future SIL as bridesmaid?

ajh65622

hi knotties!

since before i was engaged I knew at least 3 of the ladies i wanted in my bridal party.  my sister and 2 other BEST friends.  however, this past weekend, my fiance's mom asked my fiance if his sister is going to be in my wedding party.

we've been engaged for a couple months now and i've already been in touch with my top 3 ladies.  In the last couple weeks or so I've been thinking about adding 2 more ladies- best friends from high school that i lost touch with, but they've recently come back into my life.  that brings me to 5 which I thought was the total my fiance was going to have.

if he has more than 5, am I obligated to invite my future sister in law?  we're not friends. we never really have been.  she's less than friendly to most people- including me, and I dont see the point of having a debbie downer around me on my wedding day or in the planning.  granted, she might not actually be a downer during the wedding, but she's a downer now.

part of me says it's my wedding and i'll do whatever the heck i want to do.  but ugh! am i going to permanently damage my relationship with the future SIL (who currently doesn't like me)?

thanks!

mbcdefg

Your sides don't need to be evenly matched.

As for what you should do, read these threads since it's usually the same answer:

http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_laws-bridal-party

http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_fiancees-sisters-wedding-party

http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_fiances-sister-bridesmaid-1

lilianne22

Sides don't need to be even.  You should only ask people to be in your WP if YOU want them to stand up there with you.  FI can have her stand on his side if it's important to him that she be in the wedding party.  HTH.

SSaltzman87

I say either have her stand on your FI's side if he or his mom are insistant on including her, or just say you've already picked your bridesmaids.

If she does end up in your bridal party, all she's required to do is stand at the altar with the other BMs and wear whatever dress is picked-you don't absolutely have to include her in other stuff (i.e. showers, bachelorette party)

bablingbrooke

Please don't make your decision based on the evenness of the sides.  Uneven sides are very common and I'm willing to bet you've been to a wedding that had uneven sides, you just didn't notice because it's such a small, unimportant detail.  We had uneven sides and my super-anal-about-symmetry DH and actually-has-OCD MIL didn't have a problem with it so, trust me, you can handle it if those two could.

So putting that behind you, consider your options.  The long and short of it (for me) is that if it would cause long-term drama for you (i.e. FSIL will bring it up for the next 8 Thanksgivings and be very passive aggressive about it), ask her.  I had an obligatory family member in my WP and it wasn't any sort of problem.  She will be at the pre-wedding events and family photos anyway--it won't be such a big deal to have her wear the dress.  But confirm that she actually does want to be in the wedding.  If she doesn't even like you, I'm willing to bet she's not going to be terribly interested in being in the wedding.  But your best bet is to find out.  To not ask her to be in the wedding might be dodging a bullet; equally it can be handing her a reason to dislike you.

Bear in mind above all else two things:

1.  All she has to do is buy the dress and show up so you don't need to worry about her contributing in any other way.

2.  She is going to be family and you don't want to do anything at the wedding to negatively impact the relationship going forward.

LaurenEoghan

I know the feeling of being railroaded into having siblings in the WP... My fiance's parents automatically assumed that because he has a brother, the brother is automatically the best man despite the fact that they can't stand each other and avoid each other as much as possible. To make FMIL happy, we put him in as a GM (multiple times have had to readdress the fact he's not the BM), but then they were leaving out his sister saying she doesn't have to be in the WP. I thought that was extremely rude, and seeing as FH and I get along with her a million times better than his brother, I made sure to put her in. This is all after our WP was already chosen... I just thought it was unfair to include one but not the other, and am getting really annoyed that they're still pushing him as BM even though we're not having a BM or MOH. All of this makes the WP uneven, so we decided to have our 3 best friends (2 girls, 1 guy) who are all close friends walk down at the same time, a girl on each of the guy's arms. 

Don't be too worried about numbers, but do be worried about having to deal with these people for the rest of your life. Tell her that if she doesn't like it, then she can make the decision if she wants to be in it or not, and she can't do a flip flop and change her mind. Just a thought....