A former bride on Twitter has the internet up in arms after she posted a jaw-dropping photo of the white wedding gown her mother-in-law wore on her wedding day. Yup, you read that right. It's common knowledge that simply wearing white to someone else's wedding is a huge no-no, but as the photo reveals, this mother-of-the-groom took things to a whole new level.
Writer Amy Pennza posted the photo in response to a Twitter prompt about the biggest #WeddingFails.
Pennza had responded to a tweet looking for wedding fails by comedian Jimmy Fallon. "It’s Hashtags time! Tag a tweet with #WeddingFail and then tell us a funny or weird story from a wedding you were at," he wrote.
That is when Pennza whipped out the big guns with her outrageous photo. "My mother-in-law wore a wedding dress to my wedding," she wrote. "So, yeah, top that one, Twitter."
The photo shows a brunette Pennza giving her MIL some serious side-eye as they both stand wearing their white gowns.
It appears that the entire internet was flabbergasted at this MIL's faux pas. The picture quickly took off and accumulated more than 54,000 likes and more than 7,000 retweets.
"I'm ready to throw hands. What was she thinking?!" one woman wrote in the comments. "Her hair is even in an updo!"
"The updo really does seal it," added one man.
"The updo removes all plausible deniability," a third woman chimed in.
But other people knew there had to be more to the story than what we were seeing, which is why they asked Pennza to spill the full details of her big day.
Pennza decided to return to Twitter to share the full story of "The Dress" and boy, it did not disappoint.
The mom of four ("yes, I married him," she joked) followed up her viral photo with a thread that spilled the tea on what was going through her mother-in-law's mind. And it wasn't what anyone expected.
Pennza started off by admitting that she never asked her MIL what she was wearing to the wedding, which in hindsight was not the smartest move. "The morning of the wedding, all the women in the bridal party cram into a tiny room in the church," she later added. "You know, body glitter and hairspray everywhere. Fifteen coats of mascara. Putting napkins under your pits so you don't sweat on your dress."
But then her MIL walked into the room and Pennza realized she had made a horrible mistake by not checking in with her first.
"I don't remember much about the day," she continued in the thread. "Most people say their wedding is a blur, and that's true for me, too. But I know I said this: 'You… You could be the bride…'"
It wasn't only the bride who noticed that she and her MIL were matching. "Later, my sister (matron of honor) said she didn't pull me aside and talk about it because she hoped I was too distracted to notice. My college roommate (bridesmaid) said the same thing," Pennza wrote. "But secretly, they both spent the reception looking at me, then each other, then MIL, then me, then the cop the venue made us hire — hoping I didn't go for his taser."
Fortunately there wasn't any bloodshed at the wedding "or anyone being shoved into the champagne fountain," she joked.
But Pennza wrote that there was a good reason why her MIL donned the inappropriate dress.
The writer continued that her MIL grew up in "extreme" poverty. "As a child, she used to sneak into the kitchen and eat match heads," she wrote. "That's a pica craving, and kids do it when they're malnourished.
"When you grow up with nothing, it stays with you. Forever, I think. No matter how much money you earn, there's always that little fear in the back of your mind that someone might take it all away," she wrote. Her MIL wasn't being cruel, she reasoned — she just found an incredible bargain and ran with it.
"She's a bargain hunter to the bone," Pennza explained. "Her money saving strategies are legend — and often hilarious. At family gatherings, we amuse ourselves telling stories of crazy shit she's done to save money."
Her MIL has always gone through great lengths to save a dollar, including taking the olives and celery from her Bloody Marys for salads and saving cold cuts from sandwiches for later use.
"When she spotted The Dress at an incredible bargain, she couldn't turn it down. If you ask her now, she says she feels terrible about it," Pennza wrote.
Despite this small lapse in her judgement, Pennza said her MIL can be extremely generous. "When my twins were newborns, she drove across town every night, slept on the sofa, and did three feedings. For two babies. Every night for months," she wrote.
Pennza shared that since her wedding day, she's mostly forgiven her MIL and felt like it made her wedding unforgettable.
"Yeah, the wedding dress was a shock," she wrote. "But it gave me a pretty funny memory. No one who attended has ever forgotten it. And, you have to admit, weddings can be forgettable."
The writer continued that her MIL "has more than made up for it since."
Pennza also shared that she had told her MIL that their photo was catching a lot of attention online. "I worried it might hurt her feelings," she wrote, but "she waved it off. 'Whatever makes me famous,'" her MIL told her.
It just goes to prove that alls well that ends well.