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Personally, I don't think if one side pays, they "get" more guests. Not everyone agrees with me, though.
I also think that if one side of the family is substantially bigger, there will be more members of that family present. Again, not everyone willagree with me; some will say each side gets the same number of people.
I also don't think weddings are a time for "social obligations" as you call it. Weddings are a celebration, as you know, not a time for reciprocating. Again, some people will disagree with me.
I say if your side of the family is bigger, you get more. But try to make the family friends list more even. Unless your parents are massively more social than his parents, then it just seems unfair to not have a more even list. I really do think family friends should be more even in numbers.
But I also think you need to talk to your fiance. What does he think? Is he understanding that your family is bigger, therefore more will attend? If so, he should talk to his mom.
Here's my story: My family is a mix of Mormon (Big Families) and Italian (Big LOUD Families), my FI's family is Scots/Irish/Catholic (Big Loud Families drinking whiskey in kilts).
There is no way that we could possibly ever fit everyone into one place without leaving out a bunch of people, and really, do you really want to not have your friends there? What we're going to do is have two receptions. Actually, one reception and one Open House. The open house will take place at my FMIL's club and will be a mix of B-list guests and friends of hers. We're going to save the decorations from ther reception and just do finger food. It's not a lot of money, just time, and it will save you from having to fight. The biggest question becomes who REALLY needs a wedding invitation and who can you get by with inviting to a lower scale open house that can take place sometime later.
Good luck, I hope this helps!
Tough call! We had a very similar guest list situation (including the financing part), only my family is about... 10xs bigger than his. So it's wildly uneven, but there's really nothing I can do about it. There was no way to cut the immediate family we're inviting, and frankly his family isn't as close-knit so I didn't feel as bad about putting my foot down (why cut a close cousin to invite an aunt he hasn't spoken to in ten years?) Then again, my parents didn't add any additional guests out of social obligations, nor did his family. If there is any way you can have your FMIL understand you can't extend to people you aren't close with, it would really help. I hate to say it, but I am of the mind set that if they're not contributing much or at all, then they shouldn't be dictating your guest list. But that's just my 2 cents. Good luck!
If one side has a larger family than the other I don't think you should have to cut back the large family in order to make the numbers equal. I do think, however, that you should think about who you are inviting if one family is substantially larger and not invite aunt/uncles/cousins who you don't even talk to... and/or their dates!
We have a similar issue in that my family is footing the bill and therefore my mother thinks she can invite whoever she wants.... which to a certain extent sounds like a good argument, but at the same time, it is your FI's wedding as well and just because his parents cannot afford to cough up the money he should not be disadvantaged because of it.
So my bottom line is that I think unequal amounts of family are fine, as family size is not something that you can choose, but try and make the parent's friends sizes as equal as possible.
Good luck... this is a tough situation!
My family is huge compared to his - and since I recently moved halfway across the country, his list of friends who could make it to the wedding was much larger than mine. We basically agreed on a set of criteria for guests, rather than trying to make the numbers match up in any way. We invited siblings, aunts, uncles, and first cousins only as far as family goes (all grandparents have passed away). For friends, we invited only those that we socialize with regularly (at least several times a year) or those OOT friends that we communicate with often. For our parents, we let them know that we would be happy to have their friends there, with the caveat that we would prefer to have only people that one or the other of us actually knew - so no parents' friends that we don't know.
I think this was a fair method. Much more so than dividing up the guest list by numbers, which just doesn't really work if families and very different sizes.
On the subject of "social obligations" - of course, you can do whatever you want. But we were pretty firm with our parents (and ourselves) that our wedding was not to be used to finally pay back that dinner invitation you had last year... because seriously, if you haven't done anything with those folks since then, you don't like them that much anyway. We also disallowed inviting ANY work friends, unless we honestly believed that they are social friends as well (that we do things with them regularly outside of work, and would remain friends even if we no longer worked together).
As a general rule, we found that anytime anybody said "Well, but we really HAVE to invite..." that actually meant that those people shouldn't be on the guest list. Your wedding should be about having the people around you that love you, not about social obligations and networking. Particularly if you have a lack of space.
And I'm not sure why you would be sending the guest list as a whole to you FMIL anyway. As long as you make sure the addresses and name spellings are correct for her portion of the guest list, how many people are otherwise invited is really none of her concern, unless she is paying for the reception. I would double-check only "her" portion of the guest list with her, and leave it at that.
I agree with most of the other posters on the numbers situation -- it stinks but just go with who you want at your wedding.
In regards to dealing with his mother - I think this is the time where your fiance just has to step in. He needs to be the person who informs his mother that these are the finals numbers and this is what your guest list looks like. Look to him to have the difficult discussion. It is his wedding too - and he should be able to "stand up" to his mother. I would hate for this to cause a rift between you and your future MIL when he can handle this discussion himself.
Good luck though!! And remember it is your day. You and your fiance. The day should be about you and not about obligations to anyone! Even your parents (even if they are paying!).
i agree with suzanno. there's no need to send your FMIL your whole guest list. also, i do believe that the side that pays more gets to invite more.
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My opinion is that both sides of the family should be invited regardless of size. But, I think that if one side of the family is much larger than the other maybe you can make it up by trimming up the friends of family on the larger side. You mentioned how you have put 2 sets of family friends from each side on the B list. How about putting 4 sets from your family's side and none from his side. If your FMIL starts pointing out numbers you can point to that as what you are doing to comprimise.
I'm in the same exact situation as well! And I knew the guest list would be a problem, so I tried to get that knocked out in the first month of our engagement. Here I am, 8 months later and 8 months to go, and I still can't come to a conclusion on what to do.
Technically, my venue can hold 150, 200 at the most. I REALLY wanted to get the list down to 150, but it seems my mother is incapable of budging on this. I'm getting a lot of financial help from my family, with my mother paying the bulk of it, so she thinks she should be able to invite whomever she wishes. FMIL is giving us very little.
As it is right now, my side has 106. FMIL has 96. FI and I have 54, which totals a whopping 256 people!!! It's ridiculous, and I'm already having problems with FMIL on other issues... So I feel your pain. If you come up with a solution, I'd love to hear it!
Wow! Thanks so much everyone! I do like the idea of just sending people their portions of the guest list... I might do this. It will certainly help keep either mother from counting for themselves! I never even thought of it! You all are awesome!
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I suggest you coming up with a "Cap" number, this helped me and my FI figure out who was the most important to us. Because he has a huge immediate family (70) we have decided to cut kids and those not over 16. This really helped. We are also having an after party to be able to invite more of our friends as well as inviting them all to our welcome bbq the night before the wedding so they have a reason to travel and feel included. There will be music, light appetizers and hopefully just fun.
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I have been working very hard on the guest list lately, and I'm very very worried that it is going to turn into a fight. Today I sat and broke everything down into the following groups
Bride Family- 44 guests
Groom Family- 28 guests
Bride and Groom Friends- 52 guests
Bride Family Friends- 31 guests
Groom Family Friends- 23 guests
It ends up that my family has 24 more guests than his family. I do have a HUGE family... but I can't really cut those invites without causing a rift. We also have a "B" list composed almost entirely of our friends. Also, my family is paying a substantial amount more than his family- does this make them entitled to more guests?
I am seeing this becoming an issue as practically everything has become an issue with his mother so far... I am very afraid to send the guest list to them as it is. We had to B list two families that his mother asked us to invite. The issue is that we can't accomodate more than 150 ppl at our venue. We also B listed two families that my parents asked us to invite. She has already made a stink about this before- saying that she will pay for extra guests but she has social obligations to fulfill. My parents own a business, and they have social obligations as well.
I don't know what to do! Should I just send it and then stick to my guns? How would you compromise? Are my parents really entitled to more guests because they are paying?
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