Weddings are notorious for sending many sane and balanced women into complete meltdown, and understandably so. Every Bride wants her dream day to go perfectly. For many, weddings have been in planning a long time indeed. Cost a substantial amount of their hard-earned cash (or parents hard earned cash) and anything other than perfection is unacceptable. To this end, some Brides impose their bridesmaids and wedding guests with a list of do’s and don’ts of what they can and can’t do. I suspect they find that its Perfectly reasonable to issue rules and regulations for their day, but it often appears somehow unacceptable to the recipients to the point where a falling out is inevitable. However, I do think it’s acceptable to make requests of your guest on your big day. You’ll note I said request!

Now, requests are very different to rules. A request is asking something of somebody that they are not obliged to do but that you would like them to do. This is what we have done with our wedding. Yes, MY big day December 28th this year. We’ve asked our guests for their favourite recipes with their well wishes instead of cards. We will then think of that person(s) every time we cook their favourite dish. However, the world will not end, the sky won’t fall in, and there won’t be expulsion from the wedding if they bring a card without a recipe…(Some people just don’t cook!)

We’ve also asked that no pictures of the wedding be posted on social media. That’s a request we would very much like our guests to comply with, purely because we are not massive fans of social media. Especially when pictures are uploaded immediately without any thought and people are addicted to their phones instead of enjoying the moment. Instead we’ve asked them to upload their photos of OUR day to Wedapp and they can view all the photos and share from there after we have had time to ‘censor’ them. We also have a personal reason for requesting this, and that is; my daughter may not be at the wedding, and I don’t think it’s nice for her to see something she wasn’t part of splashed all over the internet. I would like to think that the majority our guests would adhere to this request. I already know there will be some who won’t. Its not the end of the world, but it would upset us if that were the case…

Our final request was to ask our guests to respond to their invites by a set date or bring their own chair and food. I think this is just good manners anyway, but you wouldn’t believe the number of RSVP we are having to chase. I personally think that it is rude and there is no excuse, especially when we have provided tick box RSVP postcard reply with our address on. All that is required is that they tick it, stick a stamp on it and chuck it in the post box. Simples. ..

I recently read of a Bride who sent out to her guests an email telling them exactly what to wear. And, I mean exactly! This, you may think isn’t so bad, however she went a step further and put her demand for the guests clothing she wanted them to wear into weight categories!!! Females under 160lb were told to wear specific brightly coloured clothes of specific fabric, all the same, and Louboutin heels, you know, the really expensive ones with the red soles! Men under 200lbs were to wear a different coloured outfit. Female guests of 160lbs and above were told to wear black only, but they could choose the fabric. They were also told to wear plain black shoes (no Louboutin heels for the curvier ladies). Men 200lb and above were only allowed to wear DPM material commonly known as camouflage! What the Hell???

They were also told they needed Dinner Jackets and evening dresses for the reception. To add insult to injury, she even went so far to say that as the wedding venue was extremely ‘up-scale’ she wanted her guests to look their best. Adding, that if they looked like trash so would the Bride and Groom.

Firstly, this is so damn rude. Secondly, I don’t know about you, but I don’t know anyone who would rock up at a wedding looking anything other than their best! The damn woman is a controlling and rude individual in my opinion with no manners to speak of. If I was a guest, I would be very upset to receive such a list of demands and I suspect I may politely (probably more likely to impolitely) decline to attend the event.

Another Bride told her bridesmaids that weigh-ins would begin in 3 weeks, put two of her bridesmaids on a weight gaining diet so no one would be thinner than the Bride. Bedtimes were to strictly enforced in the

run up to the wedding, absolutely no baggy eyes on the big day. Likewise, the Bride’s ladies-in-waiting were allowed to wear Bandeau bikini tops only as she didn’t want terrible tan lines on the big day. Hair cut requests had to be submitted along with photos for approval from the Bride. And any further tattoos were banned until after the wedding. For any Bridesmaids who already had tattoos they had to prepare to receive a private message with temporary removal options. Dear lord, where does this diva get off. Again, I think it’s totally unreasonable, your friends are your friends and you love them for who they are and not what they look like. Shape, size, hair colour, hair style, doesn’t matter. What matters is that they are there and that you accept them as they are. Surely its better to not ask guests to be part of your wedding if you think they can’t be trusted not to make an effort.

Another bride lost the plot completely when after booking a wedding abroad informed her guests, they all had to pay for their own tickets, accommodation, wedding food and Bridesmaid dresses. I am unsure how many people attended that wedding!

The rudest one so far, in my opinion sent out demands for wedding gifts costing no less than one thousand Dollars. When one guest explained she couldn’t spend that much money on a gift for the new Mr and Mrs she was told not to bother coming. I suspect she punched the air and did a little happy dance around the room in sheer relief! All whilst videoing it to send to the group chat!

I have no doubt there are hundreds more tales of Bridezillas like this out there, but these are a few that had me shaking my head in absolute disbelief! I just can’t understand the reasoning behind it.

A wedding is only about the Bride and Groom and the love they have for each other. Yes, every couple wants a lovely day, and as long as they are surrounded by the love of family and friends on that day, it will be perfect, making ridiculous demands of wedding guests and dictating what they should wear and buy is just a recipe for disaster..

It’s not right to send out a list of rules to the guests. That, to me, is a sure way to have no one turn up at your wedding! Nobody wants that do they?

I really feel that requests are ok, if you word them nicely. As my hubby to be and I have lived together for a while and already have more household items than we can shake a big stick at, we’ve not bothered with a wedding gift list. We don’t need anything and asking for money really doesn’t sit right with us. We are able to buy whatever we need, and just want our friends and family to come along to our wedding, have fun and celebrate with us. To this end we’ve arranged a Velcro wall bouncy castle, hoopla stall, beer pong, board games, space hoppers, hula hoops, twister, card games and ‘inflatable penis’ fighting for our guests’ amusement. We just want their company and to party nothing more.

I suspect we are in the minority of couples, we are older getting married, we aren’t setting up a home, in fact we’ve merged two homes into one so have duplicates of just about everything! Things and money aren’t the forefront of our minds, and both of us are confident enough in our own skins so that if some of our guests were to rock up and totally outshine us, we couldn’t really care less. Our day is about us and that’s it.

So, do Brides who want perfection and nothing less, and who find it necessary to send out rules for their guests dictating how the day should run have a better day? I don’t think so. They appear to be insecure. They will spend the whole day worrying about the insignificant things. My hairdresser told me of a Bride like this, and she made such a fuss about everything, she actually spoilt her own day with her demands upon everyone and ended up alienating the majority of guests, upset the caterers, the cake supplier, the florist and 3 of the 4 Bridesmaids because their hair wasn’t exactly how she wanted, and one Bridesmaid had dared to shed a few pounds in weight. Oh, and she had to find a new hairdresser after the wedding!

Life is too short, remember the important things in life. More so on your wedding day. Love of the Bride and Groom is all that matters, anything else is just ‘stuff’ and by putting importance on it, you are causing yourself stress and hassle. Nope, not for this pink sparkly miss and her wonderful Mr thank you very much!

OOOPs …. I’ve just realised after all that, we do have a rule for our wedding and its that everyone has to party to the best of their ability!