Invitation to non consecutive bits of a wedding

I would not go, as I would consider such an inconsiderate invitation an insult.

If you do feel obliged to go, pick either the ceremony or the evening reception and just attend that.

Ugh no.

It's the sort of thing that's alright when everyone's living locally and people just get married in the local church/registry office then go to a venue round the corner. Then you can go home in the middle. It's shit planning and manners for a guest who you know has to travel though.

I would go to the evening only. Can't see why you're so keen to do both, in the circumstances.

If it's near Leicester you can go to the Richard 111 museum or a walk along the canal or a walk in the city centre. If you don't have transport perhaps ask if someone can give you a lift

I think it’s quite rude to invite to the ceremony and evening but not the reception with meal. Do evening only invites if you must but it’s got to be awful for the guests to have to leave after the ceremony then return many hours later.

It's a gift grab. Decline. Say you're sorry and make up an excuse about visiting a family member. Shouldn't give them a problem since you're not invited to the meal or anything you need to head count.

I’d just go to the evening part. They cannot be cross with you for that.
In your response perhaps convey the reasoning behind why you won’t be hanging around inbetween.

Exactly this.
I wouldn't go or go to one part only.
Love the pp who went to the pub following the first part and had a great time.
Honestly people are so self-centred...

We did something similar for our wedding but only for my husband's colleagues/my music buddies who were very local.

It was worded as invited to evening and please feel free to come to church which is at x time...

Anyone travelling got a full day invite - it was just the only way to include 30 odd colleagues in a close knit small business without causing political ructions. Politically to not invite colleagues to the evening we'd have had to get married miles away, probably at our parents' church ..

I've been to a wedding where this was the case. It was nowhere near a 5-6 hour gap in reality, as we hung around for the photos, mingling, and only had to leave when they sat down for the wedding breakfast around 3pm and returned at 6.30 ready for the evening do. In our case the bride and groom had actually booked a table at a nearby restaurant for us. Is it possible to ask if they could recommend somewhere for you to eat?
I am also local to Leicester, and happy to suggest some nice restaurants for you if you specify the location a bit more.

This is similar to my wedding in the 90s. And a few of my friends' weddings too that I attended.

Everyone invited to the 12.30pm ceremony, as that's the most important bit.

60 friends and family invited to the afternoon in venue A.

Those 60 + a further 80 invited to the evening do in venue B.

We'd chosen to live in our uni town post wedding, but wed in my home town 3.5 hours drive away. So about half our guests drove that distance. H's family and friends lived at least a 2 hour drive away.

We had a couple of people comment before that the gap between events would be hard. Our response was "let us know as early as possible if you decide not to come so we can give the space to someone who won't find the gap hard."

It's really easy to navigate if you want to be there. One of our guests is in the wedding video doing her make up in the church car park, having told the recording she just got changed in the loos in Tesco up the road.

We paid for our wedding ourselves. We were 22 and wed in our final year of uni. We used our student loans to pay for the wedding of our dreams... Which was simple by today's standards tbf.

To this day, I'm so glad we decided early on to pay for it ourselves. Our money, completely our day. It meant we didn't have to tolerate MILs insistence we invite X, Y and Z friends of hers that had known H for years.

They were whinging baggages who no doubt would have been as offended as you @TobyChestnut for not being invited to the whole day. Either go to 1 part of the day, or both parts of the day and amuse yourself in the wonderfully interesting city of Leicester for a few hours, or don't go at all. The bride and groom are having their day and don't want (can't afford?) you at all of it.

And @YourAgileJadeHam I'm not Asian. Did you know that every resident of Leicester is not Asian? How racist are you?! Sheesh.

Don't go. The worst wedding I went to was about six years ago. Huge church wedding which was followed by a big meal for around a hundred at a posh venue. I was invited to the ceremony, but not the meal. I had an evening invitation for seven hours after the marriage. When I turned up at the posh venue there was around another hundred of us. Not a single chair was provided for the evening guests. The lunch guests were glued to their tables and chairs and we gathered hanging around in our misery. A buffet was put out as we arrived and the lunch guests leapt to their feet and piled up their plates and sat back at their tables. We couldn't because there was nowhere to sit and eat the crumbs they had left us. Some guests left almost immediately. One of the bridesmaids said she would be dancing all evening so I could have her seat, but I still felt awkward and left out as the other guests talked about the speeches etc. I lasted an hour. Honestly it's just not worth getting dolled up to be made a second class guest. The couple, who I didn't clap eyes on, are now in the midst of an acrimonious divorce.

Went to many weddings like this in my 20s, usually colleagues.
Church, then pub and local town for the afternoon, turning up for evening do nicely drunk and ready for a dance.
In your shoes you might invent an emergency on the day which means you can only get to the evening do!

In a church, yes. I got married in our local church and a few ppl did turn up to that – which was really sweet – a former colleague, the parents of my best friend from school (friend was invited to the do), friends of my mums (mum lived very locally). None of them were invited to the expensive bit but walked down the road to wish us well.

This is different surely – the whole thing is in one hotel/wedding venue, so tbf it's not public (in the way that a church is) and ppl are going to come along then be turfed out for the afternoon. It's really odd. As I said, if it was me (say it was my good friend's DS getting married – I don't really know him well at all) I would not be desperate to go but out of courtesy to my friend I would go to the ceremony to show my face in an easy and reasonably enjoyable way. But then I don't enjoy evening dos.

I don't think k the invitation is unreasonable. One third are going to the meal - that will be family and close friends of the couple getting married and the fact that they're having the legal bit of the wedding another time is neither here nor there. They will still count the ceremony, which you're invited to, as their wedding.

I would maybe not quite dress up as much - do you need to have your hair done? Could you were something smart but not too fine? Then you could spend the afternoon at a national trust place. You're only talking about filling maybe 5 hours by the time you've checked in and driven around a bit.

I would go smart but casual to ceremony, nit jeans but something i am comfortable going to pub lunch afterwards. Then out for a late lunch/early dinner then back to get ready then go to evening.

I think it is rude to invite you like this and evening invite would be better but if you want to attend both that is how I would make it work.

I’d go get changed and go out for a late lunch early dinner. Back to the hotel to freshen up and get changed back into evening outfit.

Is just go for the ceremony then leave. Evening parties are usually rubbish anyway.

I don’t see why people are so outraged. It’s basically an evening invite (which is what I’d expect being friends of one of the couple’s parents) that is offering the option of attending the ceremony, too. If there’s nothing you can easily do nearby in the middle, just accept for the evening only. I’ve several times had this kind of invitation and gone to an art gallery or for a meal either others on the ‘non-consecutive’ invitation.

I wouldn't go at all or only the evening bit so I could check in during the afternoon and get ready in the hotel room.

We had this once too. It would have been far less offensive if we had just been invited to the evening do. As it was the bride clearly had no respect for our time or our feelings. We declined.

In my opinion, if people can't afford to invite all the guests to a three course reception in a smart venue, it would be far more honest, courteous and realistic to invite them to a self catered buffet in the church hall.

It's a classic case of "fur coat and no knickers".

If you’re friends with parents of the bride or groom, rather than the couple getting married, would your friends really mind if you only attended the ceremony? To my mind the reception is for the B&G to enjoy themselves with their friends and family. I sometimes wonder if parents invite their friends so they have someone other than extended family to talk to.

Would they take it badly enough to ruin your friendship? If so then I suppose you’ll just have to ask Premier in if they have a room you can use for ten minutes to change your clothes or book an extra day. But I wouldn’t be too pleased with friends putting me to that unnecessary inconvenience just to have me at their child’s reception.

Mothers of the bride are becoming ‘zillas in their own right, more and more

I agree, we've had that type of arrangement in church weddings, years ago with quite traditional people, so from that point of view it's not a new fangled thing. Anyone can go to the church, and numbers not as limited, so I've been to sit at the back when my sister was bridesmaid at her childhood best friends wedding in our local area, when I wasn't going to any other part of the wedding, and my mum did the same when I was bridesmaid and was coming to the evening do. However those weren't formal invitations, more just an 'of course they'd be welcome if they want to' kind of thing, with no travel involved. I've also turned down an invitation to go to the other side of the country for a uni friends church wedding then evening do, because of distance and we weren't that close. Again a very religious person so they saw it as inviting is to the most important bit. I might have gone if I really wanted to see them or was up for a mini break in that area anyway.

However, the odd thing here is it isn't a legal ceremony, so presumably not church? Unless it is a different religion? I've never heard of that for a civil ceremony before.

In terms of clothes. You don't need to dress up as much to just sit in the ceremony as for a formal reception - can't you just tone it down a bit so you don't feel ott for whatever you do in the afternoon. You probably won't even be in formal photos. Summer dress, not too elaborate a hair do. If you are not the immediate bridal party, lots of people wear things to weddings that could be worn to less formal occasions. Similarly for evening dos, they are usually pretty 'anything goes'.

How do you pull this off on the invitation? My wedding invitations said x church, followed by reception at x venue. If the wedding, meal, and reception are at the same venue, how do you even word this? Wedding at x venue at 11, then reception at 7? Not everyone would pick up on that.

OP, with very good grace I’d just give the whole thing a miss. You don’t have to be angry or snarky when you decline. You can do it in a way that no offense is taken at all.

This! Have had similar.