FI doesn't "get" wedding etiquette..Driving me crazy!

SP29

As per "etiquette", I think that if you can provide the reasoning behind the "rule", most people will get it.

I also like to compare weddings to inviting friends/family over for a dinner party. There are a bunch of things people think are "just fine" to do at weddings, but you would NEVER do to someone you've invited to your home. 

Would you want to know who was actually coming? Yes. So you can plan your meal and set out enough place settings.

Would you invite your guests over, then tell them they have to bring X dish or Y bottle of wine with them? No. (Pot lucks are entirely different, and while often people bring something small to a house/ dinner party, you would never require your guests to bring something to a party you are hosting). 

Would you make your guests pay for alcohol? No.

Would you serve something different to your guests and eat something better yourselves? No.

Would you invite your friend but not their significant other, while inviting all other couples? Of course not. 

LtPowers

My point about "a week" was in consideration of the fact that invitations go out several weeks in advance of the event. If the metric were to be simply "dating anyone, for any length of time", then that would mean that anyone who started dating between invitation and event would be inappropriately left out.

Again, I reiterate: that's why the rule is not "dating"; it's "social unit". Sometimes one has to ask, yes, but one does not get thrown into etiquette hell for simply failing to invite the person with whom one's cousin had a date last week.

Powers  &8^]

flantastic

LtPowers said:

My point about "a week" was in consideration of the fact that invitations go out several weeks in advance of the event. If the metric were to be simply "dating anyone, for any length of time", then that would mean that anyone who started dating between invitation and event would be inappropriately left out.

Again, I reiterate: that's why the rule is not "dating"; it's "social unit". Sometimes one has to ask, yes, but one does not get thrown into etiquette hell for simply failing to invite the person with whom one's cousin had a date last week.

Powers  &8^]

I wasn't talking about a week in advance of the event, which admittedly was not clear. I was talking about one week in advance of invitations.

In the case of planning invitations, it's only impractical if you find it difficult to communicate with your guests, which shouldn't be the case.

slothiegal

JFC, just fucking ASK your guests.  THAT'S ALL THERE IS TO IT.

There was no one on my guest list that I didn't feel comfortable calling up and saying, "Hey soandso, I'm getting ready to send out invitations.  Are you seeing anyone since last we talked that you'd like to bring?"

sparklingjewelee

HA! I'm internet famous now.
The Knot made an article about my post.   It's the little things.

sparklingjewelee

Just wanted to thank everyone on here for their advice, comments, and personal stories as well.
It opened my eyes a lot. I realized I was doing some things wrong myself, and had no right to really pin it ALL on my fiance. Heh.

• I'm pleased to say that our invitations are now completed, just have to assemble them.FI and I also found a cool app called WedPics that we're going to include on the "more information" card so guests can upload pictures from the wedding, showers, etc. He is a big fan of it. It also has our wedding registry info in the app, so that's another way of getting around the registry info not being in the invitation itself.
  

• As far as the RSVP, we made an email address:"MYFUTURELASTNAMEwedding"@gmail.comthat guest can respond to, or if they prefer they can call either one of us. We also decided to include a reply card for the older relatives that may not be comfortable with this type of correspondence.
  

• The rehearsal dinner is still stressing me out. I have it narrowed down to a few places, but I have to figure out what his parents want since they are paying. I'm going to have about 32 people, which is the bridal party itself and SO/Dates, priest, readers, ushers, and out of towners. I'm sure we will figure it out. I also want to make it special for my FI, since his birthday will be the same day.

BTW, when I first heard that if you don't hire a wedding planner you can expect to spend between 20-40 hours/week on wedding planning, I said "yeah right". Well, these past three weeks I felt like I've been working two jobs. I know I've spent that much time---last week I was on vacation from work and that's all I did every day. Haha. Crunch time I suppose!



EDIT-I have no idea why my font keeps changing. Guess I'm not so good at this! Ha.