Disagreement on Guest List

melaniethepanda

I've recently been engaged and started to put together a guest list. My fiance and I are paying mostly by ourselves, except for a couple $$ my mom gave us. I wanted to keep the list reasonable, about 80 guests or less. I also want to have the wedding closer by us, to make it easier.

My fiance recently informed me that he wants ALL of his family in attendance. He has 9 aunts and uncles, all married, with about 40 cousins, some of which are married and have kids. They also all live on the East coast, and us in the West. He never sees this family and in the 6 years we've been together, I've met most of them once. However, he insists on not only inviting all of them (bolstering our list to 130-140) but also having the wedding on the East coast.

I'm heartbroken because it is an increased debt on our part, not to mention a bunch of people in attendance who don't know us all that well. I mean, two summers ago was the second time he had met several cousins.

I just am at a loss for what to do.

TheDuckis

You guys never discussed these kinds of things before you got engaged?

To be fair, you can be close with your family even if you don't see them often. And a lot of families see weddings as reunions of sorts.

It's also quite possible that he has no idea what doubling the guest list will do to your budget.

My advice is to approach his expectations openly, and then calmly lay out the cost difference between what you want and what he wants. There are possible compromises: invite everyone, but have the wedding out west; have the wedding on the east coast, but invite adults only, etc.