We would like to keep our guest list as moderate as possible, we''re thinking around 200 people. FI and I both have large families. My family and a few close friends are already at 100 people, so it would honestly be just family and close friends.
So where the trouble comes into play is that we are members of a church congregation that we are moderately active in and where the ceremony will be held. It seems that traditionally, couples who are members of the church offer an open invitation to the whole congregation (I have even seen people do crazy things like announce the wedding/put it in the bulletin and then have a sign up sheet on a bulletin board to RSVP for the reception!!) We are having a sit-down dinner, so clearly, we aren''t going to be able to accommodate the entire congregation (although probably only a small percentage would come). I''m also nervous about only inviting a select few.
An idea that my FI had was to announce the wedding to the congregation (and not send formal invitations) and have a short cake/punch reception following in the church fellowship hall. Then have dinner/dance reception for family and close friends only after that.
I have a few concerns about this: 1 is that we live in a small town where people can be pretty clueless about etiquette and I''m worried that people will show up to the reception anyway, not understanding that they weren''t invited. 2 is that I might be offended if not invited to the real party.
Its not that we don''t want to have these people there - but there won''t be enough space/finances to open the floodgates. We''re just trying to find some kind of solution without being offensive and would love any feedback or ideas. Another issue is that our reception will include alcohol and dancing which many members of the church are strongly opposed to, so I''m not sure how comfortable some of them would be anyway.
So where the trouble comes into play is that we are members of a church congregation that we are moderately active in and where the ceremony will be held. It seems that traditionally, couples who are members of the church offer an open invitation to the whole congregation (I have even seen people do crazy things like announce the wedding/put it in the bulletin and then have a sign up sheet on a bulletin board to RSVP for the reception!!) We are having a sit-down dinner, so clearly, we aren''t going to be able to accommodate the entire congregation (although probably only a small percentage would come). I''m also nervous about only inviting a select few.
An idea that my FI had was to announce the wedding to the congregation (and not send formal invitations) and have a short cake/punch reception following in the church fellowship hall. Then have dinner/dance reception for family and close friends only after that.
I have a few concerns about this: 1 is that we live in a small town where people can be pretty clueless about etiquette and I''m worried that people will show up to the reception anyway, not understanding that they weren''t invited. 2 is that I might be offended if not invited to the real party.
Its not that we don''t want to have these people there - but there won''t be enough space/finances to open the floodgates. We''re just trying to find some kind of solution without being offensive and would love any feedback or ideas. Another issue is that our reception will include alcohol and dancing which many members of the church are strongly opposed to, so I''m not sure how comfortable some of them would be anyway.