said, we were very clear with our parents months ago what extras we wanted and what we might want to add in the future if our numbers came down, and this was not on either list. i also gave them a deadline for making changes (basically friday night), and i got my mom's request this morning. you can see my frustration here...

also, my mom has been given ample opportunities to give input. she paid the difference of the cost of my dress and what i budgeted (~$500), and she came on several appointments with me to select it and we ultimately got something we both liked. she came with us on 90% of our venue visits back when we were choosing a place, and to the tastings offered by our venue. we sent her the final menu selection for her ok before sending it to the caterer months ago. she contributed to selecting the wines for the evening. she's paying for hair & makeup and came to my trials and ultimately i'm going with the people she is most comfortable with (our regular hair person & his team). so she's been pretty involved. i just feel like not taking no for answer, particularly for a last-minute request, is a little ridiculous!

ahhhhhh!

Thanks Miss. Snowball. I wish my mom was more like your parents and my FH's parents. They were just happy that we are getting married in the first place, and wanted to help out how and wherever it was needed.

@ Squeak - yes, i really want to try to let it go. i have really not been anywhere near a bridezilla throughout this whole process - a year and half in all - and i have been generally very accommodating, calm and easy-going. i just can't tolerate being imposed upon anymore! i know at the end of the day it's going to be great, and i'm trying to keep my perspective.

@ RR - totally get that this wedding is a reflection on her too. but as you'll see below, i think we're already making this party pretty damn great for the people who are coming. the invitations, for those that care, are bride & groom inviting with both sets of parents, since we are all contributing. (when i sent the invite copy to everyone for proofing - i.e. spelling & grammar errors - she even went as far as suggesting that the parents' names be as big as ours. i didn't ask for design suggestions, but thanks). and i included the detail that she's never been married or planned a wedding before because she thinks she's an expert and is constantly throwing her opinions at me about what she thinks is supposed to happen and what should not. sure she's been to a couple of weddings before, and that's valid experience. but don't me tell how you think it's a terrible idea that i am not having my bridesmaids get the same color dress and from the same store (yes, she said that). i feel like the entire time we have been planning this wedding (and in my life, in general), she always second-guesses and does not respect my decisions.  i don't wear nice enough clothes. i didn't go to law school. i'm marrying a white guy (don't even get me started on that one). but you know what? i'm happy. i have no regrets at all.

we really really really wanted to pay for everything ourselves for this EXACT reason, but i kid you not, my mom *insisted* on contributing. i turned her down twice. you see a pattern here, no? but she lives in fear of looking cheap, which is why she wants to throw in all this extra stuff. yet, she thinks that a DOC (which, you'll notice, she isn't offering to pay for) and providing guest transportation to/from the hotel and venue are complete wastes of money. i didn't argue the point with her and i didn't throw "it's my money and i'm paying for it" back in her face at the time. in any case, i think we've thrown in plenty of extras for our guests at this point: we're inviting all of the out-of-towners to the rehearsal dinner, we're doing 10 passed hors d's instead of eight, adding an extra station to cocktail hour and doing an extra dessert thing (besides just cake), 2 specialty cocktails, and our guests are being served wine at their tables. somehow, i don't think people will see not being served cocktails at their tables as cheap. and we've already been promised by the venue that immediate family and wedding party will be totally taken care of so it's not like any of our people will have to go back and forth to the bar! i think it's silly to waste $500 for a total bonus for our guests (which they won't miss) at this point, when there's $500 needed to hire a DOC who will actually show up and do their job so guests and family alike can just show up and enjoy the day. 

on the DOC front, my communications with her had been fairly inconsistent for some time, so i should have pulled the plug much sooner. i wrote her a "if you are still committed to doing this, please reply by 6pm today to confirm" email on thursday, and did not get a response. so i wrote and gave her the official axe on friday. that same day, some potential replacements were asking what her name & company's name was, so i went to double check her website and it says "website disabled". convenient... i should have done my due diligence and asked for references (though she probably could have come up with fake people, seeing how things turned out). but we live and learn.

@ courtney - this a total extra. like really was not even in the original budget AT ALL. this was not discussed with me or my fiance until TODAY. i could understand if we had said it was on the "possible" list all along and she had already planned to pay for it, and then we were like, no not gonna do it, without any explanation. that is not the case. it came out of the blue, less than 24 hrs ago. she asked me if we could add it, i said no, i didn't really think it was worth it the extra money, and that should have been the end of it.

@ courtney - nope. total add-on. demanding i accept it just because she's offering to pay for it and because it would be a nice convenience. sorry, but i don't think our guests need any more conveniences (see my list above). and she was with me when we had the meeting at the venue when they told both of us that the wedding party/family would be taken care of. sadly, i don't have a dad (never been in the picture), but i wonder what he would think of all this... hahaha.

ironically, her horoscope on facebook today said: Don't get too upset over any conflicts that come up. You may be making a mountain out of a molehill.

hmmm.... validation :)

thanks for the support Lee Ann.