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Original poster

To dress 6 year old dd in a bridesmaid type dress to a wedding

461 replies

Notthinkingclearly · 29/04/2016 12:44

Dd is 6 and has always loved the beautiful frothy dresses in shops designed as bridesmaid dresses. We are going to a family wedding in a few weeks and I spotted a beautiful dress from john Lewis in a charity shop for £10. Very similar currently selling for £60. I bought her a cheap pink bollero cardigan to wear over the top. It is cream with a bow at the back. Now worried that I will offend the bride as I guess it was designed as a bridesmaid dress but I just thought it would be a chance for dd to wear a proper princess type dress.. I don't even know who she has as bridesmaids as I don't know her very well and would never have expected her to ask dd. Should I let dd wear the dress?

OP posts:
PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 13:45

It's not about that. It's about whether the thought process of making that judgment on someone at a wedding would go through your mind. It just wouldn't dawn on me.

PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 13:46

You think people should consider 'I want' and not give any thought to other people who whether you like it or not are much more important on that day.

I never said wear the dress even if it offends. I said why on earth would it.

OVienna · 30/04/2016 13:48

It's white and clearly a bridesmaid dress. I think people will think you're a bit of a loon OP if you let her wear it. There is really no ambiguity about the style and the colour is for sure a no.

What are you wearing btw OP???? Hopefully nothing matching.

BillSykesDog · 30/04/2016 13:50

It's not about that. It's about whether the thought process of making that judgment on someone at a wedding would go through your mind. It just wouldn't dawn on me.

Well it would dawn on me. Because as I said earlier I've been in the exact position of being an adult bridesmaid having to cheer up two very disappointed little girls who were very hurt by someone doing exactly this.

BabyDubsEverywhere · 30/04/2016 13:52

I did this, by accident, many years ago with ex-StepDD She was only just toddling and I bought her a pretty lilac party dress... I had no idea the bridesmaids were all wearing bloody lilac until we arrived at the church! The photographer had apparently taken tonnes of pics of her thinking she was a tiny flower girl!! Luckily my cousin (was her wedding) thought it was hysterical, but I was mortified.

peacheshoney · 30/04/2016 13:54

The bride is maybe not being upstaged but teh bridesmaids are.If you are a child bridesmaid you don't really do anything excep0t walk down the aisle and wear a BM dress.If all the children start wearing BM dresses , you are taking the specialness away from the actual BMs
And while it doesn't make me think anything about the child, I do look at the parents and think 'You are so precious about your child you couldn't bear the fact that for one day they're not going to be in the spotlight so you've dressed them up to get attention'
^this^

hownottofuckup · 30/04/2016 14:05

Doesn't look like a very attention seeking dress to me.

Eminado · 30/04/2016 14:11

"Doesn't look like a very attention seeking dress to me."

But why this dress? Just why? Is there a shortage of formal dresses jn this country?
I mean honestly Confused

PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 14:12

BillSykesDog would it not dawn on you that they just liked the dress and didn't realise it would be an issue? I would have thought chiffony/netted dresses were standard outfits for wee girls at weddings, and would have bought DD a floaty party dress without realising it might be an unspoken faux pas. You'd rather read something unpleasant into it?

They come second to your little princesses right to float round done up like a dogs dinner in something out of the early 00s.

My DD is 8 and would still choose a floaty dress like the OP's for a party over something 'cool'.

PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 14:17

Also, you've said this:

It's a particular problem because those froo froo frothy dresses are to a lot of people a bit old fashioned and tacky anyway. A lot of little bridesmaids wear what are essentially floaty summer dresses now and not yards of netting. So, yes, if a little girl turns up wearing one of them it sticks out like a sore thumb.

So if bridesmaids might wear floaty summer dresses, what are little girl guests actually ok to wear so that they don't look like they are trying to be a bridesmaid?

SuburbanRhonda · 30/04/2016 14:18

I never said wear the dress even if it offends. I said why on earth would it.

So because you don't understand why someone might be offended you conclude that there is no offence? Sounds very ego-centric.

PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 14:23

No, just someone who doesn't 'get' all the shit that goes with weddings and the professionally offended. I'd be the person everyone was talking about because I'd thought dressing my DD up to the nines would be a sign of making an effort for their wedding but not realising that there's a fine line between not bothering and bothering too much.

BlueFolly · 30/04/2016 14:26

It's not saying that the bride is being upstaged to point out that dressing your child as a bridesmaid at a wedding where they are not a bridesmaid is rude, attention seeking and says that you don't give a shit about the feelings of the people involved in the wedding.

This

BillSykesDog · 30/04/2016 14:27

So if bridesmaids might wear floaty summer dresses, what are little girl guests actually ok to wear so that they don't look like they are trying to be a bridesmaid?

Basically anything which isn't clearly an old fashioned formal bridesmaid's dress?

As other people have pointed out, there are loads and loads of dresses which are coloured, patterned - you've just linked to a page full of them ffs. So why on earth would you go for the one style and colour of dress that just screams bridesmaid?

Booboostwo · 30/04/2016 14:30

Your DD is not a bridesmaid but you specifically chose a bridesmaid's dress for her - that to me is weird and I would assume you are trying to make some kind of statement (that your DD should have been a bridesmaid?).

If you want your DD to wear the dress let her wear it anywhere else but the wedding, then she will be a 6yo enjoying a pretty dress rather than the daughter of a mum trying to make an awkward statement at someone else's wedding.

itshappenedagain · 30/04/2016 14:31

I was a bridesmaid last year but my daughter wasn't, the dress I had bought her was cream and bridesmaid style ( as they all are for small girls) so I bought a dye and dyed it pale pink. She looked fab. Bride said she looked pretty too!

PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 14:32

It's just the colour that screams bridesmaid, not the style IMO. If that dress was red would it be a bridesmaid dress or a party dress?

And I wouldn't buy a white/cream dress regardless. Because my DD would drop her dinner down it. But I would have bought her a coloured, tight bodice + chiffon skirt dress, assuming that this is what children would wear to weddings.

BillSykesDog · 30/04/2016 14:32

No, just someone who doesn't 'get' all the shit that goes with weddings and the professionally offended.

No, you are a person who 'doesn't get all the shit' so had decided to impose your view that it shouldn't matter on to other people.

It may well not matter at all to the bride, groom or their other bridesmaids they might not care. But equally they might. We don't know. And asking her would put her in an awkward position where she would feel obliged to say yes even if she didn't know what she doesn't want to.

So the easiest and politest thing for everybody is just for a guest to get one of the thousands of available and affordable alternatives.

Saying 'well I don't get it and I don't care so nobody else should' is just saying 'I am incapable of understanding that anybody might think differently from me so I am just going to assume that I am right and everybody should feel the same as me'.

SymbollocksInteractionism · 30/04/2016 14:33

PrimalLass I agree with you, I also don't get all the shite that seems to go with weddings. I was just happy to have my friends and family at mine, I couldn't have cared less what people were wearing that's not what it's about. I don't get the thought process of anyone who would be bothered about a wee girls dress!!

BillSykesDog · 30/04/2016 14:35

'And if they don't - sod them - my views and feelings are the important ones.'

PrimalLass · 30/04/2016 14:38

No, you are a person who 'doesn't get all the shit' so had decided to impose your view that it shouldn't matter on to other people.

Well it shouldn't. Seriously - it is the most small minded, petty, bollocks.

Eminado · 30/04/2016 14:42

What Billsykes said.

Esp 👇🏼
Saying 'well I don't get it and I don't care so nobody else should' is just saying 'I am incapable of understanding that anybody might think differently from me so I am just going to assume that I am right and everybody should feel the same as me'.

^^
Reminds me of people who use the word "banter" when they are in fact just rude. 🙄

And in this case - choosing this dress is for no reason at all other than you can. The dress is not a family heirloom, it's easily substituted, it has no sentimental value. Makes no sense to me.

Lunar1 · 30/04/2016 14:52

I didn't have any little bridesmaids, because there were over 50 children at my wedding it just wouldn't have been fair to just pick a couple of them. The pictures are amazing of all the children dressed up.

One mum got her dd a proper bridesmaid dress and made things really hard work for us by trying to get her in every single photo and even to join in the first danceConfused.

For whatever reason your dd wasn't asked to be a bridesmaid, please don't send her as one. Everyone will be too polite to say anything but they will all be thinking WTF about you.

BillSykesDog · 30/04/2016 14:54

Well it shouldn't. Seriously - it is the most small minded, petty, bollocks.

And there, exactly, you have made my point for me. Ta.

leopardgecko · 30/04/2016 14:55

At a recent wedding a beautiful little girl wore a similar dress, and looked far more like a bridesmaid than the actual bridesmaids. Many of the guests thought she was a bridesmaid and even the photographer called for her in many of the official photographs. Unlike you OP, the child's mother DID have an agenda and DID think her daughter should have been a bridesmaids. It was embarrassment all around, both for the little girl who kept having to say she wasn't a bridesmaid, to her mother who told the long tale of how she thought she SHOULD have been, and the actual bridesmaids themselves who were equally embarrassed and sidelined her. I actually felt really sorry for the little girl. I know this isn't the same for you, OP, but I do worry that some of the guests who you do not know may THINK you have an agenda in wanting your daughter to be a bridesmaids. I think to save everyone potential awkwardness and embarrassment (maybe most of all your daughter) I would not have her wear something which does say 'bridesmaid's dress'.