Thank you wise Knotties for sharing this advice with me. I'm a bit of a Knot paradox, one common piece of knowledge is always count on 100% of your guest list coming, while another is expect lots of declines with a weekday wedding.
FI and I are getting married on a Thursday so I mostly expected the tail end of that advice to apply to me as more than half of our 200 loved ones invited are OOS. The last of the RSVPs came in this week and guess who got a 95% acceptance rate? Only one family declined due to it being on a weekday. Thank GOD we budgeted for it. Feeling very happy and loved; can't wait to celebrate with (almost) everyone we wanted in just 23 days!! 
ETF: I put "95% percent" and could not resist correcting...
Re: Why You Should Always, Always Count on 100% Attendance...
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My friend invited 180 to a 140 maximum capacity venue. I giggle. And feel sorry for those that do not fit in the room. Another friend invited 380 to a 320 capacity venue. I invited 235 to a 300 maximum capacity. What a novel concept!
I do have people I know will say no (like my 6 person family that is part of a cult and aren't allowed to leave) , and I had some declines already. I was still terrified of going over.
Boy was that a fight with the mothers. I'm happy I stood my ground, but it was a hell of a battle.
Ugh this is how we are. I realize that you great aunt that is physically incapable of traveling won't come. But we can't assume someone won't want to travel to come. We actually had a friend of Fi's cancel a backpacking trip so he can come.
And you always have to account for those that bring dates with no warning.
I know. This was quite the battle with FI. And in fact one of his GMs has since got a girlfriend. Luckily I talked him into not inviting these friends, especially since he hasn't spoke to them in years.
It's weird how it never seems to be people that are close to you and you actually care about. It's always the weird high school friend or your mom's cousin's daughter. I mean if my sister asked to bring a random friend or date I would be okay with that, but if you are only coming to my wedding because free drinks you need to come alone or with your other.
It's weird how it never seems to be people that are close to you and you actually care about. It's always the weird high school friend or your mom's cousin's daughter. I mean if my sister asked to bring a random friend or date I would be okay with that, but if you are only coming to my wedding because free drinks you need to come alone or with your other.
Oh yeah. I already had one girl who said she wants to bring a date. I was like uh.. we're not giving plus ones to single people. Also the person she wants to bring is my ex's bff. Like what makes you think that's a good idea??
I'm already kind of terrified of the amount of people that are coming - let alone thinking about more. Standing up and speaking in front of people scares the ever-loving shit out of me.