Inviting guests to ceremony but NOT to meal??

tabskitten

I am getting married in June and spent from Jan to Feb worrying and jumping through hoops trying to please everyone else and do what my mother in law thought should be done.
WE have now decided that it is OUR wedding and we will do it how the hell we like and anyone who doesn't like it can stay at home!! And that goes for my mother in law too!!!

Mme.Hibou

Okay, I'm going to speak from the other side of this. I'm not a massive fan of the whole 'invite-to-the-ceremony-and-then-party-but-not-the-meal' thing, but it seems that a lot of people don't mind. If I was invited to a wedding at a zoo, I'd think that was pretty cool but there is no way I'd want to walk round a zoo all day dressed in my posh frock and heels.

I'm not sure how you'd get around your quandary though.

simpywimpy

Im invited to the evening part of a wedding but would have loved to have been able to watch the ceremony then come back later in the day for my part of the celebration

fly_dragon_fly

we are wanting to do this, we have a lot more people we would like to celebrate our wedding but cant afford to have everyone for the sit down meal

so we are having our top ten friends and their children and then our parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles and then the cousins we talk to and class as friends and there children.

all other cousins and friends / friends of parents and neighbours are invited to the wedding and evening just again not sure how to word it on invites.

MustStopSpending23

You've already got plenty of answers but I thought I'd throw my pennies worth in!

My wedding breakfast holds 70, and me and OH have 71 members of family. So there is physically no way we can have any friends at our meal. We have however told them if they'd like to come to the ceremony (as well as the evening reception) then they are more than welcome. All of our friends have been absolutely over the moon that they can come to the ceremony too, so don't think it's rude to ask. They'll just be glad they can share an extra bit of your day with you.
I work abroad, but am getting married in the UK and I have friends flying over for the wedding (ceremony and evening reception). None of them have moaned, they're just so pleased they got an invite. And any true friend of yours will be the same :-).

V x

wkdhoney

Off topic but I'm getting married in Chester Zoo as well! I can't wait.

On topic I might actually do this. Invite some people to the ceremony but not the meal. We're paying £25 a head for the BBQ option. Aaah decisions decisions..


17 weeks to go! :dance:

shellsuit

On the evening invites, you could just add a bit saying that 'whoever', is more than welcome to come to the ceremony if they wish to see you get wed.

pretzelnut

my 2p's worth:

Normally i would say it was rude to invite guests to the ceremony and them tell them to sod off and come back later, there was a similar thread a few weeks ago that raised far more questions than answers.

BUT

I think this is clever. Having 3 small children, i understand how boring it can be for children at weddings, this way I get to go to the ceremony with the kids and the kids get a nice day out, we could take a picnic or whatever and then meet you later, The kids wont be bored as they'll have loads to talk about, about what they have seen all day. I think this is much better than forcing the children to sit down and listen to a bunch of oldies waffle on.

(not calling you old, everone over the age of 20 is ancient according to my 7 year old)

fitshase

We could "only" have 90 to the daytime reception but up to 400 for the evening (big family and lots of friends!). Our invitations were normal but we just used word of mouth to let people know that they were more than welcome to come to the church service and share in the photographs if they wanted to.

Most people would love to come to the service and see the actual marriage. The added bonus of having a day out at the zoo as well tops most ceremonies!

ellay864

Now is there any way I can fix the weather so the nice day out at the zoo is just that??? Our budget wouldn't run to hiring the place exclusively so we just have one room and if the heavens open then our guests will have to cram in the bar and restaurant bit with everybody else (and I guess the numbers of public in there would double if we're all escaping the rain!)...maybe I should invest in some pac-a-macs tastefully colour coordinated of course!!