And so it begins...invite woes and reading comprehension fails.

theartistformerlyknownas

So I posted a few days ago that I mailed my invites. Was worried about them getting delivered since I got conflicting direction on how much postage, and went with the lower one. Well we started getting messages right away that people were receiving them, yay! Including... an old friend of FI's brother who is not even super close (don't ask why he's invited, that was FI's call) who texted yesterday "got your invite! are kids welcome?" Um... was Junior's name on the invitation? No? No. (I asked FI "is this maybe a nursing baby?" He has no idea how old the kid is. We told him only immediate family kids and let us know if that was a problem.) 

Then got home to my first two RSVPs today! First, perfectly filled out, 1 chicken 1 fish, little note about how they loved the invites and can't wait. Awesome. The other gem of a response... wrote in "Unable To Attend" on the name line. No name. Not even a number of guests. No idea who this is from. Even the postmark doesn't narrow it down much because it's from the major metroplex processing center in my state. Super. I guess it's better than a "yes" with no name? Number your RSVP cards, folks... ugh.

Edited because the TK monster ate my paragraphs.

monkeysip

lolo883 said:

So I posted a few days ago that I mailed my invites. Was worried about them getting delivered since I got conflicting direction on how much postage, and went with the lower one. Well we started getting messages right away that people were receiving them, yay! Including... an old friend of FI's brother who is not even super close (don't ask why he's invited, that was FI's call) who texted yesterday "got your invite! are kids welcome?" Um... was Junior's name on the invitation? No? No. (I asked FI "is this maybe a nursing baby?" He has no idea how old the kid is. We told him only immediate family kids and let us know if that was a problem.) 

Then got home to my first two RSVPs today! First, perfectly filled out, 1 chicken 1 fish, little note about how they loved the invites and can't wait. Awesome. The other gem of a response... wrote in "Unable To Attend" on the name line. No name. Not even a number of guests. No idea who this is from. Even the postmark doesn't narrow it down much because it's from the major metroplex processing center in my state. Super. I guess it's better than a "yes" with no name? Number your RSVP cards, folks... ugh.

Edited because the TK monster ate my paragraphs.

When I first came on the knot, I remember reading the tip about numbering rsvps and thinking, "what a great idea!"  Then when it came to sending invitations, I completely forgot.  Fail.

Sorry you're already having trouble, but it's good the invitations are making it!  It's exciting to get those RSVPs back!

Senecaf

Number my cards. Got it.

I'm mailing mine out on Monday (a little late) and will definitely do that! People make things more complicated than necessary

theartistformerlyknownas

@monkeysip I had totally planned on doing it... but then just ran out of steam toward the end of getting them assembled. And I was already worried about keeping the inner and outer envelopes in order; keeping the RSVP cards in order too made my head want to explode. Of course now I immediately regret it.

lyndausvi

YAY for  RSVPs.  

Just have giggle at all these little hiccups.

slothiegal

I never understood all the strife over invites/RSVPs until I actually started sending mine out.

On the other hand, I also never understood the excitement until I got my first one back in the mail--I took a selfie with it.  (No shame.)

AddieCake

Yep! Numbering is a great idea!

sarahufl

I didn't number and, thankfully, haven't had idiots yet. I hope you figure it out!

beethery

lol I can't believe people would get offended over the NUMBERS on their cards. PRIORITIES!!!!!

Sugargirl1019

You know how some people put

"# of guests attending ________#

We did. Biggest mistake ever. I had no idea how it would be misinterpreted.
I had guests respond back with just their name on the card and then put 3 on the line - when asked, they said "I want to bring 3 guests. It says I can bring guests". I didn't think that this line would make people think they could bring guests. I just wanted to know how many of the family were coming without printing 9 different RSVP cards.

Don't ever do that line. Or save the dates. I could write a memoir of wedding chaos.

huskypuppy14

Not one RSVP came back without a name. A couple people forgot to check whether they were attending or not, but at least their name was on it to follow up with them. (One was a groomsman, so we knew he was coming).

Also, if you do your lists in excel, sort them alphabetically, then number. So if anyone complains that they are number 132, just say, well your last name is Zekes, that's why you're number 132.

But seriously, people will complain about anything, don't even worry about those things.

erollis

I took the time to number the RSVP cards in tiny writing, in a corner, on the back. No one even commented on the numbers. I'm not even sure if anyone saw them. They did help out as we got cards back without names/ common last name only. The numbers helped out with keeping track.

Sugargirl1019

Oh my gosh. My mom JUST walked in from obviously being out with her girl friend [read: drinking and whining about the RSVP situation] and she threw down this RSVP with an x in "regretfully declines" but left the M____________ line blank. No name, no way we can trace the envelope.. Like what the hell. It has happened.

Cookie Pusher

One of our cards came back with no name, but they had thankfully written their return address on the envelope. Nothing you can do but wait til your deadline happens and contact everyone who you haven't heard back from yet.

zitiqueen

This is one of the reasons we had the names printed right on the RSVP cards.

theartistformerlyknownas

Thankfully the ten (10!!!) we got today were all filled in correctly! Names, numbers, entrees, one request to make her chicken gluten free, no additional write in guests. 10% of the way there!

Simply Fated

This is the first time I've heard of numbering the RSVP cards. How clever!

I'm glad the postage worked out for you!

NavyBlue143

This is why we pre labeled the return envelopes with the recipient's name so we would know who was sending it back. Saved us so many headaches

SBmini

Sugargirl1019 said:

You know how some people put "# of guests attending ________# We did. Biggest mistake ever. I had no idea how it would be misinterpreted. I had guests respond back with just their name on the card and then put 3 on the line - when asked, they said "I want to bring 3 guests. It says I can bring guests". I didn't think that this line would make people think they could bring guests. I just wanted to know how many of the family were coming without printing 9 different RSVP cards. Don't ever do that line. Or save the dates. I could write a memoir of wedding chaos.

Oh wow! I'm glad my guests were able to figure this out! I only had one person RSVP for someone we didn't invite- and it was because my MIL handed them an invitation, which I assume had no names what so ever on it. So I suppose they didn't realize that my husband's cousin's wife's mother was not invited to the wedding. 

CamiSelene

Instead of numbering ours, we just wrote names in the corner on the back. About half of FI's side never freaking responded even though the RSVP envelopes had postage on it. All they had to do was fill it out and stick it in the mail... and we need final numbers at the end of the week. Thankfully we've tracked down all but about 10 now. Oh, and FMIL just added 2 more to the list today because they suddenly decided that FI's dad's band is playing at the wedding. After we've hired and paid a deposit on a DJ months ago.... *sigh*

FiancB

I tried to do the number thing but screwed up the order about halfway through. I did write names and return addresses on the rsvp envelopes though, so there wasn't really any confusion, except for people that had +1s that didn't specify who their +1 was (for people not in serious relationships). 

MrsMack10612

We wrote out our RSVP cards with the names of the guests.  Saved a lot of confusion and made it very clear who was invited.

theartistformerlyknownas

MrsMack10612 said:

We wrote out our RSVP cards with the names of the guests.  Saved a lot of confusion and made it very clear who was invited.

I skipped this in case both/all people invited weren't coming... I didn't want to write it out to all guests then have someone RSVP as a 1 but not know which of them it was. I feel like there's no fool-proof way of doing these damn things... :-\

thisismynickname2

Using advice from this site, I've created RSVP cards with

 ___ Seats have been reserved in your honor. 

M_____________

__ will attend  __ will not attend

Please initial menu selection

___chicken

___ seafood

___ beef

I will also number the cards.  Hoping for the best!  Thanks for all the advice! 
(Sorry OP that this got out of hand. Grrrrrr!)

CamiSelene

@kimches that is a hill I am not dying on... it's FI's parents and apparently FMIL said FI's dad would be heartbroken if we said no. As much as FMIL can occasionally get on my nerves, I absolutely love FFIL and I knowing FI, he'd be very upset if I stood against it too. I finally got him to compromise we're going to have FFIL's band play in conjunction with the DJ so we have a bit of both.