I am looking for somewhere to get deceivingly nice looking plastic plates for our reception. I have the long, classic bride-stress rant below, because this is really stressing me out and I need somewhere to vent, but that's basically what I'm looking for 
If you're bored and want some good, bride stress reading, by all means, read on.
For those who want the sob story, I feel like I'm at the end of my ropes, and I still have a couple months to go. We have an extremely tight budget for our wedding, and my parents are incredibly generous and are paying for half of it. This is super awesome, and I am SO grateful. I just want to preface with this so I don't sound like I don't appreciate all that they are doing.
Our ceremony venue is free (FH's family owns the land). For our reception venue, I really wanted to have the reception the same place as the ceremony, but had to back down because it's a mountain with no electricity/running water/internet... all that good stuff, and it would've cost a fortune to add bathrooms, and get food up there, yada yada. We looked at a couple of places, and I fell in love with McMenamins, but if we went with that venue we were going to have to cut our guest list down about 70%, and FH just couldn't do it. Understandably so.
My dad works for the military, so we were able to get an armory for a STEAL that was going to let us have the space for a really long time AND it would fit all 220 of our guests. My hang up? The floors are green. Very, very, green. I have a photo attached to show y'all just how green these floors are.
I was having a really hard time with this. My mom finally got me to agree to it, stating that we would have more room in the budget for nice decorations and that would make it less noticeable. With this in mind, I finally was like, "okay, let's do this thing in a green floor armory."
Everyone (except for my mom) has told me I have been a super laid back bride. I don't have very expensive taste, and I am honestly just really happy to be marrying the love of my life. I was okay when they chose the linen colors without me. I didn't complain when my mom told me that we were going to be using the cheap, crappy rectangle tables instead of the circle ones I'd always dreamed of. I paid for my bridesmaids outfits (because we're all young and I'm the only one out of college with a full time job other than my MOH). I was okay when I found out that FH's family literally ripped up the mountain where we're getting married to completely change the look of the venue. I have had zero communications with my florest/decorator since February because her mom was in the hospital and just passed away, so I have been giving her space and time (I feel no ill will towards her whatsoever, of course, I'm just a little stressed out because I have a lot of questions for her and I am waiting to ask them until the timing is more appropriate) And maybe this is bugging me so much because it's just enough of a thing to tip me over. BUT I am now being told by my Mom that we absolutely canNOT afford anything better than plastic dishes and silverware.
I breathed deeply. I said okay. Mom sent me some options, which I wasn't in love with, but I picked the least offensive one. But I recently actually SAW them, and the "set up" with the cheap napkins and plastic dishware looks so trashy and kid-like. I picked up the plate and it felt like it would snap in half if anyone put food on it. I was heart broken. Mom was in a really bad mood so I didn't say anything until a couple days later, after taking her shopping and putting her in a great mood. I told her that I wasn't trying to come across as ungrateful, and that I appreciated everything she had been doing (she is self catering our wedding, talk about a big job!), but FH and I weren't feeling very great about the plates, and was it possible to return them and get different plates?
She blew up at me and said I needed to stop changing my mind about the wedding, which made ME upset because I have been so open to compromise. I've been watching all my expectations for this wedding get ripped apart and not saying a peep because I know everything my parents are doing is because they really can't afford spending the money they're already spending. I haven't changed my mind about a single thing. I asked her to tell me what exactly I had changed my mind on. She said my dress (I explained this in a past post, but the only reason I got a different dress is because they ordered my dress in the wrong size and it gave me a second chance to pick a dress that I actually loved). She also said that I changed my bridesmaid dress, which isn't true at all. We ordered a couple from Amazon to find the one we liked and we ended up returning the first one we ordered, but we had never decided that would be the dress, so that isn't changing my mind?
She did return the plates (I paid shipping, which is completely fair). She is really upset with me that I've "added on" to our to do list, even though I told her I would see if I could pick plates out myself. FH and I have been contributing to a lot of stuff recently, and I asked if we could have real dishes if FH and I paid the difference, but she is adamant that they are plastic so we don't have dishes to do. (I'm also really upset because I agreed to the armory in the first place BECAUSE she had said that we could make it pretty.. I'm always saying thank you every chance I get because I am grateful for every penny they are spending, but I just wish they wouldn't have given me false expectations. My mom has VERY expensive, elegant taste, so I know that she sees our setup with even more critical eyes than I do).
My mom and I are THE BEST OF FRIENDS. I hope this doesn't give you the wrong impression of our relationship. But this wedding has been really rough on our relationship. She keeps calling me a bridezilla, which really hurts considering how laid back I feel like I've been.
So yeah. In the business for nice looking plates! Also, if you guys can lie and tell me the armory floor doesn't look that green... that would be GREAT. Thanks Wedding Wire Community!
