Weddingbee

We spent so much time arguing, compromising and finalizing our guest list that I really never took into consideration the size of the room, once we had the stage, dance floor, food etc. I guess I just always figured that a lot of people wouldn’t be able to attend the wedding, and that the room was a lot larger then it actually is. I was wrong.

Here sits our stack of returned RSVPs*. As of now, here’s the count:

Read more…

I’ve always known I can be a bit of a procrastinator at times, but I didn’t know how many other procrastinators there were out there ’till now… and all of them are our friends.

Read more…

Our invitations are in! Actually, they came in several weeks ago, but we had to redesign the RSVP card and reprint their envelopes with a different address (more details on that later). Before I share with you the whole invitation suite, I wanted to talk a little more about the RSVPs.

I don’t know of any wedding that hasn’t had some sort of an issue with people returning their RSVP cards, but Mr. H and I had several obstacles to overcome when it came to this portion of our invitations. Because Mr. H is the first generation born here in the States, a lot of his family is not used to RSVPs. Also, in his family, although they send out invites, it is normal for people to bring along other family members, friends, etc. that weren’t given an invitation. Finally, while most are fluent in English, there are still quite a few members who are more comfortable with Spanish.

Because we don’t want 500 people at our wedding, and because we want to try to get the maximum amount of returned RSVPs, we chose to try and curb some of this by writing a very detailed RSVP card. Read more…

I know I was desperate for this information when I was trying to figure out the guest list, so I hope this helps someone!

We invited 252 people to our wedding. One week after our RSVPs were due, we have 184 attending, 64 not attending, and 4 that we still haven’t heard from (and at this point we assume aren’t coming). So that’s a yes rate of 73%. If you break it down by in-state versus out-of-state, 63/74 Mainers will be coming (85%), and 121/178 out-of-staters will be coming (68%). And yes, if you haven’t figured it out yet, I’m a big dork.

We offered an email address option for RSVP’ing, but only 14 people took us up on it- 11 to say they were coming, 3 to say they weren’t, and one second cousin to say “thank you very much but actually my husband and I are divorcing and won’t be attending” (eeek).

Out of the 184, exactly 92 are my guests, and 92 are Mr. Tiramisu’s! We’ll be filling the church up nice and evenly Read more…

I was told that I should include an earlier reply by date on our RSVP cards to ensure that we would get all our responses a month before our wedding. I knew I would receive late replies - it’s a given. Well, we put a May 10th deadline and it has officially passed.

I knew we would have some people who wouldn’t respond on time, but I never thought so many people in my family would find it hard to mail a postcard, as it was prestamped. We sent out 75 invitations, and 18 of those RSVPs have not yet found their way back to our mailbox - that’s 24% non - rsvpers.
Read more…

We haven’t sent our invitations yet, but we received our first RSVP today via email:

“Hello soon-to-be-married friends!

Rather than fill out the various cards that I have received requesting I RSVP for your wedding, let this serve as my official response of YES. I’ll be coming, and am excited to attend. If there is some sort of dinner option, my preference is (in order): Steak, Fish, Chicken. I can’t wait to see you and {insert fiance name} tie the knot!

Sincerely,

T. Baxter

PS - Please let me know what you gift card you would prefer as a wedding present- Home Depot, Williams-Sonoma, or Best Buy”
Read more…

The due date for guest responses to our wedding was May 1 (which, as you all probably know, was yesterday). We received 2 more responses in the mail today, which I’ll consider on time, since they were postmarked April 30.

Anyways, we have 7 outstanding invitations remaining that are for a total of 17 people. (This includes a family of 5, where the mother is a reader, the father is our videographer and one of the daughters is our soloist. We know they’re coming, but don’t know whether they want vegetarian or chicken.) Still, that isn’t too shabby, given that we sent out 121 invitations to invite 227 people. That’s a response rate of 94%, which is pretty darn good.

Now begins the task of calling those who did not RSVP, and finding out what their intentions are- hopefully, it’ll be taken care of by the end of the weekend.

How many of your guests have you had to track down after the RSVP deadline?