Let me first start off by saying that I am having a cruise wedding, getting married in port so non-sailing guests can attend. Wedding is on a Thursday- June 21st. I know it is highly inconvenient. We sent out STD's about 6 months in advance to give everyone ample time if they needed or wanted to try to take off of work for the day to attend and I sent out my invites about a month and a half ago and most replied well at least on my family's side.
We have 42 sailing guests, that includes me and my FI. All of my fathers family is coming on the cruise and some of my mothers side. The rest that are not coming for the most part have RSVP'd to the wedding and reception.
As far as my FI side only his mother and father are coming on the cruise but only 4 other people not including his brother and brothers wife are coming to the wedding. We probably sent out 30+ invites to his family's side alone. Because I only received 2 RSVP's out of the 30 that we sent out I had to start making phone calls to the other 28. (The cruise line needs our final guest count by next week) Our RSVP date on our invites was May 20th.
I feel so sad for my FI, that he will not have his family there and he is very upset and hurt. I will say again that I know that a Thursday wedding is not the most convenient but I would have thought that at least his Aunts and Uncles and a few cousins would have been able to come celebrate with us. We have waited 14 years to get married.