CTLawyer- Gotcha. Sounds like you arent the problem.
Big weddings have been a topic of discussion with me and my friends recently. Not that the baal simcha cant pay for it but that his friends neighbors or guests cant. Now when it comes their turn instead of not paying for a big wedding and just keeping it small this friends makes a big wedding (or bigger?). Now he has to come up with the money for that, and hes stuck.
The standard of weddings is going up and its hurting the klal. If the standard and norm would be lower then noone would feel like theyre losing out.