wedding invitation - unbelievably rude or normal for today?

[marriedinwhiteagain]

Have received a wedding invitation from one of DH's cousins and her parents.

DH and I are invited to the evening do on the other side of London. 7.30

The wedding itself is in Central London at 2pm and we have been told we are welcome to attend that and it would be lovely if we do.

We have also received a covering note saying we aren't invited to the actual wedding breakfast because of expense/limit on numbers.

DH's elderly mother, now the most senior member of the family has been invited to the wedding breakfast and is not robust enough to cope with a full on day without being looked after, etc.

I think this is so wrong on so many counts: the expectation that we will dress up for an event in the middle of the day (both work full time) then have time to waste either coming home to cross London again later or have our own afternoon meal whilst killing time. The message that you have a whole day at my disposal but no although I want you there you aren't important enough to be catered for or for the formal part of the "do"

Also, DH's mother MIL is their guest, they know she will have to be taken to the wedding (at the church where she got married), taken to the reception, escorted to the evening party and brought home. Yet no effort has been made by the bride's family to offer to book her a london hotel, meet her from the station, etc. I think we are expected to care for their guest although it has beenmade crystal clear we are tier two guests, ie, not that important to the bride.

Now I think this is taking the piss big time and we should just formally decline adding a note that we trust they are liaising with MIL over her travel plans as she is elderly and a key family member. DH thinks we should just suck it up. We have had a rare row over this.

So, does the MNet jury think I'm being unreasonable? and if the little madam expects a present from me ....

The B&G are having a smaller celebration for close family and friends, followed by a party. Nothing is stopping the guests from having a late lunch after the ceremony if they wish. Just as you and your friend's did at the two tier wedding you attended Dancing..

Dione, what I was getting at was having a five hour break for guests to twiddle their thumbs is incredibly incredibly rude. And surely the point of a wedding is the ceremony? Downplaying that for the evening guests is very "you aren't important to us, but we still want a gift and loads of guests so we feel more popular than we are".

Ragwort, the only way not to spend about £50 a head is to hire a hall or something and arrange all the catering yourself. Fine if you have the time/inclination/creativity to do that but also fine if you prefer to have a venue that sorts all that for you, has waiting staff, tells people when to go through to dinner etc.

This used to be standard fare, 20 years ago - a wedding is a public event and in theory anyone who likes can come along. Yes, even that drunk at the back of the church.

Any party is a private affair and the bride and groom can invite anyone they like. I have certainly been to very smart weddings where we were expected to hang around for hours getting increasingly drunk and shirtybefore the evening do started.

It wasn't a brilliant arrangement, which is why many people switched to the current fashion for total marathons which you're expected to attend from start to finish (yawn).

Personally, my preference is for all and sundry come to the wedding, then a few drinks and speeches before bride and groom "go away" to a party with the people they really like. Granny is happy to see you wed, Dad's horrible golf club chums don't get to the bottom-pinching stage but feel welcome and nobody has to turn up to a party that has nothing to do with a wedding except there's a drunk woman in a white dress at it.

But ho hum, nobody ever listens to me.

In this situation, they've invited you to the evening do and said that if you can come, you are welcome to go to the church if you like. You don't like, so don't go.

If you are very worried about MIL, ask her what she's doing and if she would like you to interfere advocate on her behalf.

(So many refs to alcohol -can you tell I'm Scottish??)

But you don't have to buy an expensive gift if you are only going to the evening do. Usually with evening dos you will be one of a particular group - work colleagues school friends, cousins etc. in which case you all get together, chuck a few quid in and buy something between you on the gift list.

It's a party. I like being invited to a party. I like going to parties. I like seeing friends on their special day. I like knowing that they like me enough to want me there.

I really think people think about things far too much and get offended for no reason.

But dancing, lots of people on this thread have explained that, you aren't expected or even invited to the ceremony, it's a public event so the polite thing is to inform the evening invitees that it's happening and they are welcome to join, but they don't need to RSVP to that (as it's not an invitation) or turn up if they don't fancy it, they are only expected to RSVP to the evening do.

Anyone can go to a church wedding if they fancy it, invited or not. It's not a 5 hour break, it's a party invite,and informed if you fancy joining for the wedding ceremony you can. Up to the guest.

They are having a smaller wedding so they can afford to feed all the day guests, then inviting extra people to hte evening. Do you think it's politer to not invite people to the evening do if you can't fit them in/afford to have them there in the day even if you could afford to have them there for the evening party?

I don't think that evening only invites by themselves are wrong, but I do hate the presumption that it's friends of the bride and groom, people who they share their lives with, who should be evening only and extended family they don't know very well should get the whole day treatment.

(And the OP refused to acknowledge that it might be an idea to get MIL to contact the bride's father, her brother, to check if there was anyone she could travel with. It seems rather far fetched that if she's infirm and all the aunts and uncles will be at the wedding, yet none of the MIL's own siblings/their spouces would be prepared to look after her, OP and her DH have gone straight into martyr mode that of course they will have to fix this...)

I think it is rude to have a two tier wedding and purposefully cut my cloth accordingly. So that meant only 20 guests. Clearly some people have a very different view. (The majority of the guests were not family, so no doubt I caused offence too.)

Unfortunately we are all more interested in this thread than the OP.

My mum does this - she gets the hump about something (eg, feeling narked that everyone in the family assumes she will facilitate MIL logistics, say) and then constructs an elaborate Hump Reasoning around it that makes it appear she has moral high ground, rather than just a plain personal hump (eg, how outrageous people are these days with their two tier weddings! How ridiculous that they want to get married in a fancy church! Just for example).

married, if what's really getting your goat is the family assumption that you will ferry your MIL around, then fine. The rest is not a snub, even if you're determined to see it as such, and only makes you seem rather spiteful. This is, incidentally, the first time on MN that I've ever seen a B&G taken to task for having the temerity to get married in a beautiful London church which presumably they have a good reason to have chosen and are entitled to conduct the service in. As opposed to, say, a remote beach in Tahiti or an extortionate Irish castle with a wishing well donation point by the canapes.

I don't think the OP is getting offended for 'no reason' but I do think possibly her irritation is better directed towards others apart from the B&G.

Her original intention was just to decline the invite; it would have been her right to do so and not unreasonable. Some people don't like the two tier guest concept, others are fine with it, she's one of the ones who doesn't. The one time I went to one, I wish I hadn't bothered but just saw the B&G another time when we could chat etc. Anyway.

But her husband is insisting they go so they can help ferry the MIL around, which means turning up at the wedding, ferrying MIL to the meal (while they fend for themselves somewhere else), then taking her across town to another reception.

NOpe, I owuldn't be looking forward to that. But she looks difficult pulling out too.

I don't get this 'evening invitations are rude' thing. When we got married we had room for I think 90 for the ceremony and reception meal so we only had family and close friends but in the evening there is more space as tables are cleared away so we could invite extra friends. How is that rude? Should we have shunned them altogether as we didn't have room for them during the day?

It is the ferrying MIL about bit when you are not invited to bits to be ferried to which would be irritating. AND there really might be a family expectation that son would be DELIGHTED to do it. Some families are like that... believe me....

Faded I suspect you are spot on. I would bet lots that it wasn't the first time this sort of thing has happened with the MIL. LIke I said pages ago, when this happened with my grandma and my parents she was thinking about them; I wonder if the MIL has even considered this, that her DS and his wife, who aren't invited for the day, might be inconvenience. Or if it's just like: whevs, i wanna go. (Hope she uses teen speak.)

Flowery, I take the view that when I get an evening only invitation it means that I am not important enough to the couple to be invited to the day - to their marriage rather than a disco. It feels like a request for a present more than anything else. So personally I prefer not to be invited (and so followed that rule myself). I also invited who I wanted, not who I was related to. But clearly other people have a different view.

But ladyharriet. - OP said she would have been fine with just an evening invite originally, which clearly she isn't really. So your point is incorrect. Fact is, her nose is out of joint because she was not invited to the meal.

OP has refused to elaborate on why her DH has to be the one to look after mil. If none of the invited relatives (including mil's son) are willing to take responsibility for mil that's the fault of the extended family, and no reason to be as snotty as she has about the whole wedding. She hasn't even confirmed that no arrange,nets were made!

Also, OP is not going to the ceremony in the day, so is not put out at all. DH is doing it and is fine with it, hence the fact they had a row.

Finally, these people who reply to threads like this saying that they spent nothing on their wedding, hinting that this makes them better or their marriage more valid really piss me off. Great, good for you. As it happens I like this sort of wedding too, but people like different things. Imagine the furore if a 'fancy wedding' bride came on here and starting saying their wedding was superior because of x, y, z. It's personal and as long as you consider guests (which does NOT include needing to invite everyone in he world) I think that's fine.

Also, I don't get the problem with feeling less important when you receive an evening invite. Of course I know I'm less important in some people's lives than other people are! Why does that mean you can't choose to go and help them celebrate in the evening if you want to?

Ive changed my opinion slightly.

If it was my mum wanting to go to a wedding then I would take her to the ceremony, drop her off at the meal, go shopping and lunch, then see her later at the evening do. And take her home or get a hotel room, whatever she wanted. No questions asked, I'd do anything for my mum. (I am aware that I have a good one, lots of people don't)

And if my husband didn't like it then I would tell him to stay at home and babysit. :o

Wonder what we would all be saying if it was M and not MIL, and if it was her husband grumbling?

Sorry - saying OP was 'snotty' was a bit rude!

My point is not 'incorrect' that the OP is being inconvenienced - she proposed another solution which wasn't unreasonable which her DH didn't find acceptable so they are now roped into this situation.

I find it odd that the ceremony won't be full of people the MIL knows who can easily give her a lift to the meal, or that the OP can't phone any relative to ask them to transport MIL from the church to reception. Even if MIL lives in the sticks away from all the family except her only son who therefore has to take her to church I'm surprised the next trip can't be delegated.

Panzee I agree with you - but I'm guessing that in this instance the nub of the issue is less the etiquette of the wedding, and more the dynamics of the MIL/DH/DH's family/OP relationship...

Well, I thought from what the OP was saying that she is the last living member of her 'generation'.

It sounds like the DH doesn't want to delegate, hence this situation with the day.

Ok, I've done my research - I've read the whole thread though I may have hitched a lift the last few pages

Jengr says weddings aren't the coming together of two families, they are the coming together of two people

this is, I think, where the whole thing rests. Most people these days think weddings are about the b&g and it's up to them to do exactly what they want and for everyone to fall in, as a blessing to the b&g.

It used to be that weddings (or marriages, rather) were dependent on the community for survival, and therefore family/community support was essential to the b&g.

Being a bit of an old bird, I'm closer to the latter (particularly as my marriage floundered on, amongst other things, crap family/community support). Because I come in this camp, I can find wedding invites often very rude, because the emphasis is on the b&g, not the families. I find it interesting that people genuinely think their marriage will be sustained by just them, the b&g.

People who subscribe to the b&g theory think guests are being guestzilla if they subscribe to the community theory; and people who subscribe to the community theory think the b&g are being rude.

I can't help but agree wholeheartedly with Edam:

If you can't afford to invite people to your wedding, either don't invite them at all or scale down your plans. It's rude to say 'we've decided we can't be bothered to cater for you, but do feel free to come to the ceremony'. It's particularly rude not to make arrangements or help to make arrangements for elderly guests who need assistance.

OP feels insulted that the b&g have not invited the whole family, but can afford extravagant extras. The b&g see it as their day, and they can spend their money on what they want. So, in essence, guests are indeed accessories rather than the fabric quoteunquote

Those who think the emphasis should be on community/family do find it really rude/ignorant to have your wedding how you want it and where you want it sirzy

Different viewpoints.

Sorry for essay, but it I did read the thread start to finish (dense reading) and I deserve to have a very long say.

If I get married, you can all come.

Good call springy

I get narked at the assumption that you will invite cousins/further distant relatives at the expense of your close friends.

I have A LOT of cousins but some I have't seen in nearly 25 years. Why should they take precedence over close friends who I have shared my life with?

This is why I am planning on getting married a long long way away, with DP and the DCs and a couple of witnesses dragged in off of the street! It's about DP and I and not anyone else. My nearest and dearest guest list numbers more than 100 people. We either bankrupt ourself including only our nearest, or get married on our own, save thousands we don't have and end up married and happy. I really am not bothered whether it upsets people. I'd much rather be quietly married than spend years paying for feeding people who are potentially ungrateful and bitch about me behind my back!