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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Are my friends BU to book their wedding one week before their best friends?

87 replies

firebreather · 18/03/2012 18:12

We are friends with Couple A and Couple B, who are also best friends with each other. Groom B is going to be best man at A's wedding, and maybe vice versa (although I'm not totally sure).

Couple A got engaged 3 or 4 months ago and booked their wedding for September 2013. Couple B got engaged a couple of weeks ago. They were also looking to get married in September or October 2013. They looked around a few venues and found one they really liked, but the only date that was available in their time frame was the week before Couple A's wedding. Couple A are upset about it, presumably because they think Couple B are upstaging them. We are all in the same circle of friends, so quite a few of the guests will be going to both weddings.

I'm sure Couple B could have chosen a different date (ie. not in their Sept/Oct time frame), but it's not what they would prefer. I'm not sure of all the reasons they picked this particular time frame, but I suspect it's a combination of having enough time to save up money, not wanting to pay middle-of-the summer wedding prices, and not wanting to get married in winter. Possibly it could also be to do with where they want to go on honeymoon and picking the right season for that. Either way, I'm not sure if the reasons are particularly important.

Things have turned a bit sour, which is a real shame and has put us and some other friends in the middle of everything. So, who do you think is being unreasonable? I can understand where they are both coming from, but am feeling that Couple A are being a bit unreasonable.

OP posts:
PrincessWellington · 18/03/2012 20:11

My cousin got married a week after my wedding. I didn't care at all. Guests were all the same on that side.

ViviPru · 18/03/2012 20:12

Hmm, maybe, Outraged, you make some very valid points. I'm not casting couple B as the villains, just my feeling is they were a bit unreasonable and I can understand why A are narked.

In your scenario, couple B's wedding sounds quite hastily arranged for valid reasons, and I suspect it had a very different feel to yours. Whereas the OP's couple B have lots of time to plan and a whole year of dates to choose from.

Couple A are pissing me off too though because their concerns do not extend to the enjoyment and convenience of their mutual guests, which would be one of the main reasons why I would try and avoid this scenario.

I guess I'm just coming at it from the perspective of couple B and I would just never opt to do that without very very good reason. (Perhaps there are more reasons the OP isn't privy to, but the ones she has cited are not good reason enough for me.)

MrsMeaner · 18/03/2012 20:15

I think what people need to appreciate is that the wedding is only one day. It is the marriage that counts. Hopefully both couples, and all their families and friends, will support them in this lifelong relationship and not be caught up in the trappings of one or two days.

dappply · 18/03/2012 20:39

We were couple B when we got married, choosing a date that was a week before a friend's wedding. We really couldn't do it any other time, due to family being on holidays, due dates of SIL's, other family issues like operations and christenings. We wanted to get married outside, so had to do it by late summer as we wanted to ttc after the wedding and couldn't leave it another year due to my age. Putting it all together with availability of our venue and photographer there was literally only one weekend we could do before October. Setting a date is complicated!

ViviPru · 18/03/2012 20:48

dap I imagine you had a conversation with your equivalent couple A along the lines of "we're getting married the week before you, we really couldn't do it any other time because of XYZ" (Your XYZ being perfectly valid and reasons explained in a sensitive way that A would understand). OP's couple B haven't.

Stinkyminkymoo · 18/03/2012 21:16

My best friend set her date 2 weeks after mine. I have to say I was incredibly upset. I had picked my date 3 months previous to her telling me and there were tears on both sides.

It meant I couldn't go to her wedding as we had already booked our honeymoon.
Did I care about the fact her date was close to mine? Nope, only the fact I couldn't see one of my bestest friends in the world get married.

So many people forget why they are getting married, it seems to only be about the party. I just wanted people to share our day and have as much fun as we did. Which they did Grin

dappply · 19/03/2012 07:37

Yeah we did phone them up and tell them first. We were a bit worried about it, so chose to confide in them about wanting to ttc. They understood.

OhTheConfusion · 19/03/2012 08:34

Wedding date planning can be very hard. My DS is getting married this summer, she set her date around several key dates as both she and my DH are teachers. However they are in Scotland and we are in England so only a few weeks of the summer hol's overlap. We were so greatful as this ment we could be there for the few days before and after to enjoy family time etc. The poor soul is even having her hen weekend in June half term to suit us too!

Friends of her fiance have now booked their wedding for the week before DS and fiance's. They got engaged a month after DS and Fiance and both grooms are ushers at each others weddings....BUT, the other bride has now announced that my DS will not be invited all day as she won't be her fiance's wife yet!

ViviPru · 19/03/2012 08:39

Ha Confusion, I take it the friends are both invited to your DS (DD?)'s wedding the following week?! God weddings. Bloody nightmare.

OhTheConfusion · 19/03/2012 08:47

Yes they sure are Vivi... as she said, they will be married then Angry

Words fail me sometimes!

Hermionewastherealhero · 19/03/2012 08:58

not really, as we are teachers we got married the weekend after close friends who are also teachers - friends came to both and we all had a super couple of weeks celebrating together

AntsMarching · 19/03/2012 09:12

Couple A is being in reasonable.

I had a similar situation with my wedding. Me and two friends all got engaged around the same time. When talking about our upcoming weddings, Friend A told me she was upset that Friend B had set her wedding two months before Friend A's. She then said I'd better not get married before her.

As it turned out, I did. The month before. That was due to having a time limit (I was on a fiancé visa and had only six months before it expired) and not wanting to get married near my birthday. It was a month before and in a different country to Friend A but she was still mad at me.

Some people do get crazy over weddings. Incidentally, Friend A was a complete bridezilla about her special day (at which I was a bridesmaid). The marriage didn't even make it to the one year anniversary. When she married for the second time, she was much more relaxed and they are still going strong! Even she can laugh about her bridezilla-ness now.

AntsMarching · 19/03/2012 09:13

Oops - unreasonable not in reasonable

pingu2209 · 19/03/2012 09:16

I think it is unreasonable to do it a week before. It would piss me off too. However, they don't own the month and will 'look' the worse couple if they start to go on about it.

ViviPru · 19/03/2012 09:31

There you go then, dappply. You showed good form.

Couple B in the OP could have mitigated the fall out if they'd handled it more sensitively and intelligently. Couple A should have been more gracious and mature.

They're all bloody unreasonable, OP. Sod the lot of them.

MrsBeakman · 19/03/2012 09:36

Blimey Confusion. So they have a rule at the wedding that only husband and wife couples can come and people in long term partnerships or who are "only" engaged cannot both come? How weird.

ASByatt · 19/03/2012 09:44

Wow!
Erm, we got engaged. Couple of months later, our best friends got engaged (to each other, which was thoughtful!) They set their date to be 2 weeks before ours.

It was fab!

We really enjoyed sharing the planning etc - despite having 2 quite different weddings - plus it meant that we did all the wedding droning to each each and spared all our other friends.

Their day was very special for them (and lovely for us too, thinking 'eek in two weeks time.....')

Our day was very special for us, and we got to tease them about being an old married couple.

Think some people are being v precious about this - the wedding (as the start of the marriage, which is of course the important bit) should be special to the people actually getting married, not a cause for one-up-manship.

Sorry, have waffled........

LilyBolero · 19/03/2012 09:51

One year I went to 7 weddings in 7 weeks, including my own, dh's brother and my best friend from school. It was all fun, no upstaging at all!!!

AutumnSummers · 19/03/2012 09:53

Looks to me like couple A are a bit indignant that they won't be getting every ounce of attention in the run-up to thier wedding. The wedding, in both cases, is done and celebrated in one day. No need to try to hog the calendar.

OhTheConfusion · 19/03/2012 10:01

Yes MrsBeakman, the bride to be seems to think that as numbers are tight then only wives or husbands are invited all day. Seems a bit silly considering they are having a wedding that is a few hrs away from where most people live and will mean DS (and goodness knows who else) left sat in a hotel room for the day.

ViviPru · 19/03/2012 10:06

That's nuts, Confusion What about long-term unmarried partners? DP and I have been together way longer than most of our married friends. I'd feel extremely put out I was not invited to a wedding at which DP was so close to the couple as to be given the role of usher, and yet because we are not married, I am not considered legitimate enough to be a guest.

Jesus some people are just batshit.

aldiwhore · 19/03/2012 10:12

Let people just get on with it, don't take sides, don't judge. Be sympathetic to both, and just, I don't know, go with the flow.

I can understand why one couple would be miffed and things obviously haven't been approached the right way, but I'm afraid I just couldn't summon the energy to get involved.

OhTheConfusion · 19/03/2012 10:14

I know Vivi, I would love to ask her but I barely know the girl. Feeling really sorry for DS though.

OTheHugeManatee · 19/03/2012 10:51

Hmmm. The first couple to book don't own the preceding weekend, but if I were the bride in Couple A I'd be having slight kittens at the thought of spending the weekend prior to my own wedding travelling to another wedding when I was likely to be in a whirlwind of last-minute preparations for my own.

Obviously I'm making a lot of assumptions about who is doing the organising but my wedding is looming in August this year and if my best friend announced today that she was all of a sudden getting married the weekend before mine I think I'd be a bit miffed purely because it's always a hassle and I know I'm going to be pretty busy at that point.

Couple B are perfectly within their rights to pick any date they like for their own wedding, but if I were them I would probably not have chosen the weekend before someone else's especially as they are close friends.

ViviPru · 19/03/2012 10:53

I agree Manatee

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