Bridesmaid problem help please!

[Deleted User]

I've had trouble with a friend that I asked to be in my wedding. She seems to have no interest in going dress shopping or participating in any of our events. My wedding is 7 months away, and she wont agree to go dress shopping at all. The biggest problem with this is our dress shop wont finalize our orders until her dress is ordered. Should I ask her to step down as bridesmaid?

flantastic

lmotts said:

I've had trouble with a friend that I asked to be in my wedding. She seems to have no interest in going dress shopping or participating in any of our events. My wedding is 7 months away, and she wont agree to go dress shopping at all. The biggest problem with this is our dress shop wont finalize our orders until her dress is ordered. Should I ask her to step down as bridesmaid?

Your dress shop should have zero reason for this. Tell them to place the order they have. Your friend can order on her own later, and if she doesn't, she's taken herself out of the wedding party.

Your friend does not have to go group dress shopping or go to any "events." Her only responsibility is to show up to your wedding in the dress (assuming the one you chose is within a budget you asked her privately about beforehand) and stand up in your wedding. No wedding planning, bach/shower planning, "get to know each other" events (Why? Who cares? They don't need to know each other), etc. are required of her, so to ask her to step down for not being interested in extraneous wedding stuff would be rather petty.

People have different levels of interest in weddings; presumably you ask them to be in your wedding party because you are friends apart from wedding stuff. To ask her to "step down" would be a friendship ending move, when she hasn't (per your post, anyway) done anything deserving of that.

flantastic

A ) If you didn't ask her about budget for the dress, that may be a concern she's too embarrassed to talk to you about, so maybe reach out.

B ) If you did ask her about budget and the dress you chose is within that, you can tell her when is the last order date for which the bridal shop thinks it can get dresses in time, and then the ball is in her court, and stop bugging her.

C ) Have you talked to her recently about anything besides your wedding?

short+sassy

Kicking a person out of your wedding is a friendship-ending move.  It doesn't sound like she has done anything remotely so atrocious that you should be ending the friendship over and/or telling her to step down.

I don't know what "events" you're having.  Especially still 7 months away from your wedding.  But she doesn't need to attend any of them.  The only duty a BM has to show up on the day of the wedding, relatively sober, and in the appropriate attire.

I will move on to the attire.  It sounds like the dress has already been decided?  If so, there is no reason for her to go dress shopping, unless she's worried about their sizing and wants to try a sample gown on.

Has she given a reason why she hasn't ordered it?  Is money tight?  Has she just not had time?  7 months IS really early.

Dress shops do like to be all dramatic and act like it takes months.  Or that all the dresses HAVE to be ordered at the same time so the "dye lot" matches.  That last part is total and utter b.s.

I'd give her one more month and a "hard" date to order.  Like, "Friend, the dress shop says all the dresses have to be ordered at the same time.  I need you to take care of it by 12/16/17 or we may not be able to get your dress ordered."

I personally think that she could place her order afterwards and the dress shop would still be accommodating.  I mean, what kind of shop turns down sales, lol?

But, the bottom line is, she gets the appropriate dress.  Or she doesn't.  If she doesn't, she has essentially taken herself out of the WP.  No need for you to be the bad guy.

downtondiva

Find out what the absolute last day is that the dress shop can order her dress and have it be ready in time for your wedding. Tell her that date firmly but politely, and leave it at that. If she doesn't order the dress by that date, then she has taken herself out of the wedding party. That's really all you can do. 

You can't ask someone to step down from being a bridesmaid just because she's not interested in pre-wedding events.  If you do this, you can pretty much forget about the friendship as a whole. Are you really going to throw a friendship away over her not being as interested in your wedding as you are? 

lovesclimbing

+1 to the above posts. 

ahoywedding

What's going on in your friend's life besides your wedding?  I would ask the shop for the absolute latest day to order the dress (because they often lie when they say 7 months), let your friend know that, and then the ball is in her court. Give her a pass on some of the "activities." None of them are required as a bridesmaid, and not everyone is able to go to everything. I was in a wedding several years ago and the bride had THREE showers. She was upset all of us didn't go to all 3 of them, but I had to travel several hours to get to each one. I was in school and working full time, there's no way that was going to happen. 

But also, it IS hard sometimes to not get wrapped up in wedding planning and to realize our own wedding (or anything, really) just isn't as important to other people as it is to us. Spend some time with her just as friends, and maybe relax on the wedding business a little bit. 

babe1990

flantastic said:

A ) If you didn't ask her about budget for the dress, that may be a concern she's too embarrassed to talk to you about, so maybe reach out.

B ) If you did ask her about budget and the dress you chose is within that, you can tell her when is the last order date for which the bridal shop thinks it can get dresses in time, and then the ball is in her court, and stop bugging her.

C ) Have you talked to her recently about anything besides your wedding?

ya,absolutely true. 

MyNameIsNot

Why are you ordering dresses 7 months out? I'm honestly shocked that any of your BMs would agree to order this early. There are 1001 reasons that anyone would not want to order this early; budget is just one of them.

This BM is not doing anything wrong. Give her a reasonable deadline (check with the shop, but 2-3 months is normal). Then leave it alone. There is no reason for her to be participating in wedding events. Wedding events shouldn't even be happening at this point, but they are not requirements of BMs even within a reasonable time frame. 

southernbelle0915

Your dress shop is full of shit. They just want one more order (money). If you only had 3 BMs, not 4 (for example), they wouldn't bat an eye. Tell them she dropped out, or some other excuse and to move ahead with the order. 

Your BM does not need a dress 7 months in advance. That's craziness. I ordered my wedding dress about 7 months out. My BMs got their dresses with like 2 months go to. 

I was in my SIL's wedding this year. She wanted us to order dresses 6 months in advance. At the time, I was trying to conceive and didn't know if I'd be 6 months pregnant at the wedding or not pregnant at all. And really, I was pissed I even had to explain this to anyone - it's personal! I just told her I'd figure the dress out myself and that was that. I ordered the dress a month in advance and still had time for two fittings. Chill. Let her figure it out. 

lovesclimbing

southernbelle0915 said:

Your dress shop is full of shit. They just want one more order (money). If you only had 3 BMs, not 4 (for example), they wouldn't bat an eye. Tell them she dropped out, or some other excuse and to move ahead with the order. 

Your BM does not need a dress 7 months in advance. That's craziness. I ordered my wedding dress about 7 months out. My BMs got their dresses with like 2 months go to. 

I was in my SIL's wedding this year. She wanted us to order dresses 6 months in advance. At the time, I was trying to conceive and didn't know if I'd be 6 months pregnant at the wedding or not pregnant at all. And really, I was pissed I even had to explain this to anyone - it's personal! I just told her I'd figure the dress out myself and that was that. I ordered the dress a month in advance and still had time for two fittings. Chill. Let her figure it out. 

I had a six-month engagement. I ordered my own at the most around 3-4 months out. I don't remember exactly, but I remember where I was when I got it, and I didn't move there until about 4 months prior to the wedding. 

SP29

Find out the absolute last day the shop can place the order, then tell your Friend, "Dress order needs to be in by X date", and let her get it figured out from there. Stop bugging her about it after this- she is an adult and can figure out how to order and pay for a dress. Your friend doesn't have to try the dress on with anyone else there. Your friend can put in her own dress order if the rest of your BMs really want to buy their dresses NOW. It's not like you're getting a discount for putting in an order of 4 dresses, so to the store it's really no different to buy 5 dresses at once or have 5 individual orders.

My BMs bought their dresses 2-3 months prior to my wedding date, and they each bought separately from different store locations. No big deal.

MissKittyDanger

lovesclimbing said:

southernbelle0915 said:

Your dress shop is full of shit. They just want one more order (money). If you only had 3 BMs, not 4 (for example), they wouldn't bat an eye. Tell them she dropped out, or some other excuse and to move ahead with the order. 

Your BM does not need a dress 7 months in advance. That's craziness. I ordered my wedding dress about 7 months out. My BMs got their dresses with like 2 months go to. 

I was in my SIL's wedding this year. She wanted us to order dresses 6 months in advance. At the time, I was trying to conceive and didn't know if I'd be 6 months pregnant at the wedding or not pregnant at all. And really, I was pissed I even had to explain this to anyone - it's personal! I just told her I'd figure the dress out myself and that was that. I ordered the dress a month in advance and still had time for two fittings. Chill. Let her figure it out. 

I had a six-month engagement. I ordered my own at the most around 3-4 months out. I don't remember exactly, but I remember where I was when I got it, and I didn't move there until about 4 months prior to the wedding. 

Our engagement was 10 months and I didn't 'officially' get my dress until about 3 months beforehand