Planning Problems.

oxerny

Hi!We are trying to plan our wedding and celebrations.  My fiance and I live in NY, my family is in OK, and his family in IN.  We do not want to ask our friends and his non-immediate family to pay for flights/hotels/etc to come to the ceremony in OK.  Our plan is to have a small Ceremony with immediate family and best friends.  Following (either immediately or a few days later) we want to have a Reception in OK then weeks later in IN, and NY to celebrate with everyone on their (and our) turf.  I am very worried about hurting peoples feelings and being inappropriate.  We do not want a huge ceremony, but could have a big reception right after with everyone in the OK area.  I am afraid this would offend those not invited to the OK Reception (It may be seen as "the" reception)   We want everyone to feel like they are apart of the big day, without having the big ceremony.Any thoughts on how to word/handle/expect from this situation?Thanks!

ar2053

I had a similar situation- DH and I are living in OK, my family lives in IN, and DH's family lives in FL and OH. We thought about having multiple celebrations but ultipmately just ended up having one reception following our ceremony in Oklahoma. More friends travelled here than we expected (a group of DH's friends got together and made it a roadtrip), but less family came than we hoped for- 2 people out of 30 on my side. I agree that the reception immediately following the ceremony would be viewed as "the reception," but as long as you invite people to both the main reception and any local celebration, I don't think they'd be offended.

futuremrsschulze

Some people may say (and etiquette may say this, I don't know) that you need to invite everyone to the wedding who will be invited to a reception.  But I think your case is different--as long as it is well known that you're having a small (and really, it needs to be SMALL if this is your reasoning) ceremony, it's okay.  I think as long as you still invite people to the "main" reception (the OK one) it's not rude or offensive--they're still being given the chance to go and if they can't make it, they'll also have the chance to go to the more local reception.