How Did You Pick Your Bridal Party?

For us, we wanted to keep it small. We have five kids and all have a lot of anxiety. So I picked my sister as my bridesmaid, and my spouse picked his best friend since early childhood.

That will be our bridal party

There were two people I knew I wanted right away. One I invited to stand up with me after a few cocktails and I sort-of regret it. (There’s been some tension between us lately and she can be a bit selfish - but I love her).And the last I asked much later than the others as I was waiting to see if she was even able to make it (she’s coming from Australia-I didn’t want her to feel pressured to come being a bridesmaid). My fiancé is only having 3 groomsmen but meh I’m fine with the uneven numbers!

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My thoughts exactly ahahah!!

I agree with the speeches though! I'm trying to include closer family in other ways instead of having a bigger bridal party!

I was also a little worried because one of my younger cousins is being my floral girl, but I felt bad not including her sister (13) so I'm trying to find something else for her to be/do! Thinking Usher in a way to help direct and control the front of the house when everything starts!

This is the hardest decision of the whole wedding planning! I have 3 SIL's but am not close to them. I have no sisters. I am close to my cousin who was suppose to be my MOH BUT she had another wedding in which is on the same day, so she isn't even coming to mine! I ended up asking a friend to be MOH (awesome choice!!) and one SIL who showed a huge intrest in the wedding (so happy with this choice as well!) My finance was going to ask 3 but one said no (his wife is due right around our wedding!) SO in the end it all works out

I would rather have less and have all involved rather than more and struggle to keep them involved!

My decision was pretty easy. I am the youngest daughter in my family and also the first to get married. I have three older sisters and because this is the first wedding in the family I was over the moon when they all agreed. My third sister will be my MOH. She was there for our engagement and we are the closest. My fourth bridesmaid is a family friend that we have known for almost 30 years. So again easy choice.

I decided to pick my sisters (two) to be my maid of honours, my cousin as one of my bridesmaid, and two of my closest friends. I have a small group of friends so it was easy for me to choose my bridal party.

My Matron of Honor now is my best friend from here (Ottawa)

#1 Bridesmaid: I picked my best friend from home (Calgary) whom was always supposed to me Matron of honor (But since shes so far way she cant be as involved)

#2 Bridesmaid is a friend whom ive known now for 6 years and have had a lot of memories with

#3 Bridesmaid is a new friend that ive been good friends with. we get together one a weekly/biweekly basis to watch shows and cook for each other. I picked her because i know this will be a long friendship.

I picked my bridal party pretty easily - I have a really small group of friends who mean the world to me.

So I picked my four girlfriends.

It caused a huge problem that I didn't ask my FSIL to be a bridesmaid. But I stuck to my guns. i'm really glad I did to be honest I just wish my FMIL didn't focus on that for 10 months.

I recently read a great article about foregoing a bridal party, and I think it’s what we’re leaning towards.

We’re aiming to have a small guest count and though I know I’ll have close friends/fam to help me get ready, we don’t want anyone to feel obliged to stand with us during the ceremony. I’m excited to see how it turns out.

That being said - I’ve been a bridesmaid and MOH before and see the pros and cons to the tradition.

I actually found it really simple.

My cousin and I have always said since we were little girls we would be each MOH, so that was a no brainer (I do not have a sister).

Then I have two best friends/family friends (who are sisters) that I have been extremely close with since I was born(our moms have been best friends since they were 14).

Then I have two really good friends from college as well!

We are having a smaller bridal party... My sister is my MOH and his brother is his BM. Then I chose his brothers fiancee, who i am really close with, as my first bridesmaid and my bestfriend i have for over 8 years as my second bridesmaid. My FH chose the two friends he is closest with and has had since he was a little boy, as his two groomsmen; So we have 3 people each standing with us.

We kept ours on the smaller size because we have opted to cover all of the costs for our bridal party. We understand not everyone can choose to do this, but it was something that was important to us to do when asking our bridal party to be a part of our special day.

We chose those who we are closest to and that is still single. We started with family, my two brothers are groomsmen and his sister is a bridesmaid (she will be paired with one of my brothers). His cousin that I'm close with is going to be a bridesmaid (she will be paired up with my other brother). After that we choose a cousin of his as a groomsmen who will be paired up with my cousin. next we went with best friends as best man and maid of honour. For the last bridesmaid and groomsmen we asked a couple that we always hangout with. We are keeping it small. 4 bridesmaids & groomsmen and 1 maid of honour & best man

I chose who I had more of a connection to and who would suit the roles better, those that would take initiative and help me with ideas. I chose one of our close mutual friends as my MOH and a high school classmate as my bridesmaid. I think I should have reversed the roles instead as I realized I am A LOT closer with my high school friend, but other than that I am VERY happy with my choices

View quoted message Oh my gosh 12!! 🙈 I wish I had that many friends hahaha

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Fair enough, you could have someone do a reading or help out in a way that doesn't make them a part of the wedding party.

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That's such a positive way of looking at things, Allison! I hope things work out for me lol, I'm just worried I'm going to offend someone by not including them

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I know! It comes with having everyone at different life stages. At the end of the day, we will be happy no matter what! Hope it all works out for you too!

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I think you can totally have 1 guy with a bunch of girls, do what makes you happy

Sounds like you've got some complicated factors affecting your wedding party (sounds similar to my situation), so I hope it gets better. Who knew that picking a wedding party could be so complicated?

View quoted message I love my cousin but she just has a habit of making things about her all of the time. My SIL (my brothers wife) has just been problematic since the day he met her. She just forced my brother to yell at me yesterday for “taking her parking spot”... she yells at my niece constantly and just treats her poorly so that’s my main reason for the strong dislike. My niece is going to be my maid of honour though, along with the bridesmen

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That's bold to not include your SIL but I love it. How bad is the drama that her and your cousin cause? Are you just having bridesmen and not any gals?

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Just two is a great number! Sweet and simple

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I'm the same way with the small group of friends so I get how simple it can be. Dare I ask what happened with your first MOH? Sorry you had to replace her.

Mine was super easy!! I knew that I’d include both of our sisters, and then had 4 “no brainers” who have been my best friends and roommates through and since college! Also since were all lived in a house together for 3 years after college it was an easy line to draw in my friend group, so to speak!

There was only 1 bridesmaid I had to consider because she was a relatively newer friend - but she was my best bridesmaid by far! She is now married to a close guy friend of mine from college and we got really close when she worked at WeddingWire with me for a year, and she got married 1 month after I did so we were wedding planning buddies!

I struggled so much with this. Within minutes after we were engaged, my FH knew which 4 he wanted (he has 4). the only thing in that moment I could say with certainty was that I wanted my two BFF's of 17 and 15 years.
I attempted to convince him to let me have 5 (2 BFF's, a very good friend and my 2 cousins) and him have 4 which would have solved my dilemma in my head. He really wanted to stick to the 4 and 4. so I picked a 4th friend. and we are going to be asking my 2 cousins (who are sisters) to start the ceremony by lighting a candle in my grandfathers memory (he raised me, and is also my cousins grandfather). so it still includes them.
and my bridesmaids know to include the 2 cousins in planning/opinions etc.

I had originally thought I was going to have 4 but when FH decided on 5 (which was a compromise - his list started at 12 lol) I knew exactly who to add. FH proposed on a trip overseas and afterwards we decided to message only a few people and keep the news to ourselves for a few days - the 5 people I had chose to message are now my bridesmaids. 3 knew each other in advance and 2 are childhood friends but I can't get over how well they all get along! There are no family members in our parties - I'm an only child and FH chose not to have his brother. We had 10 months between getting engaged and marriage so there was no waiting to ask the girls on my part. FH himmed & hawed over who he would choose but he's finally got it nailed down.

We knew who we wanted before we were even engaged haha and we couldn’t keep it just family bc I’m an only child and he only has one brother. He has a lot of friends though, he originally wanted 6 and I wanted 4 so we compromised at 5 each and I added a jr bridesmaid. We knew we wanted people close to us who we couldn’t imagine not having with us on our big day. It just came naturally really.

I'm stuck on this too, well more like my FH is. He doesn't have a lot of close male friends, and he wants to ask his one friend to be best woman (she'd even wear a tux), which I'm all for it!

My brother will be a groomsmen and his brother *Might* be one as well... he's a a stage in his life where all he wants to do is play video games and be anti-social, so be probably wouldn't want to stand up with us. My FH has one friend who lives in Australia right now, but he's hesitant on asking since he might not even come, but I'm trying to convince him to just ask, as people do surprise you.

I've already asked 3 friends I know I want up there with me, and I also want my FSIL too (her kids will probably be flower girl and ring bearer) but I feel like it might be weird having only 1 guy in the entire wedding party with 5 girls lol. We're still over a year out, so we're hoping to have our party confirmed by October.

One of my friends in the party is in a big life change right now, so I'll probably ask her later on again if she is willing to. No matter what, she'll be invited. We don't want to force anyone to stand up with us if they don't want to and in the end, we'll be happy with who does.

#rantover

I had a mini breakdown when my FH asked me who would be in my bridal party. Since moving to Calgary, I haven't been as close to my girlfriends as I used to (I mean, life happens!). We still keep in touch, but the distance makes it hard to be close...anyways. He quickly realized it was a sensitive topic, so he suggested that we simply stick to witnesses and not have a full wedding party. I was so relieved when he suggested it, I've since asked my best gal to be my witness and am super happy that she said yes!

I knew that my 2 best friends would be in my wedding party. I had originally also asked my mum to be up there with me but then realized she wouldn't really be able to watch the ceremony the same way. We talked and since she was already going to be walking me down the aisle, she was ok with sitting in the crowd lol. I had another friend in mind but she was trying to get pregnant and wasn't sure when that was going to happen so I didn't want to add stress to her, or myself, so I opted for a newer friend that I was quite close to. Unfortunately this friend had had 2 previous bad experiences as a bridesmaid and declined. In the end we had uneven numbers but I don't care.

I have two best friends that have been planning my wedding since way before I got engaged, so when I got engaged it was kind of assumed that they've been in my bridal party, I'm not having one MOH but two, they're both helping me so much and I would not be able to pick between the two of them anyway. I have told them to flip a coin for who wants to be my witness when we sign the marriage license. They're even writing a speech together so there's not way I can nominate one and not the other. I also asked my cousin because she's my only female relative and because my FH wanted three groomsmen and I wanted to have matching number. We never spoke about having our siblings included - I have a brother and he has a sister - we just kind of went with our own friends and family. but I am inviting my FSIL to all the events, and she's the one that came with me to the bridal boutique where I found my dress, so she's taking a big part in the wedding, just not standing next to us.

I think the way to pick is more emotional than because you have to, like think to yourself - who do I know that will enjoy this experience, that will be my right hard through everything and that will no cast any dark shadows over my day whether it is drama or stealing the spot light. I honestly believe guilt - whether from family or friends - is definitely not the way to go.

I knew well before who I wanted my party to be! I grew with one of my brides maids and she's been the closest to the sister I could ever have! Being an only child and no blood cousins that I grew up with, for me it's all friends!

My MOH we use to joke around together before engagement that she would be my MOH and well! That was an easy pick haha!

My fiance's sister is one of my brides maids as well! I've become quite close with her over the years and I'm so glad we get along so well and I for sure wanted her to be up there with us too!

I knew I wanted our wedding day to be fun and not filled with drama, so that meant my cousin and SIL were out. My family (other than my mom) we’re kind of disappointed but they just make events all about them, and for once I would like to have some attention . My FH and I hangout with the same four guys so naturally I wanted them as my bridesmen because they are drama free and we are best friends. I am worried about having asked one of them though, because he’s dramatic sometimes and kind of flaky but we will see what happens as we start needing help with planning.