Not thanked at engagement party

[Whoisunreasonable]

To cut a long story short it was my son’s engagement party recently. Marrying a lovely girl. After they booked the party we were sent details and times, not given anymore info. We turned up and party was very extravagant and fancy. Turned out the brides family paid for the whole thing. We gifted them £75 as an engagement present.

Son made a small speech and cheers with champagne thanking everyone for coming and for presents and then thanked brides parents for all of the efforts they’d put into planning the party and for paying for it. No thanks to any of his side of the family at all. I raised this with him and he didn’t see my problem at all. He told me it wasn’t a wedding speech where he was thanking everyone individually, just a few words and it would be rude not to thank them. AIBU to think he should have thanked us too? It was very embarrassing not to even be mentioned. I asked if he needed me to do anything for the party and was told no as they had vendors doing it.

oh dear OP, I have changed my mind since my last post due to your responses. I think you are trying to impose your own ideas too much. This is their day, their party, their celebration. They will have (and are entitled to have) what THEY want, not what you want or think is best. You will push them away if you keep acting like this.

Please just be happy for them and let them celebrate how they want to. If you can genuinely embrace their choices then you will likely be invited to be more involved. At the moment they are afraid to involve you in case you cast judgement and try to interfere or change things. Please bear this in mind for your future relationship. Especially when it comes to how they raise any children they may have!!!

The thing is Op, it wouldn’t have been the same outcome. You would have been involved for a start - and from your posts it’s pretty clear that you are quite controlling /get the hump quite easily - but also, lack the self awareness to realise this about yourself.

The reason theyve paid an event organiser to do it is firstly that it’s much easier for them in terms of workload and headspace - but also, I suspect, to avoid having to tiptoe around your fragile feelings. Can you see that you have somehow managed to centre yourself in their big celebration?

So you wanted vol-au-vents and a cheese pineapple hedgehog and your son said no, that’s not what they wanted, so you told your side of the family there was no food at all? I can see why he got upset. It looks deliberate. And the fact you wouldn’t have paid half because it wasn’t to YOUR taste also reflects badly. You cannot impose your will on them and make it conditional. If I were your DIL I’d ignore any offers from you to help with wedding planning, however well meaning you are.

You sound naive, in cloud cuckoo land. How much do you think an engagement party costs? Spectrum of cheap v v luxurious? Or how much did his. £75?

It's not having a primary school friend round for tea, or a cheap party for a 6 year old. You yourself said it was very lavish.

Just to add - one doesn’t do serious thanks at an engagement party anyway! Her parents got mentioned specifically because they’d paid [a fortune] for the party - everyone else gets a general ‘love you all’ apart from the bride. Because it’s really her event, isn’t it? Traditionally I mean.

none of it is actually about you at all!

Thank you for what?

You did not organise the party, you did not pay for it so there was no reason to publicly thank you for anything.

You simply turned up like all the other guests. No reason to highlight you specifically in his little speech.

He thanked everyone for coming, which includes you. That should be enough.

It just sounds like you are feeling insecure because the in-laws organised an expensive party and it should not be a competition...

Still itching to know the never-before-seen-or-heard-of fancy details.
Wait staff all trained spider monkeys?
Cocktail glasses made entirely of ice and crushed diamonds?
Fiancée's father in nothing but a jock strap?

@DowntonNabby

'it would have saved lots of money that didn’t need to be spent.'

but

it wasn't your money !!!

there is no need for you to be trying to save other people's money for them, even if you now think you are better off than them ?

and of course you are now leaving this thread, as it is not going the way you want / wanted it to go...

Now I love a hedgehog as much as the next child of the Seventies but I wouldn’t expect a young couple getting engaged in this day and age to!

Jumping the shark here OP.

However on the off chance that you are serious, its really simple.

If I offered to throw a fancy party for my DC and partner's engagement then the only opinion I'm interested in is theirs. They say "yes" - it goes ahead. I'd expect them to guide me on what they felt appropriate if there was a big disparity in family incomes but this is not relevant to you since you state you are the wealthier family.

Any whiners that would prefer sausage roll platters at the Dog and Duck with Uncle Dave's ipod providing the music would be invited to go ahead and please throw that party as well and I would be delighted to join them if invited.

Yep, sons are pretty useless at passing on what females consider to be the vital bit of information.

If you can foster a good relationship with your DIL then liaise with her about important stuff - but listen to what she says. Times, tastes and fashions change and you are fine to offer, but they are fine to decline.

Can you not see that this is all about YOU, what you think, your opinion, how you would have done the decor, what you would have done with the money saved. It was about what they wanted as it should have been. Every time you post it becomes clearer that any contribution from you would have come with conditions. I can see you quibbling with the poor engaged couple over the price of balloon arches and decoration and trying to cut corners with home made. If you were throwing your own party for anniversary, birthday etc then that would be fine. Your son probably knows all too well what would have happened. They had the party they wanted and that is as it should be. I would be very, very wary of saying any of this to them when you have a chat if you want any hope of being involved in any of the wedding planning.

At the end of the day OP you are tight. End of.

Everything you have said reeks of skimping, making do, cutting corners and saving a few quid.

Lucky for your son you are NOT in charge no matter how much you tried to give your cheaper solutions to what YOU wanted.
So you embarrassed yourself further after all your meddling by giving an empty card at the party and transferring 75 bloody quid the day after it.

All you are worried about is that you came across as cheap to everyone else there and I’m afraid you succeeded in doing that.

Mortifying that you expected a big thank you on par with the in laws. For what?? Trying to throw a spanner in the works during planning? Telling everyone to eat beforehand? Insisting he invites who you want to a party you didn’t put a penny towards? Not even giving money on the right day? Giving a measly £75 because that’s what you gave your other kids many years ago?

Like I said… mortifying.

"The party was beautiful but I can’t help but think if we all banded together like I wanted we could have achieved the same outcome."

You need to get your head round the fact that this was NOT about what you want. The wedding won't be either and unless you want to ruin it with purse lipped, chip on the shoulder disapproval, you need to realise that.

If the ILs had expected you to pay half, you could have rightly expected a a say in how it was done. As they didn't, you don't.

Event planners take away the whole faff of the minutiae in planning. You'd have been bugging the poor couple every 5 mins saying "is this the shade you want, I'm not sure it will match the rest of the decor, and the other one is actually a bit cheaper". NO! They do not want to have those conversations even if it makes you feel good about yourself because you're helping.

Anyway, at least now you know, as do we, why your son kept you at arms' length and in the dark about the event. He knew you'd be like this and wanted none of it.

Not sure I’d categorise the DS as poor at communicating lazy etc based on this.

It sounds like he might have had quite a trying time with the OP in the lead up to this party. I’m thinking he’s had to do a lot of no Mum, you don’t need to blow up balloons, it’s all sorted, no Mum we don’t want you to come and sprinkle confetti on the tables, that’s sorted, right you want me to invite Uncle Gary, Auntie Sue, Uncle Dave, Auntie Pat etc? Ok right fine, I’ll add them to the list. No mum I don’t need a person you know who used to be a DJ to come and do a set - no mum we’re not having a buffet (or a bun fight as my lovely MIL refers to them as). Possibly he’s been given every indication by the OP that she doesn’t approve and they’re doing it all wrong,

The DS then gets to his engagement party to find out all of his side of family (half of whom it sounds like he’s been told to invite at someone else’s expense) have been told by mum there will be no food so have eaten. I don’t think he had to thank you in his speech but suspect he wouldn’t have been massively inclined to by that point anyway.

Spot on. The telling the family there was no food might also have felt deliberate to him because he’d said no to his mum’s request for a buffet.

No, sons are not "useless" at sharing information. Men raised to expect women to mediate their relationships are useless (full stop). My sons manage this fine for themselves, as do my daughters but they didn't grow up with the mind set that its a "woman's job".

Its perfectly sensible to foster good relations with DCiLs of both sexes and absolutely fashion changes. However there is no gene on the Y chromosome which prevents men from managing their own families and relationships and necesitates their dumping the responsibility onto women in their lives.

Honestly I sometimes wonder how it is that gay men in relationships ever see either of their families.

I wonder how much involvement OP had in her previous DCs wedding preparations.

The treatment of her for the engagement party suggests there maybe some history on that front.

Absolutely. I'm sure it wasn't the OP's intention but it's exactly the sort of thing that a manipulative MIL who was feeling snubbed might do.

Why would he thank you? You didn’t do anything, provide anything or even give the money gift on the night.

I can't over you issuing instructions to the rest of the family to each.

Clearly you are used to being the matriarch in charge in your family, and don't know how to adjust to being a supportive parent to your sons choices.

Everyone got the invitation, you didn't need to provide further information, which turned out to be wrong

You sound old fashioned, from having a set amount of money to give each child even if it means one marries 50 years after the other.

They had the money to throw a fancy party, tbh most parties are fancy now, it's quite rare to have a buffet table with pineapple hedgehog and Vol au vents, DJ in the corner, hand made decorations etc people use to spend hours at a venue blowing up balloons and cooking loads of food, rushing all about and then trying to get ready to attend the party. For quite some time people have this done now for them, it doesn't matter if you get everything for 20 quid and create your own balloon arch with sparkly backdrop for photos and fill the room with confetti, when it's done professionally it looks a million times better and the only people who will tell you a home made balloon arch looks brilliant when it looks like shite are the ones who try create them themselves.

Your son obviously knows you're old fashioned and that is why he didn't want you involved in the decorations and food. He knew it was being done professionally so no need for anyone's help.

It's shit he didn't say about the food but tbh it's extremely rare for a party not to have food, even if it's just wooden platters with chicken and skewers, and wedges and other meat and cheese things. Was it a sit down meal ? I would have just ate so as not to offend .