So my mom has been a bit of a pain since I got engaged last July and I need help in how to deal with her.
My parents are not paying for the wedding and that's fine. From the beginning I made it clear to my mom that since she is not paying, I perfer to make most of the decisions on my own and am trying to cut every corner possible to save money. I purposely did not tell her where we were looking to have the ceremony and reception until after we signed a contract so that she could not but in. (I know this might be mean, but if she has an idea of what's right she will fight you until you do it.)
Since then she has gone and found vendors for almost everything I've done (flowers, invitations etc) even though I told her that I was working on it. Instead of allowing me to shop around and find the best deal price wise as well as who I'm comfortable with she harasses me to work with one vendor until I pick them regardless of price she can't help out with. She goes to the meetings says "oh I won't say anything I'm just here for moral support" then complains that she doesn't like the idea, even BM dresses because my girls couldn't find a time to go with me.
I've tried explaining to her calmly and eventually in fights about how FI and I would like to spend less and use the money instead to buy a house but she just ingores me telling me I have plenty of time to buy a house.
Well now she has started to buy little things for me behind my back like a cake topper, a veil (from Michael's crafts, anyone know if these are good? I haven't seen it yet) etc. I won't see her until next weekend so I don't even know what it looks like. She tells me it's fine if I don't like it she can return it but it's "what I'll like" basically meaning, if I don't use it I'll never hear the end of it.
She even went so far as to say that if FI and I make a charitable donation to the Susan G. Komen foundation in lieu of favors we can't put out the cards on the tables at the reception because people will come up to her and ask her if she is suffering from breast cancer. She suggests we wait until after the reception and put the in lieu of favors cards in the thank you cards. I'm sorry that's not what you do.
She has a problem with me not changing my name when I get married, she's upset that I'm saving money and doing fake flowers for a throw boquet instead of spending $30 for the few single women coming to my wedding. She's even found my coordinator at the reception and planned "a few suprises for the favors".
I don't want to bother my vendors and coordinator and say well now that you met with me and my mom for however long, this is actually what we're going to do, but that's basically the only way I've been able to win with her.
So what do I do? I love that we're talking more in general, I love that she does care but I wish she could respect my wishes and my money! What if I don't like the things she bought at Michael's how can I get what I want? Sorry for the rant I'm just at the end of my rope at this point!