The "You're Not Invited" Vent

MusicSoul24 · March 2014

My FI and I are still decently young, and we are the first to get married out of my group of friends. Because of this, our wedding is pretty frequently talked about in the form of "How are the wedding plans coming?" "Have you found your dress yet?" "What are your colors?" since a wedding is still a bit of a novel thing for many of them.

The problem with this is that a lot of people who I'm acquaintances with ask me the above questions and quickly follow it up with "I can't wait to be there, I'm so excited!"

Umm.... Who said you were invited? I already have close to 275 on the guest list, which is made up of mostly family. I'm getting annoyed with the whole idea of "Well since you talked to me about your wedding plans, that must mean that I'm invited!" You asked me about the wedding, not the other way around... When I really want to talk about my wedding plans, I call up my mom, MOH, BM, or FMIL.

The hardest thing is having to look them in the eye and say "Sorry you aren't on the guest list!" I like to think that they understand, and I'm sure they do somewhere deep down, but I just have such a difficult time saying something to their face about it... They act like they recognize why it is the way that it is, but I just feel like I have to be hurting their feelings.

Does anyone else encounter this?

HisGirlFriday13 · March 2014

All of us have encountered that one way or another. Rather than saying, 'You're not invited,' try saying, 'We've had to keep the guest list small and we're unable to invite everyone we might have wanted to.'

Also, even if they ask, don't talk wedding with them. Just say, 'Fine,' and bean dip (i.e., change the subject.)

AddieCake · March 2014

Yeah, there's no reason to tell them they aren't invited. They will figure that out when they don't receive an invitation. There is the chance that some of them will be rude enough to press you after that as well and ask why they were not invited. If they do, you just say, "Unfortunately, we were not able to invite everyone we would have liked to invite," and then change the subject.

And then, if they continue to harass you every chance they get (as I had some do), you eventually get to a place where you say, "This is a wedding! Not a kegger for everyone I've ever known, ok?!?!" And then you make margaritas part of your regular routine.

skyhigh27 · March 2014

When my best friend got married, she ran into this problem quite often and eventually started a list of people who had expressed an interest in attending the wedding but didn't have room for. They ended up sending out invitations to those people when they sent out their normal invites for a "bar night" and took over their favorite bar with like 60 of their friends to celebrate about a week after their wedding. Might be against etiquette, but everyone there seemed to be excited to be out celebrating their marriage.

Inkdancer · March 2014

skyhigh27 said:

When my best friend got married, she ran into this problem quite often and eventually started a list of people who had expressed an interest in attending the wedding but didn't have room for. They ended up sending out invitations to those people when they sent out their normal invites for a "bar night" and took over their favorite bar with like 60 of their friends to celebrate about a week after their wedding. Might be against etiquette, but everyone there seemed to be excited to be out celebrating their marriage.

I think having a bar night with your friends a week after your wedding sounds fabulous!

raeah219 · March 2014

I get this all the time. We are still pretty young too and we are the first wedding of our college friends. I had one person ask me yesterday why she hadnt received a save the date. I just said that we havent sent them out yet. I dont plan to send her one anyway. I felt bad for lying by omission and letting her think she might be invited, but we arent really friends. I dont even have her phone number. I just dont get why people want to go to weddings so badly.

Amyzen83 · March 2014

For friends that I intended to invite but didn't send a Save the Date, if they asked if we were sending Save the Dates, I'd tell them, I haven't sent out the official invitations yet, we're only sending Save the Dates to Guests who have to buy plane tickets and Bridal Party.

AllOnOneDay · March 2014

Since DF and I both have crazy sized families (erm, pushing 350 on preliminary lists) - blast emailed friends. Said wedding is going to be boring family only crap, save the first weekend in June 2016 because we'll be getting our party on.

Actually it was -

11 December 2015 - Church wedding. Very formal. Crazy families - you know what I'm talking about. I'm only attending because I have to.

June 2016 - First weekend. We're doing the lake side party. Break out the fun, blast a certain band, etc.

So far, everyone has been decent about it.

theartistformerlyknownas · March 2014

Ergh, yes. It's not necessarily a "young, first wedding among friends" thing... I'm 30, one of the last holdouts among my groups of friends, and still getting it. I think it's more of a "yay, free party!" thing, TBH. And moreso from single friends saying things (on Facebook, no less!) like "just got my save the date, and I've already picked out my plus-one AND a back-up!" Ummm... yeahhh... we're not doing "and guest" for single guests. I'll call her before the invitations go out and ask if she's seeing anyone... but there is no "back-up plus-one." We have huge families so there are first cousins we had to exclude; I can't have some random, off-the-street "back-up" take up a seat when family couldn't be there! We have two friends who started dating each other recently too... they've both made comments like "hey, since we're each other's plus one now, we just saved you two extra guests! We should get a prize or something" No, you just made my seating chart more complicated because I don't know which circle to seat you with now. :-p

Marzipan13 · March 2014

Yep, experiencing this currently. We're a little less than 6 months out, aaaaand one of my particularly annoying coworkers (and acquaintance from high school, weirdly) keeps joking about cancelling Youth Group night (we work at a church) the day after my wedding because she'll "be too hungover to function".

Hungover from our wedding reception that you assume you're invited to? Or hungover from sad-drinking at home because you psyched yourself up for a wedding you weren't really invited to?

mcgarci2 · March 2014

Same issue here. FI is in a fraternity and a good portion of them have said, "I haven't received my invitation yet!" Some of them even went as far as telling me several times and as early as a YEAR ago.

When I told them we hadn't mailed formal invites yet, they said, "Wait isn't your wedding next month? (This was last November) ...No it's next June...... to which the response was, "Oh you moved it."

....Nope. It's always been in June....

People.

MusicSoul24 · April 2014

Ugh, at least I'm not the only one!! I'm really liking the idea of a "bar night," @skyhigh27! That'll go over extremely well with the people I go to college with; I'm pretty sure that some of them only want to come for the party anyways, not to actually celebrate us finally getting married after 7 years of being together.

princessleia22 · April 2014

skyhigh27 said:

When my best friend got married, she ran into this problem quite often and eventually started a list of people who had expressed an interest in attending the wedding but didn't have room for. They ended up sending out invitations to those people when they sent out their normal invites for a "bar night" and took over their favorite bar with like 60 of their friends to celebrate about a week after their wedding. Might be against etiquette, but everyone there seemed to be excited to be out celebrating their marriage.

We are doing something similar. Except, instead of a bar night, we are planning to have a BBQ in the fall after weather cools down (wedding is in June and we live in AZ). We plan to invite everyone to that, whether they are invited to wedding or not. It gives FI a chance to use his new BBQ smoker and allows all our friends & acquaintances a chance to hang out and party.

afox007 · April 2014

At least the people assuming they are invited are already born. One of my friends keeps bringing up how cute her kid will be in my wedding. Currently it is a 3 month fetus. We haven't finalized the date, but are leaning towards next June there's no way a 7 month old will be/is capable of being in my wedding.

vollebell · April 2014

I'm having a destination wedding and I even had people assuming they were invited. I would say it's a small wedding, only family and a few friends. Then people would say "I'm so excited that there will be just a few of us. Where are we going?"

I say "We're getting married in Scotland."

People then say "What's a plane ticket going for?"

I say "Well, it's $1600 for a plane ticket right now."

Conversation about my wedding finished.

Person never asks about being invited again.

weddingcactus · June 2014

We are having a very small destination wedding in Hawaii more than a year out and I am experiencing this already as well. When people ask about the wedding I've been saying "We're having a very small destination wedding with just immediate family and a few of our closest friends." We haven't even booked our venue yet and already people have been telling us "Well, I'm just going to show up anyway." and "I want to go to Hawaii!"

We are still working on booking a venue and have not yet settled on a final guest list. We haven't wanted to upset people by making them think an invite will be in the mail so we've tried to keep it casual and explain that we're still working on seeing what size of a guest list the venues we can afford can accommodate. Other people indignantly state that they should be invited because they feel closer to us than we are to some of our closest friends. I just don't even know how to respond to these comments.

Weddings seem to bring out the worst behavior in so many people.

coleford0 · June 2014

MusicSoul24 · June 2014

I agree!! People can be so rude - I can't even fathom inviting myself to someone else's wedding.. The kicker is that I've had people do this with other events, too. I had a girl tell me that she "better be invited to my bachelorette party!" and others ask me when my shower was. What ever happened to people having common courtesy?!

thisismynickname2 · June 2014

joshshannonwedding said:

We are having a very small destination wedding in Hawaii more than a year out and I am experiencing this already as well. When people ask about the wedding I've been saying "We're having a very small destination wedding with just immediate family and a few of our closest friends." We haven't even booked our venue yet and already people have been telling us "Well, I'm just going to show up anyway." and "I want to go to Hawaii!"

Stuck in box!

I've experienced the true awkwardness of people legitimately assuming they are invited when they're not, but I've also seen the above happen in a non-serious fashion. My FI's coworker just told him she's getting married at a winery that just so happens to be our favorite place. They work for the airlines, so free airfare. He's joked with her, and keyword here is JOKED, that we would crash her wedding.
We have no illusions about being invited. It's purely about the fun of a beautiful destination wedding and how lucky they are to be having it at that winery.
I feel like people who have destination weddings probably get comments like that a lot more, but perhaps the people are not serious and won't be at all hurt, and that's just not being perceived in the conversation....? KWIM?

Kauris · June 2014

There is this guy that FI and I are both acquaintances with, who keeps saying, "I'm going to cry at your wedding, I'm so happy for you guys." And I keep thinking, "Uh, you won't cry, because you won't be there..."

hales2010 · June 2014

I am starting to realize this. I am the first of my group of friends and I have so many people saying "OH I CAN NOT WAIT TILL THE WEDDING!' and I am sitting here think "Well I am sure you will love seeing the pictures on Facebook!" I mean if I had the finacial ability to invite every friend I have ever had I definitely would...but I don't lol. Hopefully they will not be disappointed.

Chipmunk415 · June 2014

I had an acquaintance who dropped off the face of the earth for naerly 3 years. Contacted me when she needed help
Found out I was engaged, started talking about how she was going to help me plan my wedding, acting like she was in charge and even had the audacity to demand I invite single wealthy men to my wedding for her to meet.

My solution was to block all contact from her until well after the wedding. Pretty sure she got that hint. I took down blocks afterwards but she has not deigned to contact me since

mariahlr10 · June 2014

YES! This post is everything.

I am in the same boat. My FI and I started dating in high school and 6 years later, we're getting married! Yay!

Anyways, we both grew up in the same small town and know many people. So basically everyone in town knows we're getting married and asks about wedding stuff. I don't mind talking about wedding stuff at all. Actually, I love it.

But then comes the awkward, "I can't wait to see it!"

Uh.. You're not invited?? We were in 9th grade bible class together, bro. That's it!

We have a guest list of about 350 and have no room for anyone else!

Why do people think it's appropriate to invite themselves to weddings??

weddingcactus · June 2014

thisismynickname said:
I feel like people who have destination weddings probably get comments like that a lot more, but perhaps the people are not serious and won't be at all hurt, and that's just not being perceived in the conversation....? KWIM?

Thank you for this. I think in some cases it certainly has been joking as you say. And I think I just need to learn to laugh it off. In other cases it has not been joking, but perhaps the same jovial response would do. It's difficult to know how to respond in such a way to keep the mood light without hurting feelings.

Marzipan13 · July 2014

The best (read: worst) is when someone knows your getting married, they're not invited, but they elude to being invited AND bringing their SO!
Convo went like this:

Person-We-Know: So, you guys are getting married pretty soon, right?

Me: Yep, not long now!

PWK: I can't wait, it's gonna be really fun!

Me: ...So, are you in Pittsburgh for long, or...?

PWK: I'll be bringing my girlfriend. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention! There's a new lady in my life.

KILL ME.

(etf: TK doesn't like spacing)

MusicSoul24 · July 2014

mariahroberts10 said:

YES! This post is everything.

I am in the same boat. My FI and I started dating in high school and 6 years later, we're getting married! Yay!

Anyways, we both grew up in the same small town and know many people. So basically everyone in town knows we're getting married and asks about wedding stuff. I don't mind talking about wedding stuff at all. Actually, I love it.

But then comes the awkward, "I can't wait to see it!"

Uh.. You're not invited?? We were in 9th grade bible class together, bro. That's it!

We have a guest list of about 350 and have no room for anyone else!

Why do people think it's appropriate to invite themselves to weddings??

You and I could be the same person... My FI and I have been together for 7 years (since high school!) and grew up in the same small town. Our guest list hovers around 250 and there isn't any room for anyone else, especially the kid who approached me asking about his invitation..... We sat at the same lunch table senior year because we had mutual friends, not because we were actually friends...

larrygaga · July 2014

This girl who was a classmate used to try to use me all the time was like, I've never been to a wedding before, I'll have to come to yours.

Oh.

You just want to go because you never went before, not because I matter to you.

I'm glad I'm graduated and moved far far away from this hoser.

Fairyjen1 · July 2014

I'm having a very small wedding of mostly immediate family. However, it's at Disneyland. When people ask me about wedding plans and I say this most are good with and comment on how that fits FI and I perfectly. I've had a few friends express disappointment that we are not having a large party, but most are pretty good.

However, there are those who have said they will make a trip to Disneyland that happens to coincide with our wedding. I've explained to them that, while I can't stop them from planning a trip to Disneyland whenever they want, it's a public place after all, I can't invite everyone to the ceremony and reception and Disney caps us at 20. I think some are hoping if they just show up I'll sneak them in.

The reality is, however, that most of them probably won't really book a trip at that time. If they do, I'll just meet them in the parks after the wedding. Oddly enough, some of FI's cousins booked a trip at the same time, but I know this is just coincidence. They had their trip booked before we got our date approved by Disney and we don't see these cousins much so we had no idea they were doing a trip then and they didn't have any idea we were getting married at Disneyland when they booked. We will probably meet with them for drinks the night before (non-wedding related, just meeting up for drinks) and hang out with them in the parks the day after.

peachy13 · July 2014

I just feel like you should never ever assume you're invited to someone's wedding until you receive the STD or invitation itself.

After my FI and I booked our venue, we ran into someone we graduated HS with at a local bar. We have a mutual friend with him but neither me nor my FI call him by himself to hang out... he's an acquaintance at best. Someone I wave to, not someone I hug.

Anyway, we were celebrating our venue booking and telling him about it after being asked what we did that day. During our telling him about our venue, his face was lighting up and he started talking about what he was going to WEAR for our wedding. He left for the bathroom and my FI and I stared at each other with alarm. Our eyes were saying "omg does he think he's invited? this is so awkward!"

Just awkward. Never ever assume you're invited!

peachy13 · July 2014

Another story, when I moved out of my old apt and into my then boyfriend, now fiance's house, my old roommate was at the apt with her parents, who I saw on occasion and was friendly with. I don't know them too well, and they live in another state, but I definitely had a friendly/polite relationship with them. Knowing things with my then boyfriend were likely heading into engagementville, when I hugged my old roommate's parents goodbye for likely the last time, her mother goes "we'd better be invited to the wedding!" with a big smile. I stood there confused... she's not a funny lady but maybe she was trying to joke?

Shortly after I did get engaged, my old roommate asked if she was getting a date. She hasn't dated anyone in years, AND I hadn't even created a guest list yet. It's been seven months later and she just asked me again even though my wedding is over a year away. I figured I'd invite her with a date but leave her parents out of it. What is wrong with some people!!

goldchocobo.defunct635829490514903826 · July 2014

I kinda had this issue with a friend that really isn't my friend anymore. We were close at one point but drama happened and I chose to distance myself. I haven't seen her in a long time, and when were talking in a rare moment one day many moons ago, she said "You know I am totally going to be at your wedding. I wouldn't dream of missing it!" I muttered something about the guest list hasn't been finalized and I bean dipped.

Lately, she reached out again, this time to say she was thinking of me and how she's leaving the country "but would totally be there for your wedding, I'd still love to come!" I told her to worry about her own happiness and not about my wedding (she's in a really crappy relationship, so she's leaving the country to go home instead of hanging out here to get emotionally abused some more) and her happiness takes priority in her life, not my wedding. I don't know how else to tell her without sounding like a complete jerk.

I have another friend that invited herself to our wedding LONG before we got engaged. She's a good friend, but I rarely see her. Actually, she's a friend of FI's and whenever they'd touch base, she'd say something chipper like "goldchocobo is the woman for you! You HAVE to keep her! I love you guys together!" In the end we honored her invite request, because she's been nothing but happy for us. Plus, she'd be the only celebrity at our wedding, lol. She's a sweet gal, but can be larger than life.

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