I want a wedding of about 150 guests, but my FMIL doesn't think that's enough. I told my FI that each of our mothers could invite 60 guests, which is tight considering we both come from large families. Between 60 for FMIL, 60 for my mother, that leaves 30 for us to invite our friends. And I feel this is fair. My FI and I also came to the realization that we'll need to bump up our official number with our venue to 175 to make room for our bridal party and vendors. I, of course, opened my big mouth with a division of guests that was different from the 60/60/30 to say if we had 175 GUESTS (not total number of people) as 75/75/25. So my FI tells FMIL that she can invite 75 people. A few days later, she calls me saying she's got 83 people she's got on her list. I died a little. I talked to my mom about it and it just made her so mad because she feels like "Well, how will we fit any of our family if she's going overboard?" This played on me for a while. And I'm just feeling so disrespected. I've been waiting for 3+ weeks for this list from her.
My FILs came with us the day FI and I put the deposit on the venue, and my FMIL kept trying to bully me into changing my date. FI and I both decided on March 15, 2015 which is a Sunday for several reasons: since we're English education majors, I'm going to have a subtle book theme (Shakespeare quotes on our favor, guest book, and gift tables along with on our programs, a birch tree wedding cake as a nod to Robert Frost's "Birches"); March 15 is like $4,000 cheaper than March 14 at our venue; and we both have an appreciation for Shakespeare and thought the Ides of March would be the perfect date for anniversary celebrations (trip to England to see a play in the Globe, anyone?). We explained this to her at the venue in front of the people there. And she kept it up: "Oh, it's so inconvenient for FSIL and blahblahblah." I'm like "Yeah, it isn't the most convenient date for us either." But, it was the date we wanted. We've even got it starting at 5 so that we'll be wrapped up by 8:30 instead of 7 and 10:30 because of the day of the week. This instance wouldn't have irked me so badly if she wouldn't have kept it up for an hour after we left the venue.
Before any of this happened, FMIL told FI that if there were any problems between me and her, that he should be the go between. Which I understand to an extent, but at the same time it feels really childish. I feel like its my wedding but because they're helping my parents pay for it, they think they automatically get to do whatever they want. I've kind of just thrown up my hands for now because FI hasn't shown much interest in helping me so I don't know what to do.
I know this is a lot of complaining, but please, no rude comments. I'm not being rude to my FILs, I just needed a rant somewhere my FILs (facebook) FI or my FSIL (tumblr) would see it. I'm being respectful and grateful to both my FILs and my own parents for all of their help with our wedding, and not being ungrateful at all. I'm just frustrated because my FI doesn't care to hear how I feel about this (and then wonders why I have crazy-person crying spells). Thanks March 2015 Brides!