Making the Cut
August 4th, 2008 @ 3:39 pm by Miss Sweet Tea
So one of the things that’s been a small big headache is figuring out the guest list. If we were made of money, it would be no issue. Shoot, even the family pets would be invited (you know how I love those animals). Alas, there is this pesky thing called a budget that we’ve got to stick to, so there’s got to be a cap on the list.
Wedding planning in general makes me simultaneously feel super loved and very lonely. On the one hand, all these people come out of the woodwork to congratulate you, send their good wishes, etc. But when all that happens, it just reminds me how out of touch I’ve been with people, how I’m not close to a lot of old friends any more, how I would never think to call half of them just to say hello. And vice versa. It’s the ebb and flow of relationships, and it’s perfectly natural. But it doesn’t make putting together a guest list any easier.
I mean, how do you decide who makes the cut? There are wonderful new friends that Mr. Sweet Tea and I are making in CA, but we have not known them as long as other friends. Of our older friends, do we invite ones we’ve consistently been in touch with (even ones that irritate us sometimes), ones we haven’t spoken with lately but care for a lot? Only mutual friends of ours, or can we invite friends that don’t know either Mr. ST or me?
Worse is the ‘and guest’ situation. We’re basically making the rule that serious couples are the only ones we’re inviting with a +1. The fact that it’s a destination wedding, though, makes it a bit tricky. For example, I have some wonderful girlfriends who will know no one at the wedding except for me and the Mister. Do I invite the lady sans date, knowing she very likely may not come, because the inconvenience of flying and paying for a hotel in our wedding location may not be worth it if she won’t know anyone else? Or do we fudge rules and allow certain people to bring dates if it is a better guarantee of their attendance, even if we’re not inviting other people’s significant others who better fit the ‘and guest’ criteria?
I hate even typing this out! I don’t like the thought of certain people being hurt because we couldn’t invite them for whatever reason. But that’s the way the cookie crumbles, I guess.
How are you reining in your guest list?
(Photo from someecards.com, which is just too hilarious. I’m sure another picture will make its way on this blog in due time)
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21 Responses to “Making the Cut”
I’m so with you in your frustration. My mother, bless her loving heart, and my MIL, bless hers too, insist on inviting everyone they’ve ever known. Not that I am unappreciated on the fact that they want me to have a wonderful wedding but my venue seats 166 people comfortably and we are well up to 250 on the invite list. My mom goes by the old stand by.. “if you invite 250 people, 150 will show up”. My biggest fear is that my wedding will be the over-achiever of weddings and i’ll have 100 people with no place to sit!
ahhh!
Our decision was made a little easier by the fact that our reception venue ONLY held 150 people, so we made it a rule that we wouldn’t invite any cousins (unless they were over the age of 21 and VERY close to the family).
We also did not invite guests unless they were a serious couple. We had a few people ask us personally if they could invite a +1, and in certain circumstances we said yes.
the key to remember is that you will end up hurting some people’s feelings, but there is absolutely nothing you can do about that if you’re open and honest about the situation! I have an aunt that is STILL mad at me because her 4 young children were not invited to the adult-only reception (even though I personally called to apologize multiple times). You just can’t win ‘em all.
Becky
@Becky:
OMG! I’ve been reading your blog, girl, and that Groomsmen Draft Pick is the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen. I love it!
It’s going to be hard for us as well. All of FI’s side and most of my friends (the excerption will be two to three people) will be traveling (including us) but most of the family on my side (who is also bigger) will not be traveling as we are having the wedding in my home town 4 hours from my FI’s family and where we currently live.
As for the single girlfriends, perhaps you can hook them up over e-mail (create a chain where everyone must reply all and answer questions or talk about something), facebook or some other way so that they can get to know each other and perhaps split the cost of a room for the weekend. This way they are not paying the entire cost on thier own.
I am in the same boat. New vs old friends I think might be the toughest part. The only thing that I have figured, which helps SOME, is that the only old friends that are being invited are the ones that I feel I’ve lost touch with, but I could still call and re-up the relationship. If its turned into a “Hey, how are you? Lets catch up sometime” type of thing, they got cut. With new friends, I find its a little more tricky because I started with the only inviting new friends that I feel will really be a part of my life for a long time to come… but some of them come in groups and even though I am closer to one than the other, I still see them together on a regular basis so I can’t really separate without some seriously hurt feelings and damaged relationships.
If you find the miracle answer - pretty please let me know!
we are having an EXTREMELY hard time with this one. my fiance and i both have HUGE families and big networks of “extended” family i.e. family friends. right now our max will be 400 but we are finding it difficult to even stick to that. it is SO hard. plus our dads have tons of people they need to invite too. it is turning out that we can barely invite more than 10 friends each 
Ah, I love the someecards!!!! Between that and you using “rein in” correctly, I think I’m in lurve.
Originally I wanted an under-100 person wedding. I figured we could spend more per person to make our wedding truly lovely. Then reality (and a future-MIL) stepped in. We’ve invited 140, and we’re budgeted for 115-120. Fingers are crossed some people can’t make it… (how sad is that to say?). On the topic of single friends and “+ guest” - for those who are single and know a lot of people, we did not say “+ guest.” For friends who are travelling from far away or won’t know more than 1 other person, we did say “+ guest” just to make it easier for them. I thought, what would I want if I was invited to this same wedding? …
I read this list of questions to ask on cnn.com yesterday. If only I’d found it before the guest list was done!
http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/personal/08/01/wedding.list.quiz/index.html?iref=newssearch
And someecards.com rocks!
The guest list has been the worst part of planning for me. I feel very lucky in that FI and I were on the same page wanting a very small wedding and agreed on criteria for invitation (this was SUPER helpful and sometimes surprising). Due to the limitations of our venue, we had to keep it small, so it hasn’t been as out of hand as it could be, but now that invites are out, it’s been very complicated amongst our local friends/acquaintances. We both dance socially, so we know a ton of people - one of our invite rules was that we had to have spent time with the person in question outside of dance events. This bumped some people off the list, but not others.
We’re having a dance reception separately to celebrate with everyone, including those who didn’t make the cut, but it’s still tricky now that the invites are out. Most of the dance people that are invited are in the wedding party or doing something (music, photography, etc.). It’s still awkward. I can’t imagine how others even begin to deal with the more complicated questions…
we’re limiting out guest list to “lifetime friends”, e.g. no aquntiences, no coworkers.
We only invited our closest family members and friends. The friends we included are the ones who have stuck around from the very beginning!
Wow, thanks for turning me on to someecards, which has had me in stitches all afternoon! I think weddingbee has done more to expand my online favorites list than any other site! Good luck with your guest list - it was one of the hardest parts of our planning process too, but I’m afraid I don’t have any sage advice.
I heart someecards! I’m constantly surprised by how often they express my secret sentiments exactly. ;-P
@wvmeg08: I’m right there with you. Our venue will hold a max of 160 and we have 225 guests on our guest list right now- and my mother also has the same mentality. But whatever. I addressed all of the invitations this week so if they come- then… I don’t know
Miss Sweet Tea- I think it’s understandable to only invite the serious significant others. But if there’s people you think won’t come because of that (and you really want them there) then maybe make an exception for them
we just invited very close family and friends it started off small then it got out of control and now we are back at small about 100 guest
I was going to link to that CNN article too (high five @Jenniferb).
You’re right, it’s sooo tricky with a DW because a lot of people think it’s a free-for-all. That said, I found I was probably a lot more liberal with the invitations than I may have been otherwise. Even if someone comes that wasn’t on the A-list, I figure most people will just do their own thing for the other 6 days we’re there anyways. I’ve filed the whole guest list under ‘things not to stress about’ (it’s a small file but I’m working on expanding it).
We made some basic rules that we applied to everyone that was invited…and that made everything so much simpler
These where our rules
1. People we se all the time- we have friends who we see atleast a couple of times a month and since neither of us live close to family these are the people we have sunday lunch with, X-mas (sometimes), b’day dinners etc etc with
2. People that we make special trips to see, that includes friends and family from our respecitve home countries (Sweden and Australia), as well as friends who live on the other side of London and that we make special trips to see cause it takes 1.5 hour on the tube to get to their house.
If people did not fall in these two groups, they where not invited. It was hard enought to cut down to 135 people using those rules.
So I say, make some rules, and stick with them.
our general rule was that if the couple seemed serious-ish we invited their plus 1. We did decide to invite plus ones for some out of town guests like you were considering, but because of travel guests many are just coming alone any how.
I am struggling with this exact issue right now. Cutting the list sucks, and trying to figure out who “deserves” to have a guest or not is super lame.
Miss Sweet Tea, San Diego/New Orleans
Age and Occupation: 26, Graduate Student
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 29, Web Monkey
Engagement Date: December 1, 2007
Wedding Date: December, 2008
Blogging Since: July 14, 2008
Venue: Small church ceremony, museum reception
About Me: I'm an East Coaster living on the West Coast, planning a wedding in the South. I teach, study and write about pop culture, race, and sexuality for a living- now if only my dream job paid! After Mr. Sweet Tea, my other loves are scuba diving, traveling, being a semi-pretentious foodie, and fighting for social justice. I can't wait to have our best friends and family together in our favorite city to
celebrate with us!
I LOVE someecards! Sometimes I cheer myself by reading the snarkiness I’d love to send to other people, but never do.