Being a Bridesmaid - Part 2: The Hen Do

It feels like forever since I was a bridesmaid and it feels like even longer since the hen do but it’s not a night that will be forgotten in a hurry.

Apparently in my mother’s day (the mid-80s) a hen do consisted of going down the local with your best friends and that was that.  Twenty-five years on and things have evolved somewhat.  Luckily in my case I wasn’t organising a trip to Faliraki or anything equally horrific, expensive and classless to see my best friend enter married life.

To get me prepared for what was involved I read a book on how to be a good bridesmaid.  Sadly it was aimed at the sort of vacuous woman who thinks liking cocktails and shoes constitutes as a personality.  The key, so the book told me, to all elements of being a bridesmaid was to be ‘fabulous’.  This was not the practical advice I had hoped for.  See below the picture of the aforementioned useless book.

The hen that I organised was for 26 people.  That is a lot of folk.  But whether organising for six hens or a hundred, the only thing you have to do is make sure whatever you do the bride has fun.  Obviously nothing so niche that the rest of the group are going to hate it but as long as you play to the bride’s tastes she is going to love it and that is all that matters.

The bride picked the venue, the activity and the meal as she was 1. incredibly organised and 2. she lives in Glasgow, I no longer do, so it ensured she got the night she wanted rather than me guessing on what places would be good.

I asked everyone for a deposit about four months prior to the event.  This weeded out the people who were never going to come but who may have dropped out later.  On the actual day I only had one person drop out due to illness rather than seven who could have quietly agreed to attend but had no real intention of being there.

On the evening itself games are incredibly important.  They give structure to proceedings and define it as something different to an ordinary night out.  We played Mr and Mrs.  It’s easy to find questions online, just compile your list of favourite questions from a simple Google and adapt it to be more personal to your friend.  I made it multiple choice and added in extra answers that I knew might catch her out.  For every question she answered correctly I gave her a bit of hen do tat - tiara and veil, sash, bride to be straw and shot glass etc.  I opted for nothing in the shape of a veiny penis.  She’s going to see one veiny penis for the rest of her life, one in neon pink is neither romantic nor becoming of an evening for ladies in their mid-twenties.

We played a second game that was of my own devising.  It was called ‘Play Your Kevs Right’, a rare moment where I used a pun for the purposes of enjoyment.  I sent a group email to those attending asking for pictures of the bride and groom looking happy together and ones of Kev (the groom) doing generally stupid things.  I then put the best on bits of card and the bride had to guess if the next picture in the pile was a good one (Moragulous) or him being daft (Kevastating).  It was in the style of Play Your Cards Right and highlighted something you should not underestimate in planning a hen - you will have to deal with stupidity in people you’d previously assumed were intelligent.  I asked for unique pictures that Morag may not have seen and more than three people copied ones from Facebook and then sent them to me thinking they were doing me a favour.  I could have done that, why would I be asking strangers to do this for me?

Nudity was also not part of my plans, I chose not to have a stripper.  I did have a ganders to see what was available locally.  It turns out strippers are surprisingly expensive and none that I found in the Glasgow area were remotely attractive - tattooed middle aged muscle man anyone? 

Obviously every person is different but as the bridesmaid you should know what makes your bride different and what she will and will not love.  Once the activity and games are out the way you get to enjoy the night like all the rest of your hens and you get the added thrill, if everyone is having fun, that you organised it and helped do something special in preparation of the big day.  Remember, should the worse happen and it is an absolute disaster everyone is guaranteed to get drunk and probably won’t remember how bad it was in the morning anyway.

I Did

Were it not for an imminent adventure in Scandinavia my life would be feeling a bit empty at the moment.  The wedding of my two best friends has passed meaning I am no longer in full-on bridesmaid stress mode.  There is no more worry my dress will not fit, that I will mysteriously get ill and faint as I walk down the aisle, etc, etc.  No horrors occurred, the big day was beautiful and perfect and it didn't even rain or anything.  

As this blog testifies, my biggest fear regarding my duties was the speech I was asked to give.  Seeing as I banged on about it so much here, on Twitter and even in real-life to people’s faces I’ve copied it below for the whole world to admire…

Hello everyone.  Hope you’re all having a lovely day so far and that what I say in the next few minutes doesn’t ruin it.

I’m Samantha, Chief Bridesmaid.  Best friend of Morag from primary school and good friend of Kevin’s since uni.  Which means I’m in a very rare, very privileged position of knowing them both so well that I could fill a good hour with embarrassing stories about both the bride and groom. 

I am the reason Morag and Kev met, if I hadn’t invited Morag to Kev’s flat warming party four years ago we may all be doing something else today.  The fact that I know two such lovely, funny, and today now they’ve scrubbed up, attractive people speaks volumes about what a great judge of character I am. 

They are the only couple I have ever played a part in their getting together.  So if you’re single and looking for love if you come and see me after the meal we’ll discuss a fee and I’ll try and find you your own husband or wife.

As I said, I’ve known Morag since primary school, since we were both five.  I don’t remember the specific moment we became friends but I do remember lots about our adventures.

For instance when we were wee one of Morag’s favourite games was pretending to be a teacher, a game she still insists on playing to this very day. 

When we were growing up, our conversations about potential husbands never really went past members of Boyzone or Take That.  Little did we know that one day she would become Mrs Argue.  Married to the sort of domesticated soul that I once watched spend an hour lovingly prepare a dinner that was immediately trumped by the arrival of a Vienetta for dessert.

As me and Morag have got older we’ve remained close.  We’ve been on holidays together to Greece, Bulgaria, Oslo.  Norway’s not the only Scandinavian country that we are fans of, many a Saturday night has been spent on what we imaginatively named Sweden night.  This is a very complicated process.  It involves us going to Ikea, buying a lot of food and pear cider and then watching trashy telly while consuming it all and it’s a ritual I’ve really missed since I moved away.

Because I’m in London now I’ve missed lots of nights out with Mo and keeping in touch with her extended group of friends so it was really nice to see everyone who came to the Moragulous hen do.  Thank you to everyone who came and made it such a great night.  An extra special thank you to anyone who sent me pictures for Play Your Kevs Right and an extra extra special thank you if you sent me pictures of the hen when I emailed asking for those.  I’ve used them to get this photo album made, which is for you Mo.  Along with your new found cocktail making skills, it’s a little momento of the evening.

When I first moved down to England, Mo and Kev joined me for my first New Year away from home.  They had only been going out three or four months and as we sat in a pub on Hogmanay both of them were talking about how they were going to get married, going to buy a house, how many children they wanted, when they wanted them.  When I asked Kev how he could be so sure that he and Morag were going to end up doing all those things he said “when you know, you know”. 

Although he did recently tell me that he was looking forward to married life as then he’d become Morag’s problem for life, so he’s not always so romantic. 

I’m so pleased that the plans you both set out that night three and a half years ago are turning into reality and that two of my best friends have made one another so happy...

The speech ended with a toast and then obviously, rapturous applause (at least in my head it did anyway).  

Being a Bridesmaid - Part 1: The Dress

Before being asked to be a bridesmaid it was a role I had given little thought.  About the only thing I knew I’d have to do was wear a dress that was chosen by committee and not by myself.  As I am a vain fool, this was a big deal to me.  Normally I attempt to be the only person wearing my style, colour and cut of dress.  As a bridesmaid (unless you are solo) you are going to be wearing the exact same thing as someone else.  It’s a gut wrenching thought.

These are the cold hard facts of buying a bridesmaid’s dress...

A LOT of people will see you in your underwear

This was the biggest shock to me.  I’m no prude but I’m also not an exhibitionist.  People who need to (and most importantly, want to) see me in the nip are welcomed with no blushes or mock shyness.  However I’ve never been able to change in the open of a gym locker room without being sure that everyone else is staring at my little belly and thinking ‘fat cow’.

So imagine my horror when I discovered trying on bridesmaid dresses involved numerous middle-aged women seeing me in my sensible pants and bra.  Most bridal shops only stock one of each dress style in only one colour option so the dresses you try on are in sizes that most people will be able to fit into (smaller people are pinned in, larger people might not be able to do the zipper up).  The result of this is that a woman comes into the changing room with you, helps you into the dress and then secures you in it. 

After a while you start to get used to someone watching you dress and assisting, it feels sort of like having a lady servant which is pleasing for a short spell.  In overcoming my fear of a strangers seeing me in my pants I felt liberated, it made me feel in touch with my European easygoing side.  It wasn’t a sensation that lasted.

You will wear satin (or some other material you would choose to avoid for day-to-day living)

Problems with satin: it’s very unforgiving, it creases as soon as you sit, it can feel both too light or too heavy with the slightest change in temperature.  The truth is the majority of traditional bridesmaid dresses come in satin, it’s a horror you will have to live with. 

To minimise the paunch that the satin will inevitably make you look like you have, invest in some good seamless sucky-in knickers.  Even if you don’t need your belly held flat in normal outfits you will for this one.  Also aim to have zero VPL.  Pippa Middleton proved you can shine in a bridesmaid’s dress as long your arse looks good, follow her posh pert lead.

You will have to fight to maintain your own identity

Being a bridesmaid is an odd thing, for a day one of your best friends dictates things about your appearance that, should she attempt at any other time, you’d tell her to bugger off.  But because it’s her special day you don’t say anything out loud about the colour scheme or the satin because if that’s what she wants then you are more than happy to oblige.

As well as the bride, there are also the other bridesmaids to consider.  You have to work as a team, decide what is most important to you all about what you wear and push for that as one unit.  It’s remarkably different to any clothes shopping you will do again where your priority is to wear something that feels entirely ‘you’.

You will be wearing something that looks decent on all of you rather than the dress that looked AMAZING on you but not so good on the others but you are still you.  Refuse any suggestions that you should; all have the same hairstyle, same skin tone (it was briefly mentioned I was ‘too pale’ compared to others!), wear shoes of differing heels to be the exact same height,  have identical make-up.  You will only be a bridesmaid one or two days of your life, do not allow what you are for the rest of them to be forgotten.

The actual day that you shop, although testing at times, is best dealt with if you approach it as your moment to create a montage of you trying on different prom dresses ala a cheesy 90s teen movie.

That’s the dress covered.  Posts about the hen and the big day itself to follow soon.