Do you think there is a 'bridesmaid hieracrchy'?

My lil sister is getting married next year. We've just celebrated her engagement.

She has 3 sisters , me being the oldest (she is no. 4, i am no. 1). Last night she rang me almost in tears. She is having such a hard time deciding on who will be the matron of honour. She explained how she didnt want to pick one sister, 'why should i have too?' she asked. Besides signing the marriage cert., what else does the matron of honour do??

My matron of honour flew into Australia 2 days b4 my wedding.....the only real differing role i saw her undertake was the sigining of the papers. My other bridesmaids did the rest....

Im just curious, do you think, if you were chosen as bridesmaid #3, you would feel like your '3rd favourite'???? or if you were bridesmaid #1, you were 'favourite'?????

I told her not to have a matron of honour, just choose someone to sign her papers, all 3 sisters will pitch in and do the rest, but i couldnt help but feel there is a 'hierarchy' attached to ones selection of bridesmaids........do you agree????

My besty that I've known for 22 years was my Maid of Honour. & all she did was sign the papers. To tell you the truth the other 2 went by height. My MOH was the tallest out of the 3 so I just went from tallest to shortest.

It's a toughie, I had both my best friends (one girl, one boy) and sister, and the girl bestie signed, just cos she was next in line and she was paired with dh's friend who signed.

But at my best friend's wedding, there was definite heirarchy, there were four of us, me, other girl, husband's sister, bride's sister (still with me?). Bride wasn't fussed about heirarchy, I assumed I'd be Maid of Honour (being the closest to bestie), but it was confusing and other people wanted to be this and that. So bride's sister cracks it, tells everyone I'm Maid of Honour and that's that, and can we please get organised so she can go out with friends. :P The husband's sister insisted on being the one who signed (which I was a bit annoyed at, I'd been looking forward to that, but hey, not my wedding, so I let it slide). :)

Anyway, the point of that long winded tale is: if it's obvious what the hierarchy should be, then she'd best honour that (often a best friend is MOH and all the sisters are bridesmaids), but if her relationships are equal with people (like all sisters, or is equally close to her friends), then I don't think there needs to be an official MOH, just someone to witness and sign, and really, that doesn't even need to be a bridal party member does it? She could even have Godparents or some other close people to sign. :) Congrats to her anyway.

*sigh* Matron of Honour is a married bridesmaid, a bridesmaid is an unmarried bridesmaid. And no bridesmaid signed my register, both our fathers did.

My chief bridesmaid was my sister, but that means nothing. Aside from hold my bouquet and lift my veil, both bridesmaids did exactly the same. The girl who organised my hen night was actually the girl who did the reading at the wedding, not even a bridesmaid! (In fact, I sorted out my sister's car accident claim the morning of my wedding while she had her hair done, so I probably did more for her than she did for me in all, some great chiefy she was!)

TBH, I wouldn't care where I was in the hierarchy, if someone loves you enough to ask you to be a bridesmaid/Matron of Honour I wouldn't mind if someone else were chiefy or signing the register - I mean, who knows who signs, really? Does it matter? No. It's something that very few people ever see or think about, who signed what for whom.

Is there any reason why only one signs the registar? Could all the bridal party sign?

the official certificate (that goes to births deaths and marriages) is signed by one "witness" - whether they be part of bridal party or not

our whole bridal party signed the "pretty" certificate that hangs on our wall...

Don't you *sigh* at me, Mrs. Ryn. :P
For the purposes of this discussion, 'Maid/Matron of Honour' is Chief Bridesmaid.

And while I agree it's can be a trivial thing, you don't want to scowl at your wedding photos whenever you remember the politics and stupid stuff that was exacerbated just because a wedding can make big deals out of small details, by some kind of matrimonial magic.

Honestly i have my bestie as my cheif bridesmaid, i am thinking of having my Mum witness, aswell as one of DF's aunts..... That way all my BM's can be equal except my CBM who is organising my hens and all the little things.... like dress shopping for me!!

Hope that helps a little....

Why even worry about who is what and where in the hierachy is who...
If someone decides to have bridesmaids then it is probably a privelage to be asked in the first place, regardless if you are related or not, and your job is to help where the bride needs it before or during or after the wedding. Does it really matter? Isn't the whole point of a wedding about the couple getting married not the attendants if there are any?

Just my opinion :)

ETA: I should add my bias, as I didn't want attendants at all but DH absolutely insisted on having 3 groomsmen (who stood around doing nothing and looking a little silly IMO). So in the end I compromised and had 3 BMs (2 sisters and my BF). I have no idea if there was a chief as I didn't care one way or the other. My sisters and BF didn't seem to care either. If I did it again I would definitely not have any attendants (not that I am planning to!). I am sure the wedding will be lovely, they usually are.

I wouldn't be fussed if either of my sisters chose the other sister as her maid/matron of honour... I think it is an honour to be asked to be a part of someone's bridal party.

I had a Man of Honour (My male cousin, who is like a brother to me) and DH had a Best WoMan... who is our SIL married to his eldest brother. This worked for us as we then didn't feel like we had to choose someone.

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Does it really matter? Isn't the whole point of a wedding about the couple getting married not the attendants if there are any?

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I think as a up and coming bride, yes dusty, it is a big deal. You want to get the whole day right, you want everyone to be happy, you want YOUR day to be just perfect. I can totally, totally understand her predicament.

I think she's going to have sister #3 sign the papers, yet have us walk into the church from oldest to youngest....ahhh the fun begins.......thanks ladies...

For my first wedding we did all the family politics and did our best to cater for everyone that we wanted to be there and spent a fortune. All the family members had a role to play, a uniform to wear and a natty title to go with it, it took two years to organise and deal with all the arrangements - the guests flew in from all over the planet, the wedding cake was in multiple layers to cope with different dietary intolerances, standby venues to deal with bad weather, etc, etc, etc...

My second wedding took place in a drive through wedding chapel in Vegas, cost $50, and we told the friends and family about it after the event.

Somewhat bizarrely the drive through wedding was about as close to perfect as you could ever hope to get - it was our day, and nothing else intruded. When we look at the wedding photos we can't help but grin at the craziness of that time.

But back to the topic....

It's your day, you can have it any way you want it to be....you are there to make a commitment to someone, everything else is just window dressing. Don't forget to have fun...