Wedding Dress Drama...

[Ashes711]

Arlight...I'm in need of help here. My mother is paying for the wedding...the deal was that since I paid for my entire college education, she would pay for my wedding. We're going very low-key, with just $5000 for the entire wedding. We have booked the church and reception hall for just $200. Since we are members of our church and the reception hall is a family owned place, we got everything really cheap.

Now on to the dress...It's important to mention that my mom never had a big wedding. When she married my dad, it was at the justice of the peace, and she wore a prom dress she made from a pattern, and with my step-dad, she had about 10 family members there and wore a pantsuit. Therefore...she never had to buy a wedding dress.

I have narrowed it down to 3 dresses. All very inexpensive, in my opinion. Two of them are $399 and one is $499. My mom is refusing to buy any of them, saying they are all too expensive. She is refusing to buy anything over $200. I think that's crazy...my senior year of high school my prom dress was $300!!!! She's being very stubborn on this.

I have looked all over, at sales, clearance racks, online...everywhere and I can't find one that I like cheap enough! I know everyone is going to say that i should let her spend the $200, and I can pay the rest...but we're buying a house in the next couple of months and with all of the appliances and furniture we are buying, can't really afford to spend that much at the moment.

I am out of ideas and am slowly losing patience with my mother. How would you approach this problem??

 

[princessdisneybelle]

Could you ask her to go dress shopping with you and see if she can find anything for the price she is willing to spend? I side with you. Goodluck finding something for under $200.

 

[Lesleyluvsdisney]

I got married in September this year. We split the cost kinda three ways with my parents paying for reception, meal, invites. my in-laws gave us £1000 ($1600). and we paid the rest. The entire bill came to around $9000.

Now, as a personal gesture my mother-in-law asked if she could buy my dress, so with both mums we went out looking, I ended up settling on a cheaper one (as I felt I didnt want to spend too much as we had never discussed a figure). The dress was around $220, and from the momemt i brought it home - 6 months before the wedding I HATED it, cried over it, but was too nervous to tell my mother in law. Eventually 1 month before the wedding I tried to take it back, but obviously the shop wouldnt exchange it, so I had to end up going to a different shop and got one for around $400. So DONT rush in to getting any dress just beacuse it's cheap!!

Why not look around the stores try on ones you like, to see if the style looks good on you, then get the Designer name and model number and go on E-Bay and try and get your size!!

Good luck, and dont get yourself stressed out about it!

 

[sunsh1ne]

i can relate to you. my mom is also paying for my wedding because i paid for school and i just bought our first home. She is also saying everything is so expensize. she just has a very unrealistic idea of prices and that things have changed in the past years. what i did was explained to her how much i paid for school and an extra 200 on a dress wont kill her. i told her that i really wanted this to be a special day. maybe explain that you will cut back on something else to make uo for the 200 dollars. i hope this makes sense and it helpes at all. Give it time and i agree take her with you and let her see it is almost impossible to get something that you love for under 200.

 

[JJClemson]

This is a tough situation. Weddings are so stressful!

Has you mother seen you in any of the dresses you like? I ask this b/c when I tried on "the dress" my mom started crying and became very emotional. It ended up being way more $ than we wanted to spend, but my mom wouldn't have it any other way.

Good luck

 

[j_lehr]

I would tell her how you feel...ask her since the whole budget is $5000, maybe she shouldn't worry about the individual prices of things, but rather assure her you will not go over budget as a whole. I feel for you because this is your wedding and you want it to be the most perfect day of your life. My first wedding was a disaster...planned very poorly by my mom and done very cheaply and I hated it. Good Luck...

Jessica

 

[TinkBride]

Take her dress shopping with you so that she can see the prices of different dresses and she will quickly realize that $399 is actually VERY reasonable. She is probably just not aware what a dress costs now a days, considering she never purchased a wedding gown before. Once she sees the average prices of dresses, she may come around.

 

[Maggimus]

LOL- I, this is somewhat humorous... had a smiliar dispute with DH (DF at the time). We are well to do for our ages and I wanted to pay for everything and relieve our parents from everything... considering they had already given me so much. I went dress shopping, I found my dress... $399... I would have paid thousands had it been the dress I wanted... but, I wanted the $399. I thought I was coming out cheap... but DH (DF at the time) thought it was too expensive. I wanted to tell him how much my HS Prom Dresses costed... some were more than that, I promise!! Finally... I simply took him and showed him what typical dresses cost... and he quickly saw that I did, in fact, come out cheaper.

I suggest you do the same, just as everyone else says. Good Luck...

Now looking back its hard to think I paid more for my prom dress than my wedding..... I should have gotten cheaper prom dresses!

 

[Disney-For-Life]

If the most she is willing to contribute to a dress is $200, then I would pick out the dress I really wanted, tell her you have fallen in love with it, and ask her to pay $200 towards it and you will pay for the rest. This might be the only way to get what you want in the end. The dress doesn't have to cost a lot, but by only allowing you to look for dresses in that price range, your options are decreased and it adds a lot of stress on the situation. You certainly would not want to resent your mother on any level on the big day, and as much as we might want to play it down when dishing out the money for one, the dress is very, very important. I feel so bad that you are in this situation, and hope it gets resolved okay. Take care and have fun with the rest of your planning

 

[Maggimus]

If worst came to worst... and you had to have one under $200....Just a tip... Davids Bridal puts a lot of their dresses on sale for their $99 sale. Maybe try there?

GL

 

[afinter1]

Maggimus beat me to the punch, but David's Bridal is definitely worth checking out during their $99 sale. I went during their last sale just to look and didn't think I'd score a $99 deal, but after trying on 15 or so dresses, and trying on a $99 dress . . . I feel in love with the $99 dress!!

A word of caution though, alterations can set a girl back even more on money! Even thought I spent $99 on my dress, my alterations came out to be $240 . . . which I think they design their dresses so that everyone needs alterations. For instance, hemming the bottom of a dress so that it doesn't drag on the floor costs $120 ALONE! I was miffed about this because I am not a short girl by any means (I'm 5'11") and the dress barely dragged on the floor. I figured I should just get all the alterations done and not be a cheapo on one of the most important things for my wedding.

Good luck to you. Just like one of the other girls suggested, you should check out Ebay. A lot of girls have had mock designer dresses custom made for them and loved the results!

 

[diswed0407]

I paid for my dress myself and shopped all the sale racks. Mine was $400, but I found that reasonable. Take your mom shopping with you and let her see the prices. Then try some on. I think once she sees you in even a $350-$400 dress, she may be willing to reason. Check Ebay too though. I know people who've had good luck on there.

 

[Moonpie]

You had mentioned that your mother sewed her own wedding dress. Is it a possibility that she could sew your dress? That way you could have imput in getting exactly what you want, but she would also have a major part in contributing to it without it being too expensive.
And by the way...I went way over budget with my dress...but once my family saw me in my dress, and they saw the look on my face...everyone knew that it was the dress I had to get.

 

[jojoandhb]

What about Ebay? Also, you could buy the dress yourself. Maybe you could negotiate with your mom, $200 extra dollars for the dress and cut $200 somewhere else like flowers or decor...

 

[Disneybride_Nov07]

A word of caution though, alterations can set a girl back even more on money! Even thought I spent $99 on my dress, my alterations came out to be $240 . . . which I think they design their dresses so that everyone needs alterations. For instance, hemming the bottom of a dress so that it doesn't drag on the floor costs $120 ALONE! I was miffed about this because I am not a short girl by any means (I'm 5'11") and the dress barely dragged on the floor. I figured I should just get all the alterations done and not be a cheapo on one of the most important things for my wedding.

I can completely agree with this statement! My dress was ordered and it came in about two sizes too big. I know they took my measurements and I know I am very true to my size. I know wedding gowns are different sizing sometimes, but still...2 sizes? I went ahead and got a quote on how much the alterations would be with the taking in and the hemming...225$!

I laughed inside and just took the dress home with me! I looked up individual seamstresses in the area and ended up getting my dress altered for $50.00. It fits perfectly..so my advice would be if you need alterations to try and find a small business or an individual seamstress!

I also think checking out the Davids bridal 99$ sale is a great idea!!

 

[Ashes711]

Thanks for all the suggestions!

The dresses I have picked out are at Davids, and since they are having they're big sale right now, I'm crossing my fingers that it will be on sale!

Moonpie-My mom wants to make my gown....but I decided against that! We priced the fabric and beading and all that stuff, and it all came out to around $250. Plus...the people we talked to at the store recommended that we just buy one since the gown I want is a little more involved.

I've been checking on EBay...and I will keep looking, just haven't seen the styles I'm looking for yet!

I'll keep you posted on the outcome! I'm hopeful that once she sees the dress she'll change her mind!

 

[sunsh1ne]

i was just wondering what dress it was. i bought mine a davids they are so beautiful

 

[JandJ]

I can completely agree with this statement! My dress was ordered and it came in about two sizes too big. I know they took my measurements and I know I am very true to my size. I know wedding gowns are different sizing sometimes, but still...2 sizes? I went ahead and got a quote on how much the alterations would be with the taking in and the hemming...225$!

I laughed inside and just took the dress home with me! I looked up individual seamstresses in the area and ended up getting my dress altered for $50.00. It fits perfectly..so my advice would be if you need alterations to try and find a small business or an individual seamstress!

I also think checking out the Davids bridal 99$ sale is a great idea!!

Yes, absolutely make sure you have money for alterations. My bridal boutique took my measurements and my gown was made for me, so it fit perfectly, except for one minor "tweak" which cost $20. I know a girl who bought her designer gown at an outlet for $99 but the alterations cost almost $250! Unfortunately bridesave.com went out of business, they had designer gowns for hundreds less than retail. We have an outlet here in west central Florida that sells gowns starting at $100 (Jons bridal). I didn't shop there, but have heard good things, so check out shops in your area like that too! Good Luck!!

 

[NEVERENOUGHWDW]

Maybe the best thing to do is buy your own dress and let her buy your accesorries...Good Luck!