Rehearsal Dinner Guests

Cranly

Hi all,

We're working on planning the reherasal dinner.  Obviously we will be inviting to that event the bridal party, his parents, my parents.  

Who else typically gets an invite to the rehearsal dinner?  

Originally his mom mentioned inviting anyone traveling from out of town.  However, about 80 percent of our guests if not more will be coming in from out of town.  

We'd almost be just re-creating the reception.

we could just invite select out of town friends - but that seems like it could be rude to those who didn't get an invite.  

Any thoughts?

Thanks for the help! 

vanityink

You can do all out of town guests, but we're personally doing just the people going to the reception (wedding party and parents). It started as a way to thank people for taking the time to go to the rehearsal, I'm pretty sure, so that's what we're doing.

Kate61487

ditto PPs.  If you want to extend the invite to some without recreating the reception you could start with siblings, grandparents, aunts/uncles, close family like that.  Or just leave it at parents, BP and SOs

bridalmarch

We're inviting everyone in the wedding (BP and their SO's, readers and their SO's, our parents) as well as our grandparents and our priests. Our priests are family friends of FI. 

reppunzel

We're inviting those involved in the rehearsal (+ SO's) and the family members who aren't directly involved in the ceremony (brothers, sisters, niece, nephews and FI's children, son-in-law and grandsons).  There is one out-of-town guest that we will likely include if she's able to come, because she doesn't know anyone in town or any of the other wedding guests. 

Jen4948

I'd invite all the wedding party members, immediate family members, the officiant, and anyone else at the rehearsal along with their spouses, fiance/es, or SOs.  Whether you invite anyone else is up to you, as long as anyone with an SO is invited with their SO.

another KT

We were in the same boat and did invite the out of town guests.  I thought what is the sense of having all these people come to town and not really getting a chance to see them and talk to them. It also gives them a chance to mingle with everyone else coming from out of town. To me the people were more important than the dinner.  We set a budget and worked with it.  We didn't plan as many of the details as the wedding.  We did have it at a restaurant.  Appetizers were just cheese and crackers and a vegetable platter.  Guests had a choice of three entrees.  I didn't make a special menu.  I didn't plan special centerpieces or any other decor.  I didn't have a photograher or DJ. I made the invitations myself.  If I had a smaller budget, I would have just made it a backyard BBQ.

Jager1219

We're in the same boat.  FI's parents are hosting and want to invite everyone from OOT.  However, keep in mind that even though most guests are OOT, they may not be staying the night before (they might just stay the night of).  That's our situation because it's a 2-3 hour drive for most people.  So what we're doing is ordering the invitiations now but not sending them out until we get RSVPs from people that would be in town the Friday before.  We also can check with the hotel we did room blocks for as to who is staying the night prior.  Then we'll finalize the list and send out the invitations.  Our wedding is expected to be 175 people and we've got a RD of 70.  So I'm with you about it being a BIG RD.  It was a challenge finding a place that could hold all of us!

Cranly

Very helpful!  Thanks for the input!