To be annoyed at SIL-to-be?

I've only been to one of my three SIL's hens and it's the one I was friends with before she got with my brother. Hen's are for your pals surely, not the extended family?

But you only see your brother twice a year so you can hardly have ever met this stranger. Why would you expect to pop up at these very personal events?

my brothers wife didn't invite me to he'd hen party. now our situation was a bit different to yours. she lived across the road from us was a few years below me in school. brother and her started going out quiet young. she had been to many family events big birthdays and spent many an eve at our house. so I was a bit hurt and so was my sis at tye time. my sis did invite her future sis in laws to her but she lives near them and would have seen them loads. one lives next door to her. mu sis would have invited my sis in law to her hen but she lived in a different country at the time. when my hen party came along I didn't invite her. but alos didn't invite my mother mother on law or future sis on laws on my husbands side. one I dint believe mother should be at hen party's and 2 sis in law are a good bit older than me. so I arranged for afternoon tea for them ( I did not invite my brothers wife to that either ) which I think is more appropriate. my sis did simualr but with dinner instead. i also did not have any nieces and nephews as flower girls and page boys. tried to keep it simple. older ones did a reading. in yoir case as it sounds like yoi dint know her well I wouldn't get too worked up about it. we didn't no much about my brothers wedding either so we just put on nice clothes turned up smiled for the camera and enjoyed the party. that's all yoi can do. enjoy

I wasn't invited to now-SIL's hen do. I was a bit hurt at the time but got over it and we have a good relationship.

Do you want to spend a hen do listening to
jokes based around your brother’s penis? Because that’s how some hen dos I have been to have ended up.

A hen do is for the bride and her friends. You aren’t one of her friends, so obviously you are not invited.

Flower girls are part of the bridal party, chosen by the bride. She sees you maybe twice a year so barely knows your children.

It would be completely different if you were a tight knit family and you saw them frequently.

She's going to be your sister in law, not necessarily your friend. Hen parties are - in my view - more for friends of the bride, unless family members are particularly close.

I wouldn't be offended, it doesn't mean that she doesn't like or value you, just possibly that you'd cramp her style being the sister of her husband to be?

Hen parties are traditionally for the bride's family and friends, not people from the family she's marrying into. Again, traditionally brides' attendants. bridesmaids, flowergirls etc are from the bride's family/friends, not the groom's.

If you want to be involved in the wedding, it would be by request of your brother. But as you don't sound particularly close, that's not obvious either -- and why you'd expect to be invited to a hen party or be involved in the bride's part of the wedding party when you see your brother twice a year, so presumably barely know his fiancée is a bit mad. You sound spectacularly aggrieved over the decisions of someone you must only have a fairly initial acquaintance with. Which may be obvious and why she's steering clear of you.

Why would it be the bride's job to have the groom's family's children in HER bridal party?

If he feels strongly about it, then presumably your brother would invite your children to form part of the groom's party?

As for inviting future female in-laws to a hen do - meh, I'm agnostic.

It might be a nice thing to do, possibly, but if you don't know each other well it turns the whole thing into a bit of a networking event.

I'd concentrate on developing your relationship after the wedding rather than getting hung up on the pre-stuff.

Doesn't sounds like your particularly close so not sure why you would expect to be invited? I wouldn't say it was necessarily the norm to invite your in laws to be.

I could be wrong but I think you have some very rigid views on how families work. You say you are average siblings but I don't think that's even a thing...every family works differently with so many variables that affect closeness.

Do you get on with your SIL? Are you friends with her?

I'm pretty old and things may have changed, but it literally never occurred to me to ask my sils or mil to my hen do. I didn't even invite my own mum. It's was just my close friends.

I was also not invited to my sils' hen dos and would have been very surprised to get an invite.

Also, I would expect bridesmaids and page boys to come from the bride's family, not the grooms.

You only see your brother twice a year so I assume you must live quite a distance from him? You can only have met this lady a handful of times? Maybe she just didn’t think of you given there isn’t much relationship there?

It honestly would never occur to me to invite my future SIL to my hen do. I went to the hen dos for both my sisters and neither of them had invited their future SILs either. Just sisters and close friends usually. Sometimes cousins.

I certainly wouldn't want a flower girl to be a child I barely knew. Obviously your future DH knows his nieces but if he wants to involve them he makes them ring-bearers and has them on his team, not yours.

I didn't invite my SIL to be to my hen do, nor my MIL to be. I love them loads but they didn't know anyone going nor do they do the sorts of things we were planning on doing. It was all friends and my mam at mine. My mam is my best friend.

YABU, I've seen both over the years and wouldn't think anything of it. I think it's nice to invite the in-laws, and typically the better choice but if you're not close or don't get on then it's fine not too.

The groom's sister wouldn't typically be in the wedding party (although, again, lovely gesture to make) and flower girls often come from the bride's side.

Fair enough if you're a bit miffed, but don't make an issue of it. Feelings run high around weddings and if you're the one seen to be making trouble it'll have consequences long past the wedding. Turn up, smile, congratulate them and then take it from there.

I didn't invite my SIL-to-be to my hen do - didn't occur to me, as I just had friends - and we still get on just fine 35 years later so I wouldn't overthink it!

There is no way in hell I would have invited my mum or my MIL to my hen!

You only see them a couple of times a year?

Do you have a relationship with her by phone/message?

You barely know her so why would she want to go to a spa with you? It's just so odd to get upset about this

Maybe she wants to relax with friends rather than think about whether it’s etiquette to invite certain people? And if you see them twice a year (which is far far less than I see my siblings) then she’s met you a handful of times. Why should you or your DC be in the bridal party? Maybe she has relatives on her own side she’d prefer or maybe she doesn’t want flower girls. And the hen parties I’ve been to have only included the grooms sisters and mum if the bride was close to them. Oh apart from one of my friends - she invited sister of the groom because she thought she had to and SOG spent the whole evening getting shitfaced and then loudly crying because she thought she’d never get married. She pulled similar shit at the wedding. My friend is now divorced and happy to be away from that weird family.