Parents that are making me really stressed out

Personally, if you think that amount is decently priced and all they can offer you is their $8,000, why are they dictating what you should be spending? Weddings are crazy expensive! Our hall and food alone is $20,000... Not even including anything else.

If they are only giving you $8,000 towards the wedding, why do you care so much if they think 20k is expensive? I don't mean it in a rude way. Its just, you're obviously paying the larger chunk and it's your wedding not theirs. Do what you and your FH would like.

20k is really the norm nowadays. Are they not willing to give you the money until they are happy?

This is why, in a way, I'm glad none of our parents can afford to contribute (except for my dad, he paid my dress) towards our wedding. We're at 20k as well.

Are you paying for the balance of the wedding yourselves? If you budget $20K then that's fine as long as you can afford the balance, or are your parents funding the whole event?

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No no... $20,000 is with a sit down dinner.. and they think that is too much.

Without the sit down dinner we are about $13,000I have looked at every possible option within 45 minutes of here.. nothing is good enough or too expensive.. well if they want "good enough" its going to cost.

Lindsay, would it be possible to go slightly out of town? Is there another town not too far away or any community centres, legions, hotels with ballrooms etc? If so it may be cheaper to have a wedding at one of these places (with a sit down dinner) and maybe even rent a school bus to make a couple pick ups/drop offs throughout the night. I'm from a small town and that's quite common in our area as there are a lot better options if you travel 30 mins or so.

It seems crazy that $20k won't get you a sit down dinner and I'm so sorry you're having so many problems with your parents.

We're spending $30k and although we could have done it for less we've decided to go for everything we want. Our parents together have contributed about $8k and trust me, being from a small town it blew my parents minds how much a wedding costs these days. I sat them down and went through basic numbers of what everything costs and since then, they haven't really had any issues. Perhaps too, I know it's a pain to research but if you took the time to show them how much rentals are to have a backyard wedding (tent, tables, chairs, linens, all plates, glassware, portapotties, catering, etc) they will see it's not really cheaper.

I would say go a bit out of town and see if you can find a location that may work for your budget - you should definitely be able to pull together what you want for $20k. Plus you might find somewhere cool that your guests have never been. That's how I found our venue. I just started googling cool wedding venues Ottawa area - we ended up just outside of the city but no one has complained about the travel and everyone is super excited to see our gorgeous venue.

View quoted message We are getting married in Chatham, at the Country Church and Wedding Barn..it was a little more then we wanted to pay for the wedding but we considered that our splurge, plus his aunt paid for it. She had money saved for his wedding and it was the exact amount of the venue!

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I live in a very small town and there is only one place that is all inclusive, its a gold course and it starts at $30,000.00.

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Thats amazing that you were able to do that within your budget. Where are you getting married if you don't mind me asking.

I swear i'm annoyed...first my mom being mouthy at the mention of an unplugged ceremony...and her decision to criticise my menu:
caesar salad
med. rare striploin w/ carrots & potatoes (caprese pasta w/ tomato sauce & grilled veg antipasti
passionfuit & mango mousse cake

-- the cook on the striploin being the main issue.....

im SO fed up it's insane.

Tell them they can contribute by giving you that money but they have no say on what u want for plans. It’s hard to do but my parents are giving us 5000. And yes weddings are expensive way more then they were a few years ago! 20k is honestly normal amount!

I'm with you 100% my family is giving me so much pressure, I say go with your gut and do you. If your parent's keep talking negative about the wedding, I would avoid the topic over all around them. That might reduce the stress you are feeling.

I am in the same boat as you!! My mom has stressed me out but my fiancé’s parents have been so helpful. She also thinks everything we do is too expensive and there’s no winning. I’ve just started to ignore it and not tell her everything. At the end of the day it is mine and my fiancé’s wedding not hers and we can’t please her all the time. While I respect her and am grateful for her help financially with the wedding we’re still paying for most of it ourselves and deserve to have the wedding we want. You and your fiancé should be the ones who are happy it is your special day! Everyone’s budget is different but I’d say yours is pretty average. I would say just worry about what you both want and not try to please you parents if they’re just going to cause you stress.

Will they pull their monetary contributions out if you don't host a wedding "their way"?

I'm sorry you're in such a tough situation

I think 20000 is totally reasonable! Try an all inclusive venue! We are spending approx 15 but that includes everything including a planner, blankets , flip flops for dancing. All we need is a DJ and officiant.

View quoted message Budgeting isn't always easy, but definitely doable! Tell your parents how you feel, it's unfair for them to make you feel like you're disappointing them just because you're planning your dream wedding. Our budget is less than 15000 and we got our dream venue, photographer, officiant. We are having a sit-down dinner, DJ. Our ceremony is at 3, cocktail hour from 3:30-5:30 then dinner till 7 then party time till 1am. We sat down and decided what money goes where and how much, did major research and found that having our dream wedding is possible within our budget. It just takes a bit of time to get it all sorted. You can have an amazing budget wedding, majority of us on here are.

I do not want a wedding in their back yard and I do not want a destination wedding... but I hate disappointing them. and that is the backlash I am getting from them.. and I can tell the look in there eyes are disappointment.

I also thnk $20,000 is alot of money and i could think of much better thing i would rather spend it on like our new house we are building, but I don't know how to make it any cheaper and still have the day I want. We both really want a sit down dinner, but we know that we can not afford it so we have decided to take it out.

Wouldn't it be nice if parents remembered how stressful it was for them to plan their wedding and use their experiences to make our planning a little easier? 😅
we haven't told our parents any $$. My dad said he will give us what he can to help out and my fiancé's parents said they would pay for the bar and that was that.
Whenever I have had an issue with the parents I just explained to them that what they want doesn't fit into my idea of how MY wedding will be. I've just been honest with them and with my family it worked really well, my fiancé's family not as well but still worked.

That is a lot of money, but for each couple the budget varies! So if that's what your comfortable spending the go for it, forget what they say! My dad and stepmom have been absolutely AWESOME, so don't have to worry about them. But..my mom and stepdad have been a nightmare. Me and my step dad don't have a good relationship so the day before I got engaged we went at it and he lost his mind...then after we got engaged he refused to talk to me or anything even said no to attending the wedding and my mom followed him on that decision. So obviously I was stressed and upset. I gave them time and they came around eventually, still don't like him. Now they are paying for the wine but giving me trouble on what wine they want vs what I want.. and my fiance's parents..his dad literally does not care at all lol so he's keeping out of it. His mom and aunt on the other hand are beyond annoying and constantly trying to make the wedding "the way it... should...be" their way not ours.. so I just shut them down. Told them all what was and wasn't happening, if they don't agree they can get over it. Don't let anyone, even family stress you out anymore than you already are. It's your special day and they need to get in their place and support us.

I'm so sorry you're having a tough time. Thankfully we haven't had too much comeback from our parents but that's because we are paying for it on our own. I think you need to remind them that it's about you and your fiancé and that any choice that either of you make for your big day shouldn't effect them and that they should just be happy for you. $20,000 is a great price for a wedding, in my opinion. We wanted to spend about that but ended up going over by nearly $10,000 because of how over priced everything is in our city.

That sounds really really rough. Sadly it seems to be very common to experience some issues with parents (yours or the fiance's) and their expectations for the day. I think it is hard for parents, who got married a while ago, to really appreciate how expensive weddings are these days.

The average cost of a wedding sits around $30,000 now for a Saturday, sit down meal.

I see you're aiming for a June 2019 wedding, so vendors will need to be booked fairly soon and thus, I think you should do two things here:

1. Talk with your fiance. What do YOU guys want to make the day good for you? ie. Do you want a big wedding, small wedding, do you want to get married here or destination? When you look back on your wedding 10, 20 years from now, what will make you smile.

2. Once you know what would make YOU happy, do a bit of research (which it sounds like you have). Then book a sit down talk with your parents and go over it with them. You can always ask them what they picture the day to be like, so far they've seemed to have given you some conflicting bits of advice/comments. Once you get their feedback, explain to them that a caterer can cost xx amount and the thing you were planning costs xx. Once they see the costs laid out, they might realize that it doesn't cost what they expected it to.

Keep in mind we are here to listen to you and support you, it's a great community!

If there is no pleasing your parents, make sure you ARE pleasing yourself. Its great you want to keep them happy but its the day you'll need to look back on for years to come.