So I've always had a good relationship with my FMIL until the wedding planning started. First issue was with the guest list. My parents had a lot more invitations that my future in-laws. It wasn't a big deal to anyone until a few weeks ago when my FMIL asked to see the guests list and once she saw the number of people my mom invited, she immediately called to ask if she could invite some of her friends kids. My fiance and I were hesitant about this but we let her, since she did have fewer guests. We assumed she would just invite the children of there close friends, but she invited the kids of everyone on her list - by PHONE!! My fiance wasn't happy about this and told her that it made us look bad and if she had wanted them to be invited we would have put there names on the invitations. Then as she was calling some of the people that hadn't replied, she managed to invite more kids. I wasn't very happy with this, since my fiance and I don't want our wedding to turn into a high school party. Especially if these teenagers decide to drink illegally, since the license for the alcohol is in my dad's name and he would get the fine if they were caught. We also don't know any of these kids and wanted a small wedding to begin with. So my fiance called her (I'm glad he stuck up for me but there wasn't really a solution to the problem) and told her that we were unhappy with how she was handling the situation. She offered to call all the people and uninvite their kids and we said no, since it would make it worse. Then she called him back twice that morning crying about how my parents have more invitations (it works out to 15% more people which I don't think is a big deal) and how it's so unfair because they are paying for their share - even though we have it figured out so that our parents pay for the number of guests they have. Then she accused my parents of being the ones complaining about her guest lists which they never said one thing about. Luckily my fiance told her that they had nothing to do with it and didn't even know she had invited all these extra people. He told her that he had the problem and no one else - I love him.
Then she sprung it on us that she wants to order special alcohol because she wants to have a signature drink of her own - she even named it after herself- it's called "her name Sunrise". She told us that she has already told a bunch of people that she is having it and told my mom that it's the only thing she, her friends and her family will drink - which is a total lie. We wanted to have one of our favourite drinks and told her that she couldn't have her own. She was like a child, she kept saying how it's the only think she can start her night with and that she can't start by drinking hard alcohol - to which my loving fiance told her that he hoped she wasn't planning on drinking very much anyways. He even told me that he had a nightmare about telling her she couldn't have the alcohol - in it she slammed my legs in a car door!
Then she told us that she invited her side of the family over to her house for drinks after church and before the reception. Problem with that is that we are taking pictures in her yard and don't want 60 people watching us or wandering into the background of the pictures.
To make things even more difficult, she got into a huge fight with her in-laws (my fiance's step grandparents) and doesn't want them at the wedding. She even told the florist to make the corsage for her MIL out of a black wilted flower. We live in a small town and the florist knows everyone so it was an awkward situation. We've also decided that we want to have our grandparents' wedding pictures on the guestbook table. We told her already and she said she didn't want her in laws picture up. But as I mentioned before, we come from a small town and I don't want anyone to assume that I have a problem with my fiance's step grandparents. A lot his step dad's family will be there too and would wonder why his step grandparent's have been left out. (Side note: they are probably the grandparents he is closest to and they treat him like their own grandson) I don't know how to make her see that these feelings should be left out of the wedding. I don't want it to be a place where she can get back at her own MIL by leaving her out of things. I don't want to enter his family by offending anyone either. And it bothers me that his mom is involving us in their disagreement. I feel like it's inappropriate to be complaining and talking about her own MIL to her FDIL - especially since she often does it when her husband is in the room. I don't need him thinking that I'm talking poorly about his mom since I've never had a problem with her. I feel like it's foreshadowing my future relationship with her. I don't know how to tell her to grow up and keep her feelings about her MIL separate from the wedding without having her hate me as much as she hates her own MIL. I seriously worry that there will be a major fight between her and her MIL at the wedding - things have been thrown before and they aren't afraid to scream at each other in public. I don't know what to do! My family is the complete opposite of this and they would be horrified at this behavior. Can't she see that it is hard enough to plan a wedding with a set of divorced parents without leaving anyone out or stepping on anyone's toes, nevermind having to work around her fight with her own MIL.