Gimme
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Another "Sponsor my wedding because we're poor and
have no family" web site!
http://mywebpages.comcast.net/aom42/main.html
I know a bride-to-be that created a web site to keep friends and family
posted on the details of the wedding (which is a very nice idea). But, the
site is non-stop awful. She posted photos of herself in the wedding dress,
even though the wedding is months away. And, here’s an actual quote from
the site...right at the top of the page...in HUGE letters:
"Registered at: Target Gift Registry - [link to online registry] Wal-Mart
Gift Registry - [link to online registry] Amazon.com Gift Registry - [link
to online registry]
No gift registries at Sears - but it's Bob's favorite store! Feel free
to get gift cards from them for us!"
Note: To top it off, the registries included not one, but TWO deep fat
fryers. And, nose hair trimmers! Yuck.
Gimme0206-04
Here's one for the Mail Bag. It just pissed me off a bit... I was on
the way home from a big shopping trip, pulled into a small strip mall
because it had my bank and I needed to pay into my credit card. I just
happened to glance at a nearby window, and blinked. It was a travel
agency, and in big pink lettering on the window, it said (paraphrasing)
"Bridal Services here! Wedding Registries available!" And we
wonder where brides get the idea of registering for vacations. UGH! It's
not right to take advantage of clueless, innocent brides, in my opinion.
And it's not right to perpetrate the evil with more experienced ones who
should know better! I won't be visiting that store. (a threat that would
have more fangs if I wasn't a starving student, but oh well :)
Gimme0302-04
I was surprised when I received a "save the date" note for
the wedding of a woman whom I knew only slightly through friends, but we
had always gotten along well and I wished her all the best in her
marriage. I was doubly surprised to be invited to her shower, but I
attended with a smile and a very nice gift. Then we received the wedding
invitation. It included all the specifics of the ceremony, but then just a
sentence that said "a reception for immediate family will follow the
service." At this point, I suspected a shakedown was going on...
When we got to the wedding, a big gift table was right at the church
entrance. After the ceremony, most of us were simply sent on our way -- no
coffee, no cake, absolutely nothing. Bad enough, right? The kicker was a
few weeks later, when the bride sent out a mass email thanking all the
guests for coming. She attached pictures to the email, most of which were
of the reception! Where there were apparently dozens of people, a live
band, champagne, and a beautiful cake!
Evidently the couple's wedding plan was to invite everyone they'd ever
met to the shower and the ceremony -- which the bride and groom didn't
have to pay for, naturally -- to maximize the profit. Then only the people
they actually cared about were invited to the reception. I can't imagine
what possessed them to send us all the pictures, though. Did they want to
rub in our faces that we got conned?
Gimme0303-04
I have a friend who is got married about four months ago. It was
her third marriage, and she already has several children by different
fathers. Despite this, she wanted to do the "big, white,
formal" thing. After many conversations, myself and several
other friends convinced her that such a wedding was inappropriate for her
situation. Finally, she calls me and says she has decided to have a
"Vegas" theme wedding instead. Sounds great right? Wrong!
Bridezilla decides that since Vegas is all about money, a Vegas-themed
wedding should be all about money too. Not only did she ask for money in
the invitations, she had a "Casino Manager" at the door of the
reception charging entrance fees! There was also a "wishing
well" made up to look like a slot machine, and instead of the
standard forks clinking on the glass to get the bride and groom to kiss,
one had to shoot "Craps" with a $5 minimum!
However, the
Bridesmaids got the worst treatment of all. Thank God I was not a
bridesmaid, because after the ceremony the bride made them all put on
these HUGE and incredibly ugly "showgirl" headdresses made out
of feathers. It was about a month AFTER the wedding that I found our
she had bought those awful things for $20 each but had charged her
bridesmaids $100 each! She justified this by saying it was a huge
"pain" to store the headdresses in her house!
Gimme0304-04
I am the above mentioned wicked stepmother. I raised my stepson
since he was four. I just received an invitation to a baby shower
for his wife.
Some background: *It is their second baby. I thought showers were for
firsts only. They had a tremendously garish shower for their first, who is
now three.
*They also had a garish "Bridal" shower although the
"bride" was already married with a two-year old.
*They leave me out of everything in their lives (holidays, etc.) unless
it means they can collect a gift from me.
*They had a huge wedding a YEAR after they were actually married, and
asked me to help pay for it. 95% of the invitees were from the
bride's side, and the wedding was merely an attempt to extort gifts of
cash from her father's business associates.
*The invitation came today and the shower is on Saturday. *This is
another example of greed, pandering for gifts, and general low-class
mentality. *No one who sent a gift for the first baby (including my 80
year old mother) received a thank you note or phone call.
I am left to ask: Should I politely decline the invitation and send a
gift? Politely decline the invitation and not send a gift? Change my
weekend plans, show up and choke on my quiche and in-laws? Comment upon
the short notice? Ignore them altogether?
Gimme0210-04
I have a huge problem with people who include registry information in
their wedding invitations. As far as I am concerned, that is Etiquette
101! This particular incident takes the cake, however. My friend
"Loralai" always had a track record for being somewhat tacky, so
while still shaking my head, I was not terribly surprised when she
included her registry info. in her invites. I must say I was shocked when
I received another envelope from her about a month before the wedding:
"As we have such generous friends, most of the items on our
registries have already been purchased for us. We have taken the liberty
of registering for more gifts, so if you looked up our registry and found
few things available, I urge you all the look again, as the lists are
updated! Thanks!" I bit my tongue through that wedding but I started
avoiding her afterwards. I just could not surround myself with such an
incredibly tacky person!
Gimme0730-03
My husband and I attended a wedding for a friend and co-worker of his.
The wedding invitations asked for cash gifts to help fund their honeymoon.
Tacky, but if that's what they really want, OK. We obediently gave them a
check for fifty dollars. Other people didn't agree with this request and
gave gifts much to the ire of the bride.
At the reception that followed,
the bride insisted for a "cash dance". All male guests were
expected to pay the bride $5.00 for the privilege of dancing with the bride
and all male guests were "asked" to participate. Susie would
allow one turn around the floor per participant. She even made her father
pay. After complaining about the number of gifts that they received that
weren't money, she proceeded to collect only the envelopes and refused to
open any wrapped gifts saying she would later return all of them. How rude
of these idiots to not heed her desire for cash. When she began opening
the envelopes she became very angry that most contained checks and not
cash. "I can't believe these stupid people think I will be able to
spend their checks on my honeymoon. Any moron knows the bank holds
personal checks for ten days!" She also complained about the
amounts. "25.00 Why bother!" I retrieved our check for 50.00,
tore it up in front of her and said, "You can't spend it anyway so
why bother." The marriage lasted only 1 year. The problem? He didn't
make enough money. Go figure.
Gimme0117-03
A couple from church was planning their wedding. They didn't have much
money, so they started asking for help from their friends. Well, it got to
the point where their friends were doing everything for them, from
decorating (including buying the crepe paper bells) to the photography,
even making the bride's dress. They got these people to do it all for
free, but still expected them to attend the shower, gift in hand. Even the
men didn't escape, as they were invited to the shower also.
Then they sent
out the invitations. The reception was to be a pot luck. The guests would
be supplying the food. Then, to top it off, one of their close friends was
going around asking for donations to send the happy couple on a honeymoon
trip. I decided to skip this whole tacky affair, since I was busy that day
(busy doing anything else).
Gimme0128-03
My friend Kate got
engaged to Brad last October. Kate and I went to the mall a few
weeks later. There was no great discussion on when they would be
getting married, where they wanted to have things, or any of the usual
beginning wedding planning stuff. Instead she talked endlessly about
how they both have their own places (his a two bedroom apartment, hers a
two bedroom condo) and how worried she was about how they were going to
fit everything they both already own into one place and where would they
ever put "all of these wedding presents we're supposed to be
getting."
The wedding is now approaching, it is in about two
months. They decided to have a small wedding (60 people).
Of course, that isn't nearly enough wedding presents for them so they're
having a picnic in September (5 mos. after wedding). They are
registered at 3 places (yes, 3 for a 60 person wedding!). The
groom's sister (a bridesmaid) had a fit at my observation that nobody
not invited to the wedding should be invited to a shower, so she is
planning her own shower for the couple, inviting only people who are
specifically not invited to the wedding. The MOH and I
(another bridesmaid) are left to throw a shower for those family members
and close friends who actually are invited to the wedding. To top it
off, the bride included friends from college she hasn't seen or talked to
in a year or more just because she went to their wedding and took a gift
so she feels that she deserves a gift from them. Silly me, I thought a
wedding was supposed to be about promising to love someone forever!
Gimme0317-04
I love my cousin dearly, she is the sweetest person I know. I feel bad
sending her to ehell, but this is too outrageous to keep to myself.
"Jane" has made a point to tell the family she is having a
small, informal wedding and does not care if she doesn't get gifts.
"Your presence is present enough" she says. However, her
registry is not to be believed. She registered at three stores, and one
of the registries is 20 pages long. I kid you not. She registered for
everything you can think of. Here are some examples: EIGHTEEN place
settings of china, 8 bedspreads, mosquito repellent, alcoholic mixers,
sour patch kids, butter seasoning for popcorn, matches, CDs,
dads, straws, a silver piggy bank, and (my favorite) a toilet. YES, a
toilet! I've had a good laugh perusing over her list. I think if she
could've registered for the kitchen sink it would be on there!
Gimme0408-04
Shortly after I got married to my now ex-husband, we were invited to
the dance of one of his friends who was an usher at our wedding.
They were having an intimate ceremony only for family and close friends on
a ranch, complete with the jeans and cowboy boots. Ok, to each his
own. I was a bit put off that we weren't invited to the wedding
or reception considering he was part of ours, but didn't think much more
of it - until we got to the dance.
The invitation to the
*dance* said they preferred cash, not presents - remember, we weren't
invited to the wedding ceremony or the reception. Sure, it
is common to invite people only to the dance, but then you
certainly don't expect them to bring a gift and you certainly don't put it
on the invitation even if they are being invited to everything.
So we decided to give them the same amount of money they gave us for our
wedding gift and we showed up with our envelope, which we put in the
wishing well upon arrival. They had a cash bar and then, during the
dance, they passed around the groom's boot for donations, came around with
the bride's shoe for MORE donations and then passed the wishing well
around AGAIN!
My ex and I were sitting with another couple
from his work who were only invited to the dance as well. The wife,
who was Italian and is used to huge weddings, was shaking her head at the
tackiness of it all. She and I had a good time, but we rolled our
eyes as the footwear continued to be passed around throughout the
evening. Then, much to our surprise, they actually sprang for
a midnight snack that they put out on tables that consisted of dried out
roast beef, stale bread with all the GENERIC ketchup, mustard, and
salad dressing containers. My Italian friend and I joked that we
attended a fund raiser BBQ disguised as a wedding! This
wedding, or should I say, dance, goes down in my books as the tackiest I
have ever attended!
Gimme0419-04
My cousin had a shotgun wedding out-of-town and then held a reception a
few weeks later. At the reception, my cousin’s new wife had the nerve to
stand at the head table in front of all the guests and count the money
they collected from the dollar dance. I’m surprised they didn’t start
opening gifts. VERY TACKY!!! Not to mention he wasn’t wearing a tux and
she wasn’t wearing her wedding dress. They looked like guests at their
own wedding. It was obvious that they had a tux and wedding dress, because
they were passing around pictures.
Gimme0505-04
I am currently in professional school. We have a small class of 80
people. There is some kind of law that when less than 100 people are stuck
together 40 hours a week in class they revert back to high school
behavior. So our class has its cliques. That's OK by me. However, a member
of the Prom Queen clique is getting married this summer. This is a woman
who hasn't spoken to 2/3 of the class because we're beneath her.
This spring, she sent out an email to the entire class announcing that
she wanted to raise money for her honeymoon. We were all invited to a Line
Dancing night at a Texas style club. There would be a $10.00 entry fee to
help the bride pay for the honeymoon. A couple days later we all got
'invitations' in our mailboxes to the event.
I was appalled that a woman who never gave me the time of day had the
temerity to 'invite' me to pay for her honeymoon when I wasn't invited to
the wedding.
Just wanted to share the joy with you all.
Gimme0512-04
Thank you, I can ~feel~ the joy.
This story happened a number of years ago now, but reading the posts on your
site reminded me of it. I was about 14 or 15 at the time, and
my church Sunday school teacher (in his early 20's) was getting married.
We'll call him Chip. Since he was close to the ages of us in the
class he taught, we all thought of him as a friend/older brother type and
were very excited listening to him discuss the wedding plans. We all
chipped in and got him a fairly nice wedding gift from the class
(even $10 each seems like a lot of money when you are in junior high!)
Neither the bride nor the groom's families were wealthy, but
fairly well-off, and the couple decided that they wanted to invite
everyone in the church. They accomplished this by simply extending a
verbal invitation to the congregation, and then posting a sheet for those
who wanted to attend to RSVP. In hindsight, and now knowing that an
invitation to a wedding normally means you are expected to send a
gift, this actually seems a little bit tacky, (also, we later
discovered that they had a second, private reception for family &
close friends) but, I digress & anyway, we all thought it was
nice at the time. To keep costs down, considering they were going to
have over 200 people at the first reception, the luncheon was to take
place in the church gymnasium.
Here is where the faux
pas occurred: the Sunday school class was excited about being able
to attend the wedding. I think it was the first wedding I had ever
attended, certainly the first person I actually knew to get married.
A month or so before the wedding, Chip asked all of us in the class
if we would like to be involved in the wedding in a special way - or words
to that effect. They were having food delivered, but needed
"help" with the luncheon. Just what this help was was not
explained in detail, but we were left with the impression that it would be
something along the lines of pouring punch or helping with the setting of
tables, setting out a buffet or with clean-up
afterwards. Sure we all said, we'd love to, what fun, we feel so
important and happy to be included. (Also, the way it was presented,
it wasn't like we could really say "no").
Wedding day: We all reported to the gym after the ceremony where we
discovered that, far from being wedding guests, we were to be the
wait staff. Again, to cut costs, they were having food
delivered (for a sit-down, served/plated meal!) but had not
bothered to hire servers. Also, given that there were at
least 200 people in the church gym, there wasn't a great deal of room
to maneuver - this meant no self-serve coffee/water/punch station
- we got to serve punch all right! (at least there was no alcohol, since
we were in the church).
Basically, the day SUCKED. We did not
get to sit down once, and if we eventually got to have lunch, I
don't remember. What I do remember is having very sore feet
after 2 1/2 hours of waitressing in my Sunday shoes that weren't meant to
be walked around in, and being treated like an indentured servant by the
caterer (who was understandably upset at being forced to work with
amateurs who weren't moving quickly enough, getting in her way, etc.) and
the wedding guests who didn't go to the church, who probably thought we
were just poorly trained catering staff, clearing a lot of plates &
pouring a lot of coffee.
After all that, I don't even
recall getting any sort of thank-you gift or card from the happy
couple, although at least he thanked us verbally. Over the years
after this, I held a host of high school/university jobs that included
waitressing and food service, and let me tell you, serving people is
rarely a great experience for the person doing it, even if they are being
paid (minimum wage:). While inviting every person you know to your
wedding may seem like a good idea, it is in extremely poor taste to
then single out one group who do not get to enjoy the occasion at all,
instead making them work for you! We (and our parents who got to sit
down and be guests) were fairly bitter about the whole thing, but he &
his new wife started attending a new church shortly thereafter, so I don't
think anyone ever called them on it.
Gimme0521-04
Last year I went to a wedding of a friend of the family. He had
gone to college with my brother and was marrying a woman a few years
younger than him. She was a little immature to say the least.
She was about an hour late for the ceremony, because all of her relatives
made appointments with her at the same hair salon that she did--and there
wasn't enough time to get to everyone and still get there on time.
At the reception, there was both a band and a DJ, who played salsa music
all night (even when we were eating).
About halfway through the
reception, the band began demanding their final payment (in cash) or else
they would leave. The bride, who already had a few too many,
proceeds to the bird cage where the envelopes have been stored, and starts
to rip open the envelopes, taking out the cash gifts inside so that she
will be able to pay the band. Her husband is mortified to say the
least, stops her after she has ripped open quite a few, then tells the
band that they will take a check after the event, or not get paid at all.
Needless to say, the band did not walk out. BTW, it is a year later
and my husband and I still have not received a thank you note from them.
Maybe our gift got mixed in with the ripped open envelopes.
Gimme0610-04
Page Last Updated May 15, 2007
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