Weddingbee Boards Topic: How ruthless have you been with the guest list?

Weddingbee Boards Topic: How ruthless have you been with the guest list? http://boards.weddingbee.com/ Weddingbee Boards Topic: How ruthless have you been with the guest list? en Tue, 14 Feb 2012 12:46:18 +0000 msmonicka on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-410228 Sat, 17 Oct 2009 06:35:22 +0000 msmonicka 410228@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ We have been extremely ruthless with ours! Its only our CLOSEST family and friends. 76 total including ourselves and the bridal party. We were not playing. I don't even like people really so I didn't want a bunch of people I don't socialize with at my wedding. I don't wanna be paying for dinner for people I don't even know or meeting them for the first time at my wedding...what the heck? And on our RSVP's very nicely on the bottom we have "Please do not bring any extra or univited guests as they were not included in our seating or dinner count". Simple as that...i don't bite my tongue. krissycake on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-410204 Sat, 17 Oct 2009 06:21:59 +0000 krissycake 410204@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ lol i'm another "not very ruthless." we have been getting more "no's" than anticipated so really, I'm kinda digging into a "B" list at this point.  Not to mention all my invites were at least +1's. daydreamwanderer on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-410185 Sat, 17 Oct 2009 06:01:38 +0000 daydreamwanderer 410185@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ I feel like I'm being the opposite of ruthless! BUT most of my friends live either halfway across the country or halfway around the world from our hometown, where we'll be getting married even though I haven't lived there since high school, and J hasn't lived there since college. I'm hoping that by inviting everyone, at least SOMEONE will come! Fortunately for me, J has a pretty short list of friends (although a stinkin' big family). cardigan on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348660 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 07:11:32 +0000 cardigan 348660@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ We're just now starting to put a guest-list together and FI and I are being very ruthless...it's the mothers who aren't! We are definitely going to have to tell them NO on alot of people. We're hoping for right at 100...and right now our list is at 120 without my mother's list. Lovely. Jessie516 on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348639 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 07:02:38 +0000 Jessie516 348639@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ We wanted to keep our guest list small for many reasons.  We ensured that it would be below a number we wanted by booking a venue that would only hold (at maximum capacity) 120 people.  We did this first, even before talking to parents about guest lists because we were paying and wanted to keep a handle on the list. We really limited our list in terms of family and friends.  For family, we included parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles and first cousins ONLY.  We didn't add any extra family members, so there was a clear cut-off on both sides.  My mom has 40 first cousins, so if we had extended out even another level, it would have probably tripled our numbers.  For friends, we included only our very closest/oldest friends.  We didn't include coworkers, aquaintances, or many HS/college friends.  We basically asked ourselves if we had seen/spoken to the people within the last 3 months.  We didn't include people just because we had attended their wedding, because several of those people had very large weddings.  For parents, we allowed his parents to have one table of their closest friends and didn't include their coworkers, friends kids, etc.  If we hadn't capped this, I think my MIL would have invited 300 people herself!  My mom didn't request any friends to be invited, so that helped, too.  Actually, because my husband and I paid, we never really let anyone else give us people's names to add to the guest list.  We made the list and showed it to our parents for approval, but never actually requested names from them.  This way, we were in control the entire time.  Finally, we didn't invite anyone under the age of 16, so there were no children invited. Incidentally, we were able to invite all single people with a guest because we kept the guest list so much smaller.  Of the 117 people we invited, our final attendee list was 86--including 3 vendors, my husband and me.  Most if not all of the single folks decided to attend without dates. cheerful on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348620 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:57:32 +0000 cheerful 348620@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ We have four guests coming to our elopement. Pretty ruthless, I'd say ;-) brandy512 on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348609 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:52:42 +0000 brandy512 348609@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ Hey, to all the people who said you can't do that many people for $10K, they are totally wrong! It just takes some innovation and research. We have 110 people, for right under $10K. We could have has as many as 140 and still stayed within budget, but a lot of people couldn't make it. Any, I was suepr lucky, and didn't have to be ruthless. I have a small family, and my fiance's family is holding a second reception up North for us, so they don't all have to come down. There were people I kind of wanted to invite, but didn't, but it was more because of just not really wanting them there, not to keep the ##s down. Ms. Guava-Tini on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348575 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:39:03 +0000 Ms. Guava-Tini 348575@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ Ruthless - We arent having our first argument as a married couple be the bill for the wedding. In fact, we are paying everything cash & I am not about to pay $100 plus for someone who only seems to peak their head when there's a free meal to be got (i.e. distant relatives) I explained early on to my parents ( although we are footing the bill) that only my family and first cousins/aunts would be invited. nothing beyond that and fh only has about 8 people in his family (including second cousins) so his family totally got in. I am only inviting close family and four girlfriends. We are contracted for 75 guests. alohababy28 on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348569 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:35:03 +0000 alohababy28 348569@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ Our first rule was that if we hadn't seen them since we've been dating they were out. Of course then we started getting invited to random family parties and that blew that rule out on a technicality. Then we made it that if we wouldn't hang out with them, or have dinner at their house they were out- but that made our guest list too small to find a reception hall that would accommodate, so we opened it back up. Now we are only inviting up to aunts and uncles (no cousins unless they are young, or if we are very close). Most of his cousins are closer to his parent's age than ours, a lot of them have kids, and some of their kids have kids- so that would have added a TON of people. As far as +1 we limited it to adults (nobody under college age) only, but I have heard that a lot of people aren't taking advantage of the +1 anyway, so you might be ok there. Best wishes! littlemissmoo on "How ruthless have you been with the guest list?" http://boards.weddingbee.com/topic/how-ruthless-have-you-been-with-the-guest-list#post-348367 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:15:09 +0000 littlemissmoo 348367@http://boards.weddingbee.com/ Fairly ruthless. They had to be people we both knew or at least both knew ABOUT. FMIL tried to put her sister's best friend from school on her list. Apparently her and Mr Moo are very very distantly related (so far off the tree you'd need extra pages for the branches!). I had no idea who this woman was. She had to be put on the "if we have a few no's list". I still don't know who this woman is. Also people only got +1's if they were married/engaged/in a relationship.