Invited to baby shower, but not wedding

Angusaur

This didn't happen to me, but it happened to my best friend. Just curious on other opinions as to if it was rude.

Mutual friend X invited myself, as well as most of our social circle to her wedding. Plus ones and children were also included, so I don't feel this was a close-knit family and friends only situation. She excluded best friend. Best friend and her were close, not best friend close, but still kept in contact and hung out semi often. Mutual friend even invited her to the engagement party but excluded her from the wedding. Of course that's already a no-no. Best friend and X remain just as close between wedding and baby shower. They haven't drifted apart, but they haven't gotten any closer.

Best friend gets an invitation to the baby shower.

To me, that's like saying "You're not good enough for me to pay for a meal and drinks and cake/favor for you, but please feel free to bring me a gift to another party that someone else is paying for." So best friend was venting to me about it. I'd definitely be annoyed if she had done this to me. I told her I would decline.

theartistformerlyknownas

Yeah I would decline too.

MobKaz

That sounds really strange.  Is best friend 100% sure she was not on the invitation list and wasn't actually the victim of an invitation that went MIA?

If your scenario is correct, I would probably decline as well.

bethsmiles

I would probably decline and let the friendship die.

Angusaur

@MobKaz yes I am positive. The reason I know is because I kind of beat around the bush to find out if she was invited, and mutual friend told me no.

I also know mutual friend is the one who got the guest list together for baby shower because she asked me for my address and asked if best friend was still at xxx address.

littlemushroom

I don't think it is rude.  I wasn't aware of the etiquette rule that the only people who can be invited to a baby shower were people invited to the wedding.  

People are told all the time here that not inviting certain people to a wedding is not rude.  It's not a slight and not something that others should hold against the bride and groom.  Being invited or not to a wedding has nothing to do with having a baby.

Should people who are excluded from one life event for one reason or another be excluded from all future celebrations of life events?  Seems silly to me.

southernbelle0915

I kind of agree with the sentiment in your OP. If I were her, I'd decline the baby shower.

jdluvr06

I would decline too. It wouldn't be so much about not being invited to the wedding as it would being invited only to gift giving events.

Angusaur

NikkiJay3333 said:

I don't think it is rude.  I wasn't aware of the etiquette rule that the only people who can be invited to a baby shower were people invited to the wedding.  

People are told all the time here that not inviting certain people to a wedding is not rude.  It's not a slight and not something that others should hold against the bride and groom.  Being invited or not to a wedding has nothing to do with having a baby.

Should people who are excluded from one life event for one reason or another be excluded from all future celebrations of life events?  Seems silly to me.

I agree wholeheartedly that it was X's choice whether or not to invite best friend and if she hadn't invited her to the e-party, I don't think either of us would have any qualms about it. But I just personally feel if someone isn't close enough to invite to my wedding (when it is not a private or small event) then they are not close enough to come to my gift receiving shower. I wouldn't do that to someone.

hikebikebemerry

NikkiJay3333 said:

I don't think it is rude.  I wasn't aware of the etiquette rule that the only people who can be invited to a baby shower were people invited to the wedding.  

People are told all the time here that not inviting certain people to a wedding is not rude.  It's not a slight and not something that others should hold against the bride and groom.  Being invited or not to a wedding has nothing to do with having a baby.

Should people who are excluded from one life event for one reason or another be excluded from all future celebrations of life events?  Seems silly to me.

*Stuck in the box*

Yes, but it is against etiquette to invite someone to a pre-wedding party (OP mentioned that she was invited to the engagement party, but not the wedding); and only inviting someone to gift giving events does come off as gift-grabby, IMO.

theartistformerlyknownas

Angusaur said:

NikkiJay3333 said:

I don't think it is rude.  I wasn't aware of the etiquette rule that the only people who can be invited to a baby shower were people invited to the wedding.  

People are told all the time here that not inviting certain people to a wedding is not rude.  It's not a slight and not something that others should hold against the bride and groom.  Being invited or not to a wedding has nothing to do with having a baby.

Should people who are excluded from one life event for one reason or another be excluded from all future celebrations of life events?  Seems silly to me.

I agree wholeheartedly that it was X's choice whether or not to invite best friend and if she hadn't invited her to the e-party, I don't think either of us would have any qualms about it. But I just personally feel if someone isn't close enough to invite to my wedding (when it is not a private or small event) then they are not close enough to come to my gift receiving shower. I wouldn't do that to someone.

Yeah I saw it this way as well. Showers are meant for your nearest and dearest; unless you had a super small, private wedding, if someone wasn't close enough to be invited to your wedding and you haven't gotten any closer, it's super gift grabby to invite them to a shower.

littlemushroom

I just think that there are other reasons why people may not be invited to a wedding that have nothing to do with the relationship the bride has with the potential guest.  Maybe she was dating someone that bride and/or groom couldn't stand and chose to invite neither of them rather than to have the person they didn't like at the wedding.  Maybe the groom doesn't like her and it was a compromise the bride made.  Maybe something happened around the wedding that was more of a perceived slight against someone that has since been rectified and forgiven.  Just because one part of the equation didn't think something happened, or it wasn't discussed by the bride/groom with others doesn't mean there wasn't a legit reason for not being invited.

If the reason for not being invited to the wedding was due to an issue someone other than the bride had with the guest or something that has since been fixed, then that is still no reason to think an invite to the baby shower is rude.

And I agree that not being invited to the wedding after being invited to the e-party was bad.  But the tone of post read to me that the issue was more that there was no wedding invite but there was a shower invite, regardless of whether she was invited to the e-party.  I apologize if I read that wrong.

Angusaur

No, you're correct @NikkiJay3333 the tone of the post is still basically about being invited to the shower but not wedding. Even forgetting the e-party, it just rubs me the wrong way and seems gift grabby.

littlemushroom

Thank you @Angusaur for the clarification.

I know for me, I wasn't able to invite all the friends I would have liked to my wedding because my parents are paying for it.  After our families and my parents' friends and coworkers, I was only able to invite a few of my friends to fill the remaining slots and not go over the agreed upon budget. I am close to people that I wasn't able to invite to the wedding. I hope that just because I couldn't invite them to the wedding doesn't mean that they would find it rude to be invited to a baby shower in the future when I have more control over the potential guest list (less extended family and parents' friends, more people in my own social circle).

huskypuppy14

How far apart were the baby shower and the wedding? If they were a couple months apart, then yes I think it's a little strange, but no necessarily against etiquette. We say all the time that having a baby is separate from a wedding, so a baby shower would not be a pre wedding event.

Now, I was invited to a baby shower of a cousin of mine that I did not invite to my wedding. I barely know her, and I declined also because it was the same weekend as my bachelorette party. I thought it was a little gift grabby (because I barely know her). They also happened to get married quickly before the baby was born a few days before my own wedding (I think it was a very small wedding). So there was less than a month between the baby shower and the wedding.  I didn't even think about not being invited to the wedding but being invited to the shower. It never even crossed my mind that I would be invited to the wedding anyway. They are completely separate events.

JessicaB387

Isn't it customary to send a gift even when you decline the shower?  I have always felt it would be rude not to send a gift to something you are invited to but can't attend.  So declining the invitation only gets her out of actually showing up to the shower, but not the gift part of it. Or is that wrong? 

huskypuppy14

JessicaB387 said:

Isn't it customary to send a gift even when you decline the shower?  I have always felt it would be rude not to send a gift to something you are invited to but can't attend.  So declining the invitation only gets her out of actually showing up to the shower, but not the gift part of it. Or is that wrong? 

No an invitation is not an invoice. 

monkeysip

I didn't have a bridal shower (or E-party or anything) before my wedding, but we had a relatively small wedding.

When I had my baby shower a year later, the hosts (H's sisters) invited some people not invited to the wedding.  I felt really bad, but they also didn't consult me about the guest list.  From their POV, it's an "honor" to be invited to a baby shower, so they wouldn't be offended.  I hope they weren't....