Weddings Abroad bit Presumptuous

unholyangel

FishHookPockets wrote: »

Hello all, I bet this has been discussed by a few folks at some point.
One of my sisters has decided to get married abroad. She is marrying into a fairly comfortable family who will be bank rolling the event in terms of the couples arrangements and venue. Guest however must pay their own travel and board.
I myself am a family sole earner non home owner with some savings (not easy I have had to buy virtually everything we have 2nd hand)
I would not be able to save enough to attend in the time frame which leaves to credit cards or raiding my ISA. For my partner and kids to attend and to kennel out dog + spending money etc it will wipe out a fair percentage of my money (more than i have probably ever spent on a car). My other option is to attend alone which seems wrong especially as my sister is never apart from her fiancee.
To be honest I see little reason for marriage unless practicing a religion, I have been in a relationship for 20 years and we've never seen reason.
The ceremony is not on a beach or anywhere special it is in a hotel . They just don't want to be in the UK, which Is their choice as a wedding is all about the couple of course.
I have genuinely been having sleepless nights over it and feel as though a large bill has come through the post or I have to commit social suicide.
Am I a misery or is it unfair to presume people should attend ?

Perhaps they dont want that many people to attend? It was one of the reasons I wanted to get married abroad. Plus personally, I prefer to spend thousands on a good marital bed rather than the wedding (but then I think you get a better nights sleep so less likely to argue and also sturdier for some bedroom fun :whistle:). ETA: Posted this before reading the rest of the thread and see OP has already answered this, that'll teach me to be lazy!

It would be nice to attend but I'm sure your sister must have taken this into consideration when booking the venue so I dont think you should feel bad and certainly dont think its a misery. I wouldnt expect anyone to pay hundreds or thousands per person to come to my wedding, its my big day after all, not theirs!

Georgiegirl256

catkins wrote: »

Ok if you can afford it but I will never understand all this business about chair bows and other stupid completely unnecessary expenses.

No, me neither.

jellyhead

Tell her you'll come if she pays (for all of you) but otherwise it's just not financially possible. You would love to be there, but can't afford it. It's her choice whether she pays for you or not.

If it's your parents nagging you then tell them the same - if they pay for you all to go then you'll go. The ball's in their court.

claire16c

catkins wrote: »

When and why did getting married become this "I have to have the biggest showiest most expensive wedding"?


Ok if you can afford it but I will never understand all this business about chair bows and other stupid completely unnecessary expenses.

That was one thing I found was really good about getting married abroad - I didn't do any of that type of thing. Yet my friends who have got married here have all kinds of stress over chairs, table plans and goodness knows what else! I just picked photos of what I wanted online which were flowers, an arch to get married under & I bought flower petals for the aisle off eBay.

Any wedding can be made into a stressful event if someone really wants it to be!

jackieblack

catkins wrote: »

When and why did getting married become this "I have to have the biggest showiest most expensive wedding"?

In my experience, the bigger, showier, flashier, more expensive the wedding, the shorter the marriage has lasted :cool:

catkins

jackieblack wrote: »

In my experience, the bigger, showier, flashier, more expensive the wedding, the shorter the marriage has lasted :cool:

Yes, I have found this too

bylromarha

OH and I missed SILs wedding in Cuba. We had a 5 month old baby, a 2 yr old and little money.

We said we couldn't afford to go, so MIL offered to contribute to our cost. It still would have cost too much + it took up 2 weeks of holiday allowance. We really didn't want to be on a plane for so long with the littlies, plus have a newly weaning baby in unknown Cuba, plus lose the holiday allowance being on "holiday" with SIL, her and BILs friends, with MIL and partner.

More like hell you had the priviledge of paying for!!!!

Tropez

jackieblack wrote: »

In my experience, the bigger, showier, flashier, more expensive the wedding, the shorter the marriage has lasted :cool:

Well that's encouraging

mtc95

claire16c wrote: »

That was one thing I found was really good about getting married abroad - I didn't do any of that type of thing. Yet my friends who have got married here have all kinds of stress over chairs, table plans and goodness knows what else! I just picked photos of what I wanted online which were flowers, an arch to get married under & I bought flower petals for the aisle off eBay.

Any wedding can be made into a stressful event if someone really wants it to be!

Agreed - but you don't have to go abroad to avoid all that. You can avoid it equally well in the UK.

Person_one

Tropez wrote: »

Well that's encouraging

Its not really that simple, don't worry.

There's nothing wrong with having a big posh expensive wedding if you can afford it, and if you don't screw your guests and family over to get it.

Issues seem to arise when people want the big posh wedding but can't really afford it, go into debt, leave themselves broke for years afterwards, alienate all their loved ones in the process and are so stressed out by the wedding day its a wonder they can get through the vows!