My niece (the one with the sundae-bar reception) got her dress on sale at David’s Bridal for $99. She looked great! D’s bridesmaid dress for the wedding was twice as much as the bride’s dress.
I got married almost 33 years ago, so I don’t know if florists still do this … but I rented pots of azaleas. It was only $1/pot, and I lined the church with them. It looked awesome and was inexpensive.
^^^Wow, what a crazy good deal!
I have to join in. My youngest dd is getting married in 2017. She also got a $99 dress from David’s Bridal! She wanted a tea length gown and saw just what she wanted. I told her if she found something else later that we could certainly resell this one. It is beautiful though and I think she will keep it. We have the venue and the room block and I am suppose to call a catering firm today. I am hoping that with our long lead time that it won’t be very stressful- probably still will though!
The only wedding battle I would not back down on is the amount we would be contributing.
To date,we have never shared the cost of the wedding with the fiancee’s family, but if we were, I would make our budgeted amount very clear. Some seem to have their heads in the clouds when it comes to managing wedding expenses.
Just a few days ago, I heard from a colleague that for the marriage (not just wedding) of the son (or D?) of his friend, the groom’s family contributed $50K, so did the bride’s family. The contributions are almost all from the parents.
My first reaction is: Can their family adopt us (or more specifically, our kid)? My second reaction is: How much of the 100K were actually used (and the kids pocketed the rest) ?
Both the groom and the bride are from a large city (one of them in US and the other one in another country.)
That’s what my D plans to do now. I think she’ll put it on Ebay in the spring - she thinks she can sell it for more than she paid for it. It had been $700, marked down as the particular cut is being discontinued. When she first bought it, I was tempted to whip out my credit card to pay for it, but I held back because I didn’t want her to feel locked into that choice or as if she would be hurting my feelings if she changed her mind. So now I’m glad I held back. I think its nuts to pay $1K+ on a dress for a day, but it isn’t my wedding. (Or my money!)
Flowers – if you are near Pick-Your-Own farms, there are a few in our area that have flowers grown onsite. We did flowers from a wholesale market – $199 total. Fortunately one of my sisters and SIL knew how to make bouquets, boutonierres, etc.
Our family’s experience was that the K-1 visa took about five months to be approved. It is good for six months afterwards. The couple must be married within 90 days of the K-1 applicant’s arrival in the US. Once they are married, there is more paperwork that gets submitted, and then the temporary green card is issued within 90 days. The permanent green card process begins two years after the temporary one is issued. The couple should be sure to have documentation proving they are living together, have joint accounts, as well as photos and such that document that they have a genuine marriage. Establishing good faith and authenticity is important if the marriage fails before the permanent green card is issued and the immigrant spouse wants to stay in the US. Sorry to be a bummer here. Just hard experience.
Just for fun, here’s a photo of the first (bargain) dress that my daughter bought: http://imgur.com/SCY4K5t
(Technically it’s the second dress she bought, as she bought a dress earlier from ebay, but returned it because it didn’t fit).
And here’s a photo of the more expensive one she has chosen instead: http://imgur.com/5VesYv3
In fairness, I think my daughter looks a lot better in the #2 dress than the model – my daughter is a size 4, but curvier than the model, so I think DD fills out the dress more nicely.
I have a feeling my D’s wedding is going to end up going way over her planned budget by the time she’s done…
Ok, sorry, apparently CC does not allow links to images at the site I used… and things are messed up and it won’t let me edit or delete the post I made either. I just see a bunch of garbled text when I click the “edit” button.
Calmom, I couldn’t get the visuals.
See my post #88. CC blocked the URLs with the images, but the system won’t let me correct or delete the post.
Darn, I wanted to see the dresses…
Posted twice…
@CountingDown - My daughter has done her homework on what is involved in a K-1 visa so nothing you wrote comes as a surprise. Frankly, I’m glad it is so rigorous.In her case, I don’t anticipate any problems because they actually are in love and plan to live together/have a real marriage. The paperwork for the K-1 visa took several weeks to prepare and the stack of paper was several inches thick when completed! It’s just a bit challenging to plan a wedding without an actual date yet.
I believe you. I said the same thing about my daughters in their strapless, sweetheart neck prom dresses…a stick thin model really does not fill out that style of dress nicely. (Don’t know the style of the dress your DD found, but just agreeing with your point.)
I need to start looking for my MOB dress for my daughter’s early September wedding. The ceremony is outside and could be in the upper 80’s to lower 90’s at the start! 
While the maid and matron of honor are wearing long, the bridesmaids will be in short. My hope is to find something long, but not too dressy; no beading or embellishment. My daughter would prefer I not wear lace as she thinks it will look too much like her dress; it won’t! At the moment the girls and guys will be in grey and pink, and the guys ties will be a mint green. I don’t care what color I wear, but would like it to go along with the colors of the wedding.
So, if anyone finds a dress that is long, not too dressy, that I won’t pass out due to heat stroke, let me know 
Why brides always want to get married outside is beyond me. My cousin’s daughter’s wedding was outside in mid October; we spent the entire ceremony brushing ants off of ourselves and the chairs! >:P
I thought of this thread after a call from my younger D (both Ds are getting married this year). Our call wasn’t about the wedding, but just kinda a weekly update about life. Honestly she is going 24/7, and is also currently performing in a show in NYC and was calling between her matinee and evening performances.
This D is getting married in NYC in late September (actually both Ds are getting married in NYC, but not at the same time). She doesn’t like “traditional.” In fact, she has never wanted to wear white her entire life, and I wondered when she was going to be a bride what she would do, but she is OK with ivory or champagne. But she doesn’t want a frilly or traditional style bridal gown, no veil, no flowers. Anyway, for a few months, she has looked online and she and I have sent links back and forth to one another and she has a general style she thinks she might like. In terms of shops, right now, she only has one of interest that she knows of. Others either are not of interest, are too high end, or whatnot. She has an appointment at this shop about 6 weeks from now and I am coming to NYC to go to it with her and her two best friends. In the meantime, she has a private Pinterest site she is sharing with me of which dresses from the shop interest her. The company is BHLDN (which is affiliated with Anthropologie). She told me on the phone that she talked to a person at the shop over the phone to tell them which dresses she wants to try on for her appointment day. They are the dresses she has liked the most in our exchanges with one another and she pinned them on her private site we share. I’ll estimate that there are at most 13 dresses. She told me that when she listed the dresses to the person at the shop, the person acted very surprised and commented at how many she wants to try on and how unusual this was and more than most do! My D was taken back by this (almost tempted to say she’d take her business elsewhere…that this is for her wedding day and a big expense). When she told me, I had the same reaction. A dozen dresses or so does not seem like a lot to me to try on for such a big day and such an expensive purchase! Had I been on the call, I might have added that this is the first shop she is going to and hasn’t tried on any wedding gowns and in fact, plans to only shop there, unless she doesn’t find anything she likes. So, she is focused heavily on this shop. Geez, when my D was visiting me over Thanksgiving and I offered to get her a nice dress that she might wear for her opening night for her show in NYC, which cost WAYYY less than a wedding dress, she likely tried on at least ten then. Is it us, or don’t you guys think that a dozen dresses is not so unusual to want to try on for one’s bridal dress? She has generally narrowed it down to a type of silhouette and is not all over the place in her thinking. She and I have researched a bunch. My D isn’t even that fond of clothes shopping. I’m as surprised as D that the bridal shop person went overboard in her comments about how many dresses D is interested in trying. So, I’m asking the bride moms here.
PS, not to focus just on D2’s wedding, as both daughters’ weddings are equally important to me, but this call just happened. D1 is having a different style wedding than D2 and much smaller. She is not wearing a traditional bridal gown but a dressy short dress. In her case, she found the dress before the wedding date and specific plans were finalized! She came upon her dress by accident when browsing in a dress boutique on Newbury Street in Boston and saw a pretty dress and tried it on and fell in love with it. She came over to my place and went into the guest room and changed into it and surprised me to show it to me. I love it and she looks very pretty in it. It is a gold and ivory brocade, sort of fit and flare style. Then on another trip, she found the perfect shoes for it, while also not looking for them. It was rather funny to me that she had the outfit before the date and plan and the other D had the date and plan before the outfit.
LOL, Missypie, that’s probably why my D didn’t choose a strapless dress.
She had planned to wear my mother’s dress (50’s white satin with long train and off-the-shoulder portrait collar held up my illusion netting) but change into another dress for the dancing at the reception. She ended up wearing that one for the wedding. Beautiful platinum beaded top with a wide, rounded scoop neck and then a flow chiffon skirt. A bit Downton Abbey except high waist instead of dropped. It was perfect.
@soozievt - small world. I am also flying to NYC to go dress shopping with my daughter at BHLDN in a month or so. She has shopped for dresses at other places, but really loves the simple styles at BHLDN. Don’t know how many she will be trying on, though…I’ll ask her.
This is the dress that I wore to my daughter’s recent wedding in Maui. I know it’s not long and it is lace, but I loved this dress. It was extremely comfortable and very flattering.(and I’m not a dress person)