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Aw that's a bummer, sorry you have to be put in an uncomfortable position like this! Have you guys generally explained to her that your after party is not at all formal, there's no such hosting going on at all, and it's mostly a friend thing. I'd certainly leave the option open for them to come if they want, since they were already told about it, but maybe call them individually yourself to explain what the nature of the after party is, and leave it up to them to decide. If I heard that one of my cousins was having a wedding after party, I'd definitely be interested. But if they told me that it was primarily a friends-going-out type of event, I'd probably not go and just let them have friend time. I mean, you already get such a heavy dose of family for weddings I think it's fair to try to do something with your pals. If I were you, I'd just say something along the lines of "Hey we're glad you'd like to celebrate more, we'll be out at such-and-such bar with all of our friends who are coming into town, FYI, we're not hosting or serving anything, we're just going out blah blah blah." I bet a lot of them would just choose not to come - obviously your FMIL was giving a skewed picture to them of what the after party would entail (first round on you?! haha). Good luck with it though - that's kind of a hard call. IF they do end up coming anyway, hopefully you guys will have tons of fun still!
You could tell her that it is just planned for this small group of friends and the place you are going does not have the capacity for everyone. How many cousins are we talking about? Does your FI want his cousins to come?
I'd stick the soon to be hubby on his mom and get him to straighten things out. If you don't want to have family there you shouldn't have to. It's time to de-stress. Let the family do their own thing amongst themselves... tell your fiance to talk to his mom. That is what I would do.
This may be shady but can you tell her you decided not to have the afterparty and have it with just your friends and not say anything? Or maybe you can talk to your cousins (or have your FI talk to them) and explain the situtation. Just let them know you are so excited to see them at the wedding, rehearsal and brunch but you are getting togther with a few close friends after and thats it. Or tell them your friends are taking YOU out so then it would definitely be imposing.
I think lagiggle has a good solution, have a small venue for the after party, so only a select few can come!
That is actually what we're planning, to just have the after party for just ourselves and those we invite (even though etiquette-wise supposedly everyone invited to the reception should be invited to the after party). But because our families are mostly stuffy and boring, and don't know my FI and I like to have fun (a.k.a. have more than 1 or 2 drinks and do something other than sit around and chat about nothing), we're limiting the after party how we want. We're going to include a separate invite with the regular invites, a kinda cheesy but fun "After Party Golden Ticket", and just put them in the invitations for our friends. And we're holding it on the first floor of our two story bridal suite, so it can't be a huge party, which is our back up plan for if any of our friends let it spill about the after party to those not invited. We're just doing pizza and wings and a make your own cocktail bar and beers, nothing that crazy, just a more private party for my FI and I to relax after the reception.
I say just reiterate to your FMIL and the cousins that it's just a small get together with a couple close friends, to relax after the big party, and you'd rather just keep it simple and small. Hopefully everyone will get the hint.
I agree you should ask your FI to talk to his family and explain that they took it out of context and its only an intimate affair with your friends. Make sure he mentions that its not a family thing.
Why is your FMIL always calling YOU to tell you these things? Is it because if she told your FI he would have shot that down? Again, and as always, your FI needs to tell his mom that she is not the wedding coordinator, and she needs to STOP INVITING PEOPLE TO YOUR EVENTS. Especially saying things like "Oh yeah, they'll pay for the first round!" WTF? I would also stop telling your FMIL your plans. Clearly she'll keep doing this (for the rest of your lives!) unless you only tell her what's up after it's gone down (did you get that?). If she's not invited, she doesn't need to know until after it has happened. Don't tell her anything! And FI better tell her to UNINVITE the cousins, because if this is a SMALL shindig with buddies, you shouldn't feel obligated to inform people who were never invited by you and FI in the first place!
thanks girls, it's nice to know i'm not being crazy. The problem is that my FMIL is definitely a meddler. She gets overinvolved in everything- especially her sons' lives. I'm very worried about how things will be in the future, honestly. I mean, she coddled my FI for his entire life up until now. She has reminded him to do his taxes, go to the dentist, get his license renewed, etc etc etc. She paid his phone bill until I insisted that he get a cell phone on my plan and grow up and take a little responsibility. Now though, I can tell she still wants to mother him, and it is driving me nuts. My mom and I have a great relationship, and my mom has taken a very laissez-faire approach to me since my teens- I'm not used to being told what to do-- I take initiative and do it myself. It's so frustrating. My FMIL gets really defensive if you tell her to butt out and makes you feel really guilty by being super passive aggressive, and my FI has been conditioned by that to not even contest what she's saying. I tell him to be more direct with her, but he just can't seem to do it. I can tell this is going to be a big thing we have to work on in our marriage.
I would call your FMIL back and tell her that you appreciate her help in trying to get the word out, but that everyone that is invited already knows about it. Tell her that you know that she understands how difficult it is to make everyone feel special and for that reason you and your FI have invited a very select small number of people to share a drink with you after the ceremony. It is not a party and not open to additional invites.
I would then personally call the people that she has invited and tell them how much they mean to you and your FI and thank them for being willing to come to the after party. Tell them that your FMIL misunderstood and that you are not actually having an afterparty per say, but that you had made arrangements to have a private drink with certain friends following the ceremony that had been especially helpful to you during the planning process. Just a quick little thing for only a few people outside of the family.
Then tell them that you would love to spend time with them and have a family style get to gether after you get back from your honeymoon and that when you begin planning that they will be the first to know.
After all of that, please smack your FI on the back of the head and tell him to grow up. Honey, problems like this don't generally get better with time. He either will grow a set and be a man or he won't. You need to know which it is before you say I Do.
Good luck!
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After all of that, please smack your FI on the back of the head and tell him to grow up. Honey, problems like this don't generally get better with time. He either will grow a set and be a man or he won't. You need to know which it is before you say I Do.
>>
Great advice. I agree 100%. You need to let him know that it's time to tell her mother to BACK OFF. Good Luck. She sounds like a dream. @@ You poor thing!
I 7th or 8th or whatever all the people who are saying that you should not be dealing this. Let alone so close to your wedding. Sorry to be blunt, but FI needs to "man up" and let your FMIL know that you're going to be his wife v. soon, he's going to be a husband, and you both will be making decisions together. Seriously, this will not get better after you're married, and it's something that you need to work out. I don't know if you both went through pre-marital counseling, but it might be worth it afterward. This isn't about you having a bad realtionship, it's about learning tools to make a better marriage.
All that aside, though, I think it would be hard to un-invite the cousins now, as they are probably looking forward to it. but the "drink on the couple" is waaaaaaaay out of line. I think your FI needs to explain to your FMIL that you simply don't have it in your budget to pay for that, and weren't planning to do that. Hopefully FMIL will step up and offer to pay rather than put you in a situation where word needs to get out that the plan has changed. If FMIL is that much of a meddler (and one who used to pay his phone bill for him), then hopefully he can flat out ask her to do that. It seems like the least awkward way of doing it. If the point of going out was friend time, I'm sure after the first drink or two the cousins will figure it out and leave anyway. It might not be such a bad way to get to know them also.
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I know, these FMIL posts just get so *tired* but ugh, where else can you vent? You ladies are so understanding.
Today my FMIL called to ask about our after party. We had mentioned in passing to her that we planned to have drinks with some friends after the wedding. This wasn't meant to be a formal event or anything, just us having drinks with our friends that we haven't seen in a while. Definitely a no-host thing.
Well, as it turns out, FMIL has been spreading the words among the young cousins all about this, and was calling to tell us how interested they were and wondering where to tell them to go. She told them the first round was on us!
It wouldn't really bother me if the cousins weren't already invited to the rehearsal dinner and brunch. I got major guilt for not inviting them all to the bridesmaid luncheon, but I stood my ground. The going out for drinks was meant to be a time for us to hang out with our friends, without our families, so we could talk shit and tell embarrassing stories- without our families hearing them!
Now the cousins are invited and I feel like yet another wedding weekend event is going to be ruined because we had to invite way more people than we wanted to (I'm still pissed about having 60 people at the rehearsal dinner, but that's not my party. This IS my party.) What would you do?