Is anyone else dreading....

[inloveinpa]

Making the wedding list of who to invite? (this may be long)

Although I am not engaged yet, this is my biggest fear and the thing that I dread the most about planning BF''s and my wedding...who to invite and who to cut.

I have a huge family...mom, dad, stepmom, stepdad. I have 4 sets of grandparents. My mom, dad, stepmom and stepdad all have brothers and sisters (16 siblings total plus their SOs). My BF and I want to have a small, intimate wedding...like 50-60 people MAX. And we can only afford a small wedding. My parents and my BF''s parents can''t help pay for anything, so we have to pay for all of the people. And I have no clue who to not invite. I want to invite my immediate family of course, but I know that if I invite my mom and dad''s siblings, but not my stepmom or stepdad''s siblings, they will be pissed off. Also, I have young siblings, my youngest brother is 20 years younger than me. I would love for him to be a part of the wedding, but he will only be like 6 or 7. My other brother will be 10 or 11 and my sister will be 15 or 16. Do I invite them? I really don''t want any kids at the reception and we want to do reception and ceremony in one place. And if I invite them, do I need to invite all my young cousins? I am the oldest grandchild out of my entire family, so all of the kids are under 15 at this point. My BF''s family is really small, so he''s more worried about who to invite, rather than who not to invite.a. does anyone else have a similar situation?

So my questions to all of you are:
a. does anyone have a similar situation?
b. how are you dealing with this stress?
b. how do I figure out who to invite versus who not to invite?
c. why am I stressing about this when I don''t even have a ring!!??!! lol

Thanks for your advice in advance!

 

[purselover]

Yes! We are discussing invite lists as well. My family like your bf''s is very simple they have no problem keeping it very small and intimate even though they are the ones paying and I guess could insist on a ton of people. SO''s family on the other hand want to invite a ton of people, relatives they only see once like every 10 years. I refuse to give in to this and I told them it''s OUR wedding I will not have people there that I''ve met like once in my life, and don''t even play a large role in their family. If they have a problem with that then they can pay for whoever they want to come. I refuse to have a wedding where I don''t even recognize everyone there. If you don''t want some people there I would just say so it''s your day and your money so do it your way.

I also think it''s fine to have your siblings but no other children I think brothers and sisters are different than little cousins and your family will understand that.

 

[misskitty]

Yes! This is the part of wedding planning that I am least looking forward to.

If I had my way, we''d elope or have a VERY small destination wedding, but B has his heart set on having family and friends around, so we''ll probably end up having a bigger wedding than I''d like. In my book, it''s a compromise worth making.

I''m dreading this part of planning because my extended family is huuuuge (I have 50+ first cousins), and because I wouldn''t know where to make the cutoffs for friends.

I''m dealing with the stress by putting off thinking about it until we absolutely have to.

I have no clue how we''ll figure that out, but I suspect I''ll be leaving most of it up to B. I know that doesn''t sound completely fair, but I''d rather let him make the decisions and I''ll reserve veto power. Have I mentioned that this is the part I''m least looking forward to?


And...you''re stressing about it early because it''s a stressful question!

 

[FrekeChild]

This is the single most stressful part of my wedding planning. Unfortunately I caved to the pressure after deciding on exactly what I wanted (less than 20) and ended up with closer to 40. Sooooooo....I uninvited people. Yeah. Talk about not fun.

a. my mom was the youngest of ten. So I feel your pain. I didn''t want any kids there either.
b. I''m going to give advice instead of saying how I''m dealing with it--STICK TO YOUR GUNS. I wouldn''t be committing 500 etiquette crimes if I had done this from the beginning. So don''t bend to the pressure. Pick who you''re going to invite, and invite them. Don''t continue making STDs for people you don''t want to be there!
c. We said, 1. Immediate family 2. Super close friends 3. No one from out of town 4. No kids except FI''s nephew who will be 15 at the time of the wedding. It''s Vegas and not exactly kid friendly ANYWAY! 5. Only people that we REALLY WANT there.
d. Trust me, it''s better to think about this now instead of later.

 

[Lauren8211]

Honestly? Not at all.

I have a VERY small family. I only talk to my mom, brother, and stepdad. That''s IT. FF has a big extended family, but his parents will not be contributing to the wedding, and the extended family is not close with FF, so they''re not getting invited. If his parents insisted that they be invited, they would need to help pay for the wedding.

That leaves my parents and brother and his gf, his parents and brother/sis-in-law, and up to 30 of our closest friends. We''re keeping it to 40 and under.

Its pretty much already planned. Whew!

 

[sunnyd]

This is fo shizzle the worst part of planning. My mom keeps adding people and dates for people and I've had it. I've suffered a few bridezilla moments because of it.

And even now, looking at the list, we hardly have any of our own friends on it. It's sad, really.

ETA: That was really a debbie downer post!

Here were our rules at the beginning:
1. No one we didn't know.
2. No dates for singles (because this would likely violate rule 1) except for the BP...I guess
3. No friends we haven't seen all year

How our rules have been broken:
1. People are coming that we don't BOTH know (ie, FMIL's friends, allowable because she only had 6 requests)
2. My mom thinks it's proper etiquette to invite everyone and their brother with a date (additional rule 1 violations). She finally caved to just having a few people with dates, which will probably make us look bad because now some singles are invited with dates and others not.

3. 2 groomsmen count in this category because they fell off the face of the earth for awhile.

 

[ellie424]

Yes!! I am definitely dreading decided on who to invite/not invite. My brothers and sister have gotten married already, so I''m going to use their lists as a base for who to invite from our family...and then I need to add friends and figure out which co-workers we are going to invite. But just thinking about it is stressful.

Another thing that is stressing me out is the bridal party. I am either going to have a very small bridal party (2 guys, 2 girls), or a very large bridal party if I decide to include everyone. I have a large immediate family...so if I have some family members, I will have to have others. I feel as though it will be much more expensive having a large BP (flowers, gifts for BP) and my boyfriend and I are going to be paying for most of the wedding...so I think we will probably just keep it small. It def is stressing me out though!!

 

[trillionaire]

yup. I want to elope, just the two of us. Anyone beyond that is going to stress me out!!!

I could probably live with immediate family only (my 2 sibs and mom and dad, maybe grandma, and his dad, mom, brother, SIL and their two kids... though preferably without the kids!) as a DW. However, that is going to be DRAMA with our friends and extended family. We met in college, so we have the same friends, and we''ve know each other and each other''s families for almost nine years, so yeah.... everyone EXPECTS to be there!

They have said that they are waiting by their mailboxes for the invites, and all our friends are looking to us to throw some huge ''reunion bash wedding''.

I would love to ATTEND a wedding with my friends and our two families, but the idea of all those people coming to celebrate US, and being the center of attention makes me want to hyperventilate and crawl into a hole! I have no idea what we are going to do... depends on how much or how little wedding SO wants.

 

[Jessie702]

I am stressing, but he isnt. I have HUGE family, and dont want to invite everyone, and he has a tiny family, you can count them on one hand, including cousins, also he has just a few close friends. So the most part of the list is me. Im looking at keeping it under 50 guests. LoL...IF i could trim that down to 30, i would be so happy. Also, i am trying to keep it small because my mother will be paying for most of the cost, well the reception, the actual wedding, and the food. We, C and i, will have to pay for my dress, his tux, our honeymoon,flowers, favors...the small stuff. Luckly the place im thinking of, the cake is included in the price of food.

 

[inloveinpa]

Date: 6/4/2009 3:44:43 PM
Author: trillionaire
yup. I want to elope, just the two of us. Anyone beyond that is going to stress me out!!!

I could probably live with immediate family only (my 2 sibs and mom and dad, maybe grandma, and his dad, mom, brother, SIL and their two kids... though preferably without the kids!) as a DW. However, that is going to be DRAMA with our friends and extended family. We met in college, so we have the same friends, and we''ve know each other and each other''s families for almost nine years, so yeah.... everyone EXPECTS to be there!

They have said that they are waiting by their mailboxes for the invites, and all our friends are looking to us to throw some huge ''reunion bash wedding''.

I would love to ATTEND a wedding with my friends and our two families, but the idea of all those people coming to celebrate US, and being the center of attention makes me want to hyperventilate and crawl into a hole! I have no idea what we are going to do... depends on how much or how little wedding SO wants.

OMG - that is how I feel. AND I hate being the center of attention and isn''t that what weddings are all about!??! I would love to elope, but my BF doesn''t want to..he wants the whole shhaabang! I would love to keep it under 50, maybe even 25, but I have no idea how...I feel a little relieved that there are other people who feel my pain. All of my friends have extremely small families and their parents are paying, so it wouldn''t matter anyway how many people they have.

 

[CurlySue]

Thankfully, this isn''t something I''m worried about.

Then again, I don''t even know if I want a wedding, and my BF, family, and close friends all know that. So I think they are expecting us to just elope. Not sure what BF''s family thinks, though I know his mom said she''d be OK if we just went down to city hall. So my sense is that we won''t get any pressure from family or friends.


... And if I''m wrong, and they *do* put pressure on us, I''ll just tell them to shove it!

 

[Squirrly]

eloping would be more fitting with my personality, but considering this is the only time FF''s and my family will meet, well it''s a once in a lifetime thing, and i''ve had a blast at my friends'' weddings. instead of having a small one, we''re going to have as many people as we can possibly afford and depending on that, possibly invite more to the dancing part.
it''s going to be the last time we hang out with some of our friends, since he''ll have just re-located to another base and i''ll be leaving to go live with him, so i''m looking at it as one last hurrah/giant going away party and well, starting saving now. he said his family might help out if we asked but i feel bad about that sort of thing, so i guess estimates on how much it costs per person now, see how much we can save, and then hopefully we''ll have more than enough for everyone or i''m going to have to figure out some tactful invites

 

[ladypirate]

LOL. Ideally, I would love to have 50 people, no more than 100 for both of us. We just got my mom''s list and there are 100 people on it. Oh dear. Now I''m just praying we can keep it below 150.

 

[MonkeyPants]

ooo yes I hate this part! My side of the family is 150!! not even including any friends. These are just aunts, uncles, and cousins that I''m obligated to invite. FI''s side is even bigger!!! So what we''re doing is making a list of everyone and then cutting away at it...a lot of family are out of the country so we figured we could invite them but they wouldn''t show...which helps. But still, it sucks.

 

[LitigatorChick]

Not at all. In fact, the list is done. It is me and him

. We plan to get married on a beach just the two of us - sooooo romantic!!!!

 

[lilmissrugger]

Ugggh, I feel your pain. I mean, I do want to have a nice sized wedding, and I don''t mind the attention

but my FF and I will be paying for the wedding for ourselves (at least 90%) of it, but we both have HUGE families. We''re doing a bunch of DIY projects for the wedding that will keep it down, as well as probably using FF''s brother''s house (he and his wife are both doctors, and their property is BEAUTIFUL), but still. I don''t want to invite aunts and uncles we never see, as well letting everyone and their mother bring a date, but that''s difficult.

Le sigh.

Oh, and I have no ring yet, either- but it''s something to think about.

 

[gwendolyn]

I''m supposed to be doing this now (or like a month or two ago?) so we can get a venue for next March/April, but...blarg. Really not wanting to do it (but I will! This weekend probably. Bleh.).

 

[Still_Waiting]

Sorry, this is such a miserable task for you (and so many others)!

It''s one of the (many) reasons we''ll be planning a destination wedding...although we aren''t engaged yet either. We talked about the many benefits of a DW long ago and haven''t turned back since! Besides not having so many details to worry about, whomever can make it, great! Those that can''t, well, that''s fine too. Lately I''ve been thinking more and more about eloping, though I haven''t discussed it with SO. I totally agree with you, though. Who''d want a wedding surrounded by people you''ve never even met but once or twice? I only wish to have the most important people in my life surrounding us with their love and support! I wish you the very best with this miserable task. Sorry that I don''t have any advice to offer!