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Um...perhaps we should let our moms wear what they want?

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luckystar112

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Today''s Dear Prudence:


Dear Prudence,
My wedding is 59 days away, and I am concerned about my future mother-in-law''s dress. She is a wonderful woman who makes me feel accepted as her son''s choice for a wife. But with only two months left before the wedding, she had finally begun her search for a dress. Last Sunday, my mother-in-law held my bridal shower at her house. My mother told me that while she was there, she saw a photo of the dress my mother-in-law picked out. She described it as "young, low-cut, and flowing." I wanted to get to the bottom of this, as my mother-in-law had not even informed me that she had purchased anything. So, after the party, I sent her an e-mail, and she sent me a picture of the dress. I couldn''t believe what I was seeing. My 51-year-old mother-in-law has picked out a dress with a wispy skirt, a V-neck, and spaghetti straps. It''s fit and styled for someone my age—25! And it''s robin''s egg blue—which doesn''t even go with my champagne-colored dress, the bridesmaids'' sage green, the chocolate brown tuxes, and my mother''s pale pink dress. I can''t swallow the fact that she would attempt such a daring wardrobe choice on a day so important to me and her son. This dress has been ordered and is not set to arrive until two weeks before our wedding! I really need advice on how to tell her that I do not feel it is appropriate to wear.

—Frustrated Bride


Dear Frustrated,
The nerve of this 51-year-old woman to decide she''s just going to march off and buy a dress that she finds flattering without asking permission of a 25-year-old. Sure, she has welcomed you into her family and thrown a shower for you. But now she has really shown her true colors—robin''s egg blue, to be exact—by pulling this spaghetti-strap stunt. This V-neck desecration has to be stopped! You simply must tell her the hard truth. Something along the lines of, "Hey, you old hag, no one wants to see your saggy flesh. Your choice of color is an outrage. And, in case you''ve forgotten, in 59 days it''s going to be my day, my day, my day, my day."
—Prudie


YIKES!!! lol
 
Ugh...I hate people like that!! I forwarded that to my mom, FMIL, and FSIL''s. I said "Thank God I am not like this. It''s sad how people create stress for themselves and others."

Her response is funny though!
 
Yeesh!
 
I can''t tell what I think without seeing a picture or knowing anything about the parties invlolved.
I knew a girl whose mother showed up looking like an overdressed strweatwalker to her daughter''s wedding. This woman ended up snagging a guy at the party who was 3 years older than the groom, half the mother''s age. We kept the comments to ourselves, but it was pretty frightening to see the mother try so hard to outdo the daughter on her own day. So without both sides, I don''t want to judge, because I have seen it go both ways.

My FMIL wants to wear a hot pink polyester button up shirt and dark wash jeans to our wedding. Given that it is a formal, evening event at a mansion, it is inappropriate, but I am not sure if I want that fight so I understand where this bride may be coming from.
 
Hmmmm. Yeah.

I didn''t much like what my MIL wore to our weddings, but I didn''t really think it was any of my business. I can''t even imagine telling my MIL what to wear. That''s actually unthinkable. But then, I don''t know her very well. And as for my mom, I did suggest early on that a dress she had her eye on was a bit too much, but mom and I actually talk like that to each other about clothes generally, so it didn''t end up being even a little bit of a deal. Frankly, my mom was more beautiful and gracious than I was at both parts of our wedding. So I just basked in her glow and felt happy and proud of her.
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I don't think I will have that issue. I could see if she wanted to wear a leopard print miniskirt but that dress didn't sound that bad. I haven't seen it in person of course so...

I was watching an episode of "whose wedding is it anyway?" and the MOG work a full length bright red strapless gown complete with matching shawl. Everyone was pooing themselves over it and it only made her happier. I wouldn't have been happy but to freak out and make it a huge ordeal? She is only makeing herself look bad, not you.
 
It''s such a careful balance with families and weddings.

My mother spent ages looking and constantly wanted my opinion on any little outfit change she was thinking about. My mom is overweight and young looking for her age and was trying so hard to down play her weight while looking young. So I ended up practically dressing her! By her request. And my MIL is fly by the seat of her pants. Even she didn''t have a clue what she was wearing until 2 hours before she left the house!!

I''m all for letting people wear what they want. Surely adults have the common sense to pick something they will be comfortable in, even if they don''t look good in it (offering to take their photo so they can match accessories to it and showing them the photo can fix this little issue though).
 
I love that response!
 
Great response!

My general feeling was "I''m going to look fabulous in my dress, you should wear something you feel fabulous in as well. If that''s gold lame, then great." Seriously, WHO CARES!
 
I should make my mom wear a bikini
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hahahha
 
hehe. I gotta say I''m pretty surprised by the responses here. Although I think the bride may have a touch of bridezilla in her, if I''m picturing the dress correctly--and picturing it on a 51 year old woman--I think I''d be a little embarrassed too. Not that people shouldn''t wear what they like or what they are comfortable in...but like Sabine''s thread, sometimes what people are comfortable in isn''t the best choice for a wedding.

I wonder if "Prudie" would have responded differently if the bride didn''t seems so erratic.
 
Date: 4/17/2008 4:50:53 PM
Author: Dani_81809
I was watching an episode of ''whose wedding is it anyway?'' and the MOG work a full length bright red strapless gown complete with matching shawl. Everyone was pooing themselves over it and it only made her happier. I wouldn''t have been happy but to freak out and make it a huge ordeal? She is only makeing herself look bad, not you.
I saw that too. She admitted on camera that she wanted the attention to be on her so she could feel like a bride!
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Here''s the thing: some of us have friends, mothers, sisters, who would WANT to know if they looked silly or inappropriate, and we have the kind of relationship with them which allows us to do so. But the idea then isn''t to have them not embarrass us, but that we care about them, so that we care whether they embarrass themselves. Sabine''s worry for her mum was more that her mum didn''t look her best, not that her mum was harming HER in some way.

But it seems to me that if you don''t have the kind of relationship with someone that allows you to advise them they should nix an outfit on a normal day, then you shouldn''t be telling them what to wear to your wedding. You may be annoyed or upset by their duds, but ultimately, what someone else wears is none of a bride''s business.

What I found obnoxious about the letter written to Prudie was the bride''s sense of entitlement to decide what people wear. I find that really ridiculous!

It''s one thing for her to think to herself "man, that is one inappropriate dress!" and raise her eyebrows privately, but for her to say "how dare she not match herself to the napkins!" is seriously lame. I don''t think anyone on here has been like that. Not that I recall anyway.
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Date: 4/17/2008 6:23:24 PM
Author: Independent Gal
''how dare she not match herself to the napkins!''
LMAO!!!
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While reading Prudie''s letter, Lucky, I forgot that it was a letter you found. I kept reading it as if you were the bride.
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All this wedding planning does bring out some interesting things, doesn''t it?
 
I''m with lucky on this one, but go a little further. I wanted those standing next to me and FI (my sister and his best man) to wear muted colors. I didn''t dictate anything else but that. I had talked with my photographer for ideas and he thought that muted colors would work great with the Mexico landscape, as they wouldn''t compete with it. For some reason that idea started to extend to my mom and dad for me, as I knew they would be in a lot of our pictures. I felt that muted was broad enough that it wasn''t asking for a lot. My mom ended up buying a black dress, and when she told me, I wasn''t thrilled about it. Again, mostly because I just didn''t think it would be hard to keep to muted tones. But she explained to me that she had tried tons of light-colored dresses and she just hated all of them, and once I saw the dress, and how good it looked on her, I let it go. She''s going to look great. But, in trying to keep with the muted color thing, she had bought my dad a jacket that looked like it was from the 1970s, in white. It was terrible. It was hard for me to tell her, but I did. And I cannot say that I was looking out for my dad why I did it. I wanted him to look good. Is there an aspect of me not wanting the way he was dressed to embarrass me? Maybe there is some truth to that, even though I''m almost 39, and I view my parents as totally separate people from me and my identity. But I wanted them both to look good. The wedding is going to be somewhat on the elegant side and I wanted them both to fit in. There''s plenty I can be proud of when it comes to my parents, but I did also want to be proud of the way they looked. Muted has nothing to do with elegant, of course. But for example, if my sister had picked a dress I thought was way over the top sexy, I must admit, I would have probably asked her if she could find something else. It''s hard to admit if that''s terrible, but I think I would have.
 
*starts humming Dear Prudence*
 
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