Who gets an invite to the rehearsal dinner? While the true answer is "invite whomever you want", there seem to be several schools of thought on the issue.
- Invite only those in the wedding party
- Invite those in the wedding party and out of town guests
- Invite those in the wedding party, close family not in the wedding, and out of town guests
- Invite everyone
It seems while the economy has fallen on tough times, the rehearsal dinner is something that has fallen under the budget cutting knife. People seem to be scaling way back on the rehearsal dinner. Right now I see and agree with all sides of this debate. One minute I understand the importance of having a big rehearsal dinner with a large guest list, then the next I question why you have to throw a mini-wedding reception the night before the wedding reception. That's why I'm turning to you... help me. What are your thoughts on rehearsal dinner guest lists?
We ended up inviting about 26 people: our close friends and family. We saved money by doing it after dinner and serving appetizers and a small selection of beer and wine.
ReplyDeleteWe're inviting anyone who wants to come and are doing a PA-inspired rehearsal barbeque at our house. Nothin fancy, just hot dogs, pierogies, yuengling, and some other PA goodies. We liked the idea of being able to hang out with anyone who wanted to come over more than just those 5 hours at the ceremony/reception, ya know? Just something casual to extend all the celebration.
ReplyDeleteHi! I just found your site in search of looking for sites for my fiancee, so he can help out with the planning. I look forward to catching up on all your posts & reading your future posts!
ReplyDeleteFor our rehearsal dinner: Our wedding is in West L.A but a lot of our guests are coming from the East Coast, so we will be inviting them since they made the trip out here and we will be inviting family & the wedding party.
When I got married, my understanding (after a ton of research), was that you invite to the wedding rehearsal those who will be in the wedding, and close family members related to those who'll be in the wedding. And the rehearsal dinner is to feed those people who come to the rehearsal. But, whatever your budget will bear and you want to accommodate is what you should do, with the caveat that generally it's considered poor manners to invite someone to your rehearsal and rehearsal dinner who isn't invited to the wedding. All that said, I lean to the side of not throwing a huge party the night before you throw what's probably the biggest party you've hosted in your life so far. You'll need the whole honeymoon just to recover.
ReplyDeleteoh I'm facing the same dilemma! I want to keep it small but my family has a tradition of inviting close family and out of towners i have a HUGE family). It's usually done as a casual BBQ or something to keep costs down. To make things a bit more complicated, my fiance's parents want to pay for the dinner at a restaurant (they don't seem to understand how many people may be involved!). So I'm trying to a) limit the guest list without offending anyone and b) politely suggest that his parents contribute to some other wedding cost.
ReplyDeletehelp!
We were lucky, our hotel offered a wine & cheese tasting on the night of the rehearsal for all guests. We advertised it on our website like our event, and it fell in between the rehearsal and the dinner. All of our out of town guests had an event they could go to, drink wine, and see us. But we were able to keep our rehearsal dinner really small, just immediate family, bridal party and their significant others. See if your hotel can do something like this, it would be less expensive to just do wine & cheese - and then you only feed the rehearsal dinner people, instead of feeling like you have 2 weddings!
ReplyDeleteAs a frequent wedding attendee, I think it's nice to include as many people as possible. I think it's especially nice to include out-of-towners... they put in a lot of time and money to be sharing your happy day! If out-of-towners are included, adding assorted close local family members not directly involved in the wedding makes sense as well. I suppose if you organize something for out-of-towners to do (suggest a restaurant for dinner in your area, help them all meet each other, maybe even stop by...), that can go a long way to making everyone feel welcome!
ReplyDeleteTechnically. the rehearsal dinner is for the people who are rehearsing, and their significant others. If there are kids, at least one parent for each kid needs to be there. Anyone else is just a courtesy, and their invite depends on budget.
ReplyDeleteHowever, it's gotten so that OOT guests EXPECT an invite to the RD, and then the couple is deemed rude if they do not invite OOT guests. And really, it would be nice if it were allowed to BE just the people who are in the wedding party, because these are the people you asked to stand up with you -- and it would be great for them to get a party with you, just the wedding party and the couple.
Our rehearsal won't be a rehearsal =) but a simple get-together for guests who arrive the night before. All our guests will be out-of-towners (or, rather, the wedding will be out of town...) and there really isn't a lot of things to do around the place except maybe help us decorate the garden and have an informal bbq.
ReplyDeleteI'm having super anxiety over this one! There is no way my fiance's parents can afford to feed the out of town guests along with the bridal party and close family. So it's pretty much just going to be the bridal party (lucky for us, we have 2 couples who are both in the wedding). But even that might be a stretch, so it might also be an informal get together at their house.
ReplyDeleteSame issue here, as my mom is running the show. We have tons of OOTers coming and it would be about 60 people if we invited them all. I basically told my mom, we're doing rehearsal party only, parents, and the minister. We will be having an "open house" in my parents home for the OOTers hosted by my uncle. It ends up being as expensive, but separates the group into manageable sizes.
ReplyDelete