So I have been having an argument with my mother about my rehearsal dinner. I was hoping you ladies, whose opinions I have come to value, could weigh in with your honest opinions and help me!!! When my fiance and I first got engaged (and even before that) we never had in mind the whole big wedding thing. Honestly, we would have gone down to city hall and done it alone with a court appointed witness! But...since both of our parents kinda wanted us to go ahead and have a party, and since both sets offered to pay, and because we thought one day we might regret not celebrating more, we decided to have the big wedding - which has now turned into a guest list of 275. Here is how this relates to the rehearsal dinner - I want to have a very small, very intimate rehearsal dinner. We are not having a bridal party, so the only people intimately involved in our ceremony besides us are our parents, siblings, and the judge who is marrying us, a friend of my dad's. My idea was to do the rehearsal the day before the wedding, then go to dinner with just those involved in the ceremony as our "rehearsal dinner", then we would meet our out of town guests at the hotel where they are all staying for drinks and dessert (we would provide them with dinner before that, but we wouldn't be there eating). I think this is an acceptable compromise, since it is important to me to have something intimate and I have let my parents invite whoever they want to the wedding, but we are still feeding our out of towners. My mom disagrees. What do you all think??? I should also mention, my fiance's parents would be hosting...