To have expected my daughters to be flower girls

[Notmotherofflowergirls]

Just created an account for people to pile on to me and tell me I am an idiot. I don’t think I can tell my real friends.
I am inwardly cringing!
My brother is getting married in 3 months time to a woman with no nieces or nephews.
My mother and I naturally assumed that my two girls 4 and 6 would be the flower girls. There are no other kids in the family although stepdad has grandchildren.
My mother was feeling left out of all the planning. DB was uncommunicative about the plans and always referred us to SiL and when my mum asked to contribute she was batted away.
Finally Mum insisted that she would buy the flower girl dresses and finally brother agreed. So on Wednesday SiL posted an invoice for three flower girl dresses from a Shop in Dublin. She included a nice note saying that she mustn’t feel obliged to pay.
My mum asked who the third dress was for: it turns out all three are for her cousin’s girls.
Brother came round and said that they will be only kids at wedding.
My brother was asked point blank if he didn’t want his nieces there and all he could say was he would speak with SiL. He did look sheepish.
My dad died and while my mum has not remarried she has been with her partner for 9 years. His kids are not invited. My stepdad isn’t going and is angry that my mum has been made to feel so upset.
I feel as if I have been kicked in the guts. My mum keeps bursting into tears.
My DH says he’s ongoing either Have we overstepped? Would anyone else have made the same assumption?

Now I see why couples just elope so much less drama and future drama for all involved.

The flower girl assumption was a bit presumptuous I feel... I've seen a bride have her best friends' little girls as flower girls. You don't know who else she might be close to, like her cousin's kids here.

Not being invited when kids from the bride's side is, plus them not communicating it to you in advance, is rude and hurtful.

This is more on the groom, though I also don't understand why a bride would want to cut herself off from her in law's family like that from the start of her marriage. Fair enough if totally no kids or only immediately related kids but this isn't the case here

Jeez, the drama, the histrionics! Bursting into tears multiple times, kicks in the gut, diva behavior from stepfather because his adult children aren't invited..

Something tells me, the bride would be perfectly happy if none of you attended. I'd be if I were her, for sure.

Look, the bride seems perfectly happy to be with her own family and isn't really fussed about any of you, clearly. Your brother also doesn't seem to be. Or is otherwise a wet-wipe. So if you want a relationship with them/him and any possible future grandchildren - go. If not - don't.

@Notmotherofflowergirls

Thinking back to weddings I’ve been to - it has very much been bridesmaids = brides friends/family, and then flower girls = children associated with brides friends/family. With both my sister in laws, I don’t think I’d expect my children to be flower girls etc or get upset. It is brides : maids rather than grooms : maids.

However I do think I’d have reconsidered if I’d know it would have meant a lot to my in laws. And then not to be invited at all seems odd unless it is an otherwise child free wedding or planned as a small wedding. Plus not including the others. Again this really depends on whether it’s a small wedding/child free etc.
I also agree that your son should NOT be taking a back seat here.
If you really think this has been an intentional exclusion, then I’d have a heart to heart with your son and explain how you feel.

And then going forward, I think you’ll just have to take a back seat. Not get involved, stand back, not intervene - and just be open if they come to you.

I personally don’t like weddings- they often get farcical and someone is always offended.
The most important thing is the life they have together after the wedding : and I’d focus more on that, supporting where you can but (however difficult it may feel) - letting go and let them live their life.

My s’n’law (husband’s brother’s wife) is lovely but she is like this. It’s all about her family and no interest in helping my b’n’law to engage with his family and he’s a bit of a wet blanket. They had their wedding abroad so a small wedding party and our twins were b’n’laws only niece / nephew - Bride had uncles son involved in ceremony and zero roles for b’n’law. She is nice enough just self absorbed.
let this be a warning to you that this is the way forward with things her family will take priority

Sorry OP YANBU to be disappointed but are you able to help smooth this over at all with your Mum and DSD?

I do think your DSD should still go to the wedding and suggest the adults in the family put their own views aside for this one day (is there someone else who can have your DDs?).

It’s on your DB really as you said but it’s not worth making this so petty as having a point of DSD looking after the DC (unless truly necessary).

So has OP’s brother in agreeing to it/going along with the plans.

It’s not your wedding.

I don't understand why everyone blaming the soon to be sister in law as the brother is their family, can they not just sit down the mum, son and sister and talk calmly about this instead of all this crying and gossipying and can imagine endless grief.

You are being ridiculous. The bride picks children she is close to (or probably whose parents she is close to as they will need to be involved) as flower girls - my best friend did exactly this- her second cousin's children (so her second cousin's once removed) were flower girls and none of her DH's nieces - no one made a fuss (and believe me this is a family who create a drama about most things) - because she wasn't close to his nieces.
the rest of it is just reasonable choices- adult children of your stepfather- when you weren't brought up as siblings- it just depends how close they are - neither of my sisters had my stepsister at their weddings and my stepfather came (and gave one of them away!)
you all seem to have made it all about you- this is the way to create a division in the family- your reaction rather than their actions

We still don't know from the OP just how big a wedding this is. Maybe it's fairly small and the groom decided his 25 invites should go to his mates at the rugby club. He won't have thought to mention to his sister or mother all the people he's not inviting (his nieces, his mother's partner's adult children and their spouses and their children, etc)

Why on earth did you assume your DDs would be flower girls? Does SIL to be know them well?

Are her cousins a lot younger? I have cousins my own age who I grew up knowing and I also have others that were born when I was in my teens and my relationship with them has often been more as an aunt than as a cousin.

The son of one of my older cousins got married a couple of years ago. My dad, brother, brother's wife and children were invited. I wasn't.

And that's because I have only seen the groom a couple of times in his life, he doesn't know me whereas my brother and dad and family are closer, in my dad's case geographically closer too.

I don't think you should just have assumed your kids would be flower girls and it's not unreasonable at all for the bride to pick her cousin's children, maybe she's closer to them. Your mum is just as bad insisting she pay for the dresses without checking who's wearing them first.

@ittakes2 - Why is it the sister in laws job to help her husband engage with his family? My husband's family are his family, if he wants to see them or include them then he sorts it out not me.

And this is exactly why we eloped. There’s always at least one person who isn’t the bride or groom that believes they should have a say over aspects of a wedding.

It's not at alll cheeky.

The SIL probably has no idea that the MIL expected the grandchildren to be flower girls, she got a message that MIL would like to contribute to the wedding and would like to pay for dresses.

She sent a message saying this is what the dresses cost, pleaaae don't feel obliged to pay.

She asked children she knows and has a relationship with to be part of her wedding party.

It's completely normal everywhere except Mumsnwt to have a child free wedding except for members of the wedding party. Cousin may be bringing them home early, etc.

Most of the hundred plus weddings I have been to were like this.

Only on Mumsnet do people think that invitations addressed to a couple extend to their 7-child blended family. That's not the real world.

Have a fun time being child free at the wedding and invite BIL and SIL to tea afterwards to as your kids and get to know them.

Going NC is a batshit reaction.

That was her choice and their choice. Maybe her brother just thinks of them as his mother’s partner’s kids; people he gets on perfectly well with, and doesn’t see as close.

It’s quite common for people not to invite cousins to weddings - no one bats an eyelid at that. To me, the children of a parent’s partner, who you didn’t even meet until adulthood, are less close in terms of relationships.

You and your Mum were wrong to assume your children would be flower girls. They usually come from the bride's side. A bit odd and hurtful if they aren't invited at all though. Is it they aren't well behaved? Does your brother really get on with your Mum's partner's kids? Ask your brother again.

Thought it was going to be a reverse because of th "nice note" but maybe not.

Has anyone said it yet? They are not second cousins! They are first cousins once removed

I reckon the cousin is like a sister to the bride.

Although, I did tell my husband I would have nothing more to do with my ILs if, after telling us that no children were invited, they invited the brides nephews (although my husband is close to his brother and sees him often) because that would be ridiculous (obviously, wedding party aside) but I accepted my kids weren't originally invited.

Shouldn't have assumed they were invited, definitely not that they're flower girls, but brother should have stated it was child free.

Your mum played a silly game, I also wonder if she would have said she wasn't paying for the third girl's dress if the other two were for your children.

Bride has done nothing wrong, although could have invited Groom's nieces. I don't think sending the invoice (stating she doesn't have to pay) to someone who offered to pay is a problem, only other way to make it clear would have been for your brother to say "you don't have to pay for their dresses, it's for Bride's cousin's children, you could always pay for x instead if you really want to contribute".

I would t have assumed they were going to be flower girls but to invite her cousins kids to the wedding and not his nieces is strange and mean. She is basically saying her family trumps his going forward. It’s every mother of sons worst nightmare . Sounds like the finance won’t let your brother have much to do with his family once they are married. Prepare to never see much of him again.

Yes you were wrong to assume the girls would be flower girls but I think it’s utterly disgusting that they aren’t invited (when some cousins kids are), and now even your dh isn’t going to look after them, that really is quite disgraceful imo. As is not inviting the step siblings. Sounds like sil has called all all the shots and db has gone along with- he should stand up for his family before this gets worse, he can see his mum is upset her grandkids won’t be there!

Why are you assuming this is her decision rather than his, and that if he doesn’t see his family much it because she ‘won’t let him’ rather than him not wanting to?

It’s amazing how he’s being hand waved away as ‘weak’ and she’s being cast as the controlling harpy that’s more responsible for his relationship with his family than he is. Maybe this is exactly the level of involvement he’s actively decided he wants his family to have. Maybe she just isn’t interested in doing the infamous ‘wife work’ that mumsnet seems to simultaneously resent and yet expect.

Is it only me that thinks that OP's daughters may be a handful/as dramatic as some of their close relatives which is why they weren't invited to be flower girls? B&G may have been hoping to avoid having to tell the family why they didn't include them in the bridal party.

It's always the fault of the controlling IL child, don't you know? Their own dear child would never do such a thing.

Always the way it seems, in a world where grown ass men famously have zero agency.

What makes me laugh is the ‘he’s being controlled by that witch. Don’t stand for it, YOU tell him what he needs to do!’. As if the problem isn’t actually that he’s being controlled, just that he’s being controlled by the wrong person.

I think it is presumptuous to assume these things based off of OP who is hurt because her expectations and that of her mothers weren’t met or given into. OP doesn’t read like she is close to the bride whatsoever or has actually talked to her herself and it has all been passed through her brother who probably isn’t that bothered as OP and his mum are.

Add in his mum pushing to contribute and not taking no for an answer and getting upset because it wasn’t what she thought it was and OP adding to it with their assumptions about flower girls, it reads more of miscommunication and assumed expectations with neither OP or her mum actually asking the bride herself and relying stupidly on her dear brother.

Surely, if the bride was as mean as some posters are ridiculously choosing to see her as, OP should/would have mentioned whether they got on or not, talked much, etc. Plus, if that were the case, why would she want her daughters a part of a wedding where she couldn’t stand the bride and have to be around her?