Hello!
I'm running into a combination etiquette and mom-relationship issue. Before we even got engaged, my fiance and I had talked about what we wanted to do when we did decide to take the plunge. Because his family and friends are all on the West Coast and mine are in North Carolina, we had always said that we would elope and then have two receptions - one in California and one in NC. We told our parents this plan - explaining to them that we would want to be able to celebrate with all of our family and friends and did not want to burden any one person's family/friends with expensive travel to the other side of the country (especially in this economy - we would rather take on the burden of travel than ask others to take it on).
My issues are - even though my Mom has know about this plan for awhile, once I got the ring she has started acting like it's not a good idea. She wants to come to the wedding (it's planned for a private island in Belize) and doesn't think the two reception idea is proper etiquette. She's been alternating between pouting and ignoring us when we talk about BElize. How can I get her to stop criticizing our decision to elope? And, are we really being rude for having two receptions?