Regrets

[FrekeChild]

What do you regret about your wedding?

Would you do the big wedding instead of eloping/small wedding or eloping/small wedding instead of a big one?

Would you invite different people? Have different people be in your bridal party?

What would you do differently if you do have a redo?

 

[violet3]

Good thread Freke! I clearly don't have any regrets (as i am yet to be married as well) but i am interested to hear the responses!

EDIT: hey, what's the status on your reset? i didn't miss it did i?

 

[Dannielle]

Well, I am not even married yet- but if I were to do it differently from our plans now, I would have a destination wedding.

Just FI and I in paradise somewhere.. *dreams*

 

[FrekeChild]

Date: 4/27/2009 10:00:03 PM
Author: violet3
EDIT: hey, what''s the status on your reset? i didn''t miss it did i?

You haven''t missed it. I''m going to call the jeweler tomorrow, unless he calls me first. Should be any day now though!

(Keep your fingers crossed that I get it by our anniversary--May 5th--we''re going on a special date and everything!)

 

[decodelighted]

I was just thinking about this today ... nearly three years later. I kinda wish we''d gotten the Arbor I''d wanted & then placed it in our yard afterward so we''d always have a bit of where we got married right here. It was mostly a budget decision (so much adds up at the last minute) ... but also when we were planning at the site there was such a pretty tree that made a perfect backdrop that we though maybe an arbor AND tree might be overkill -- or not flow together. Plus we''d have probably wanted to decorate the arbor then & that would have increased our nearly non-existent flower budget. A snowball, if you will.

Its not so much that I wish the setting had been different at the *time* ... I just kinda want that arbor NOW. Does that make sense?

I think that''s my only "iffy" potentially regretful thing.

 

[CDNinNYC]

Well, I'm not married yet either but I'm starting to regret going with a DW in Mexico right now.

At this point, (with 4 weeks to go) I don't know what the status of our wedding is. I'm reading horror stories online of mexican DWs being cancelled because all the guests bailed.

Another thing I regret is not getting wedding insurance.

I've always wanted to do a small intimate DW, but a big, traditional wedding in my home-town is sounding really good right about now.

 

[White Orchid]

I don''t regret anything. If I had to do it over again I wouldn''t change a thing! Thank you MIL for all your help!

 

[luckystar112]

I loved my DW and would absolutely do it again.....but I do have one regret:

You may remember that my cousin and her husband got married the day before us.
Make that ex-husband.
Their divorce was final earlier this week.

They hadn''t even been married a year (although they were together for nine). It just makes it sort of weird for DH and I since all four us had SUCH great time in Jamaica and we spent so much time together. Now it just kind of feels like something we aren''t supposed to talk about anymore, if that makes sense.

So even though we didn''t get married on the exact same day, so much of our DW week involved them. As much fun as we had (and it was a blast) I kind of wish we would have done it a different week/different place.

 

[violet3]

Date: 4/27/2009 10:04:37 PM
Author: FrekeChild

Date: 4/27/2009 10:00:03 PM
Author: violet3
EDIT: hey, what''s the status on your reset? i didn''t miss it did i?

You haven''t missed it. I''m going to call the jeweler tomorrow, unless he calls me first. Should be any day now though!

(Keep your fingers crossed that I get it by our anniversary--May 5th--we''re going on a special date and everything!)

Oh goodie! fingers crossed for sure - can''t wait to see it!

 

[Camille]

*Too many people, didn''t know many, ok at the time [I was a kid] ask me now? lol
*Didn''t mind the size, since I didn''t pay for it, my MIL/FIL had ''priorities'' and paid for them, I still wouldn''t elope, but just family/close
friends would''ve been nice.
*Wouldn''t change the bridal party, my sister is my best friend, DH''s twin brother, and our true friends matter lots to us [6 total]
*I wouldn''t redo a thing, I was blessed with a loving FIL [w/o girls, 5 boys] felt ''adopted'' when we first met, we both got what we
wanted.

 

[newbie124]

Well, first of all, I''ll say that what I DON''T regret is taking a risk and changing up the plans to have a "destination" wedding in Napa rather than marrying in Chicago. And I''m so glad we didn''t let other people try to talk us out of it b/c there are so many great things I''ll remember about our wedding specifically because of the location (not to mention the weekend we probably would have held it in Chicago, it would''ve rained all weekend!)

I do regret leaving a lot of little things to the last minute and also stressing about some small things that in the end didn''t make that big of a deal (like trying to find the right boxes for my BM gifts, which I ultimately just put in gift bag ) b/c I really didn''t have any chance to relax leading up to the wedding. I think the only time I wasn''t occupied with "planning" was when I was getting my makeup done. I did let myself have that half hour to just sit back and be pampered.

One of my biggest regrets was not initially sending a Save the Date to a college friend of mine. I initially hadn''t invited him b/c we hadn''t talked in awhile and we were expecting more of our original invites to make it. Then when we started getting a lot of declines, I contacted him to see if he''d like to/be able to come. This was only about 1-1.5 weeks after the real invites went out and even though he lives in the same state, he just wasn''t able to find someone to cover for him at the hospital that weekend so he wasn''t able to make it. He felt really bad about it, but I felt worse for waiting until the last minute to invite him. Especially when there were others we HAD invited who gave the impression they would come only to spaz out and decline w/ no explanation or apology or anything. If I could do everything over again, I would think harder about some of the people who we invited and not second guess people who I really would have liked to have had but didn''t think we could initially accommodate.

I regret that our rental linens were lost and now I have to try to confront the hotel about reimbursing us for the replacement fees!! Unfortunately I don''t think there''s anything we could''ve done differently, though, to have prevented that

I also ever so slightly regret not just getting our marriage license out in CA. We went to our local court house this weekend to make it official, but the whole experience was very "administrative" and sterile (we don''t have a beautiful City Hall like SF) and the complete opposite of our wedding celebration in CA that it just left me with kind of an odd feeling. I guess the main thing going for it was the novelty factor in addition to being slightly more convenient.

Finally, one small thing is that if I could go back I might have requested that the DJ play at least one or two more slow dance songs during the course of the night rather than just as the last dance. Don''t get me wrong, he was actually GREAT and played an awesome set (people kept telling us what a great job they did), but I think b/c it was fast dance songs for pretty much 2 hrs straight, people would get tired and leave the dance floor to take a break and then it was hard to round people back up again. I was also dying for a break but felt like I had to keep dancing to keep other people there...not to mention, he was just playing some great songs that were too hard to pass up dancing to

Oh, yeah, and I also regret that my stupid cousin had to start up all that family drama over petty stuff that didn''t even concern her. But I probably couldn''t have really done much about that either.

Ultimately, though, there are far more things that I''m so happy about and wouldn''t have changed for anything...and also things that I didn''t initially expect or had some worries about that in the end turned out fine and perfect and beautiful. So really, if I could go back again knowing how things would have turned out, I would just try to RELAX and try not to get as stressed out about things that ended up being totally fine in the end

 

[jstarfireb]

I have a few. Halfway through my planning, when my mom got really involved, the wedding started to morph into her idea of a good wedding rather than mine. So most of my regrets are tied into letting my mom get too involved. For example, the size of the guest list (final head count is 120 when I wanted 50-75), the exponentially increasing expense (I wanted to keep it under $10k, but since the parents decided to pay, the cost started spiraling out of control), and a couple of minor bits involving decorations, food, etc. She also threw me a "surprise" bridal shower when I specifically asked not to have a shower at all, but particularly not to hide it from me. And she was also what led me toward changing my dress for one I don''t like as much. She saw it and told FI how "ugly" it was, which led to our search for a new one.

All of this has definitely made me regret not doing a DW or City Hall elopement.

 

[choro72]

I''m so lucky I actually do get to redo our wedding. I will

-request financial assistance from FI''s parents
-delegate more assignments to my friends and family
-tell people that they are NOT invited
-look for a smaller location
-cut more guests if necessary
-practice saying NO, NO, NO, and NO

 

[BigDiamonds]

I''m not married yet, but I''m getting close (6 weeks, yikes!), and I can say without hestiation that my biggest regret is allowing someone to do me a "favor". It''s just not worth it when it comes to a wedding. I didn''t get what I wanted when I wanted it, and the fact that I paid slightly less for it didn''t make it all right. Maybe for some brides it''s not a big deal, but it was a huge source of stress/aggravation for me.

I also would have been more realistic about what I wanted and what it would cost. I''m the sad kind of person who feels really deprived when I don''t get exactly what I want, and that means the catering budget, flower budget, dress budget, etc. all got stretched because I had that one thing I had to have. I should have been more realistic upfront so I could have saved/budgeted for it.

 

[doodle]

BAH! My bridesmaids! Huge regret for me there. From age 8 or so onward, I''ve had the same two best friends, but when we graduated, one of them went away to college, and we somewhat drifted although we were still close, while the other girl and I wound up living together, still best buds, etc. I wound up not asking the first girl to be a bridesmaid because I didn''t feel we were as close as we used to be, and I did ask the second. The first girl was extremely hurt by it, but we have since repaired our friendship and are closer than ever now (she just asked me to be a bridesmaid in her upcoming wedding). The second girl, who I considered to be my best friend in the world up until all the drama that went on throughout my engagement, showed zero interest in the whole thing, her only contribution whatsoever as a bridesmaid was grabbing me a pack of crackers from the gas station on the way to the venue the morning of the wedding, and she bailed on all the other pre-wedding stuff (showers, etc.). We don''t even speak to each other anymore. I regret trusting my father when he said he''d pay for our pictures because it''s been over 6 months, and we still don''t have a wedding album but can''t afford to pay it on our own. I also regret my dress only because it was just too big to be altered properly, so the chest was huge even after it had been taken in as much as it possibly could be. And I''m not even going to let myself get started on the BS treatment we got from the people who ran our venue!

Let''s just say I''m disgruntled! Everything else was fabo, though--LOVED our photographer, florist, caterer, and DJ immensely!

 

[JSM]

I wish I would have been more forward with the woman altering my dress. And I wish I would have ordered it in a smaller size (somehow, even though I ordered it the correct size, it came HUGE and disproportionate). So after alternations, which the lady didn''t listen to what I WANTED, it didn''t look like it should have. And that''s my biggest regret by far. I thought when I ordered it I had found my dream dress, but the manufacturer didn''t make it to the correct measurements, and the alterations changed the way the dress laid, and I felt more like a blob than a gorgeous bride. Bah.

Thankfully it didn''t bother me that day, but looking at the pictures? It really really does.

But eloping just the two of us? Wouldn''t change a thing. It was one of the best days of my life.

 

[katamari]

Our after-the-fact reception is turning much more "wedding" and much more of a production than I ever thought it would. I am totally okay with all of this now, but I could see this becoming a regret if it gets much further away from what we initially wanted or turns traditional.

I currently regret spending more than we anticipated spending--on dang near everything. It was important for me to have something people consider nice and fun without it costing a fortune (A "Take that, wedding-industrial-complex!" kind of thing). Our actual budget is double what I wanted it to be (though I quickly noticed in planning that my ideal budget wouldn''t even cover the cost of the tent and rentals). We are still coming in significantly less than most budgets, so I will just have to deal with it. Plus, with the parents paying, it is hard to tell them they can''t get things they want because of cost (though I wish I could).

I also regret how I told my closest friend about the wedding plans for the actual ceremony. Since we are getting married in Ecuador, I thought I was doing her a favor by not having BM. So, I made a joke about how I am saying her a ton of stress, planning, and money by only having immediate family for the ceremony. She really wanted to be a BM and it hurt her. She has become really snippy and hurtful about it (calling me selfish, making a ton of comments to others), in a way that has damaged our friendship. I will never know if I could have avoided that by just framing it better or if she is being a brat.

 

[wannaBMrsH]

I am not married yet, either, (will be in August) and I don't have regrets (yet) as much as a new resentment. It is not really a regret and I had no control over it, but I really wish FI had proposed sooner. The reason that this REALLY upsets me is that we were planning our wedding without actually being engaged and as I am sure everyone here knows, NOBODY takes you seriously when you aren't actually engaged! The result is that by the time we were finally engaged, so were about 6 other very close couples and I didn't realize how much they really weren't prepared for our destination wedding (even though we told them!).

As a result, most of my friends aren't coming to the wedding and you can really see the financial lopsidedness of our circle of friends. Most of FI's friends are not only coming to our wedding, they are flying first class, upgrading their suites, staying extra days, etc. and most of my friends aren't even going to be able to make it. One of my oldest friends (13 years) is getting married this weekend in her future inlaws backyard and is taking a weekend long honeymoon locally. With the expense of her wedding, she definitely can't make the trip to our wedding. Another is a teacher who is getting married next month and believe it or not, she just got laid off! so she's not coming... It's really starting to get to me.

On the one hand, I am excited that we have confirmed 40 people at our wedding with 3 months still left to go, but on the other...I really resent that so few of my friends won't make it simply because they didn't count on our wedding because we weren't even engaged six months ago!

 

[Mediterranean]

Date: 4/27/2009 10:00:06 PM
Author: Dannielle
Well, I am not even married yet- but if I were to do it differently from our plans now, I would have a destination wedding.


Just FI and I in paradise somewhere.. *dreams*

OOOOOH, YES YES YES YES. God, Dannielle, DO IT! Yours isn''t til December... Mine is on My 29 and all is paid for, but OMG, if I could do it all over I would do EXACTLY what you say n the post: DW, just me and FI......Oh, do it. I wish I could.....

 

[Hudson_Hawk]

I regret asking one BM in particular to be in the bridal party. She and I were close friends and sorority sisters in college and we remained close after school. She lives near where FI and I got engaged and we had dinner with her and her husband the night after we got engaged. I got so caught up in the moment that I asked her to be in the wedding. She and I were close at the time so it wasn''t a big deal, but a month or two later she fell off the face of the earth. She''s super hard to get in touch with and rarely tries to contact me or any of our other friends. I know I''m not the only one she''s done this to, she''s in another friend''s wedding and is MIA with her as well. I wish I hadn''t asked her to be in the wedding because I feel like she has so much going on that she doesn''t have time or the desire to be a part of my day. I haven''t asked her to step down because she''s still someone I consider a good friend and its easier to just avoid the confrontation (esp since I''m only 2.5 months away).

 

[NewEnglandLady]

I wish I'd kept a closer eye on my husband--my family are what you might call "heavy drinkers" and my husband had never had a shot in his life, so I don't think anybody realized what kind of damage multiple shots might do to him...until I found him pantless and draped over the toilet after returning home from taking my BIL to the emergency room. Oh, that's another thing: I wish I hadn't had to go to the emergency room after my BIL thought he broke his leg (I was the only one who didn't have anything to drink on my wedding night, so I was the designated driver). I don't regret these things for my sake, I find them both pretty funny (we found out my BIL just bruised his knee after 4 hours in the ER), but my husband and BIL both still feel awful about the night and I wish they didn't.

I wish I'd let my Dad make a toast. I'm close to him, but he's not mushy and I didn't want for him to feel like he had to say mushy things in front of the entire family just because I was getting married. He started to make one, but I said "No toasts!" so that he didn't feel like he had to. I'm sure it would have been very sweet and probalby something I would have always remembered, but in the end it just looked like I refused his toast. Bah.

 

[LadyBlue]

Date: 4/27/2009 10:09:36 PM
Author: CDNinNYC
Well, I''m not married yet either but I''m starting to regret going with a DW in Mexico right now.

At this point, (with 4 weeks to go) I don''t know what the status of our wedding is. I''m reading horror stories online of mexican DWs being cancelled because all the guests bailed.


Another thing I regret is not getting wedding insurance.


I''ve always wanted to do a small intimate DW, but a big, traditional wedding in my home-town is sounding really good right about now.

I''m sorry for you, a month is a lot of time, I''m sure by then things are going to be better and you will love your weddings

 

[tlh]

Regrets. I don''t regret my wedding, because all I ever really wanted was the marriage.

Our wedding was for our parents, and we made a LOT of concessions. I think the only part of my wedding that was at all MY CHOICE was the colors, and the groom. We wanted a small intimate outdoor affair, and ended up w/ a hotel wedding and reception. I think the part that makes me so sad, is knowing how much money was spent on something the bride and groom didn''t want.

But oh well. Honestly if I had it all to do over again, the only thing I would change was my own behavior. I was soo stressed out all day long, and was so worried about being appropriate and manners. (Our photog ran long on the post ceremony shots, and I had to spend HALF of the reception doing a table greet of the guests, since I didn''t get the receiving line... stupid *$*@#*$*%@* photog!) So if I could, and I was stuck w/ all the same pieces, I''d just have changed ME. I''d have tried to relax, and enjoy myself. Spend more time w/ my family, and not worrying about meeting people (IE MIL''S outrageous guest list that took up more tables than my own family! CRAZY!) that I would never in my life see again or care about. Seriously! I say that, but then I guess I''d have to deal w/ the aftermath of my MIL by being rude to her guests. So, I guess nothing, since I don''t own a refurbished delorian.

 

[musey]

What do you regret about your wedding?
I regret not being able to eat... the food looked soooo good but I had no appetite and couldn''t enjoy it at all.

Would you do the big wedding instead of eloping/small wedding or eloping/small wedding instead of a big one?
I''d love to be able to experience both, really, but since I could only have had one I''m glad it was just like it was.

Would you invite different people? Have different people be in your bridal party?
I''d have invited a few more friends... I cut the wrong people, and didn''t figure that out until it was too late (since the time between finalizing the guest list and wedding day was about a year). I wouldn''t change our bridal party for anything, and I hope I''ll always feel that way - that was how we chose our BP, we wanted to to be sure to choose people we were sure to still be happy to have in our wedding pics 10/25/50 years from now.

What would you do differently if you do have a redo?
Other than aforementioned guest list changes, I might''ve gone destination, but realistically I don''t think I''d change a thing

 

[brightstone]

My regret is that I would have done it at 632onhudson.com rather than at my brother''s house in the Hamptons. We thought it would be cheaper to have a venue with no fee (pretty garden, etc) but the costs of the tent are CRAZY!! The tent alone is $4500 at this point. Yikes! I fell in love with 632onhudson when I saw it and sided with my brother when he said there was no one room big enough to house everyone for dinner so it would have to be more of a cocktail reception or people would have to be divided into two rooms. I just fell in love with that place though...it''s so unique and quirky.

 

[Sabine]

If I had a chance to redo it, I''d probably do it where I''m currently living instead of my home town and try to do it much smaller. But a lot of the decisions we made were due to our situation (family, finacial, etc.) and there still isn''t much I could do to change that stuff so it would end up pretty similar.

HOWEVER, I do really wish I could zip back in time and tell past me to clarify 2 things that I think would have made a big difference...1. My florist. I wanted a small bouquet. Not for budget reasons, but for taste reasons. I thought I was clear, but I guess she wanted to make the most of our budget, and it was way tooooo huge. And 2. The DJ - I would have really clarified our playlist and DO NOT PLAY LIST. I had only told him "no line dances, silly dances like the electric slide, etc." and assumed he got that I meant all dances like that, and he played almost all of them to my extreme annoyance.

 

[lulu]

I really didn''t have a wedding. My mom was dying and she wouldn''t let go because she wanted to see me get married. We put it all together in an evening and married in her hospital room with each of us holding one of her hands. She died two hours later. We meant to have a reception but it never felt right.It''s been 15 years and I have never regretted it.
But I do love to come here and look at the beautiful dresses.

 

[Maisie]

I would have made is smaller and more intimate with less fuss and a better photographer.

 

[Gypsy]

Not saying "F---- it all, let''s go to Vegas" at the three month mark and figured a way to get grandpa there and our photographer to take pics in Vegas. I loved my wedding. But my wedding day was just about the only day 3 months before and 3 months after that I was healthy, happy and whole. 6 months was too much to sacrifice for one day.

 

[anchor31]

Eloping would have been great (it was what I wanted), but we had a wonderful wedding so I don''t really regret it. I wish I''d had a better seamstress for alterations, my dress did fit me as well as I would have liked.

But the only thing I would really change if we got a do-over is our officiant. He wasn''t bad per say, but we had no way of personalizing our ceremony. He just took over and did his thing, we had no say except the music and readings. Blah.