Wedding invite rsvp

[Cuppa12345]

I know IABU but twice in the last few months I've got invites to a wedding miles away, on a Thursday, evening only, no kids. One from my cousin and I don't see her often and there's relationship there outside of usual family gatherings so that's fine. I've declined, saying we can't make it.

A really good mate of mine has been talking about her wedding for a while. I've just got a save the date through, evening do in West Sussex, Thursday, evening only. I know IABU, they can invite who they want, "it's not a summons" but I genuinely wanted to celebrate her wedding but I feel like I've been demoted.

It's unlikely I'll go - 1.5/2 days annual leave, prob hotel, babysitters, travel, all for a few hours.

I want to say - sorry, it's a bit far for an evening do mid week!
Is that massively unreasonable: to be honest about why I'm declining?

Both of these people were invited to my whole wedding 5 years ago. We didn't have evening guests, just invited people we wanted there to see us get married and celebrate after. We spent £3k doing it, and I think these people have prob spent 10 times that to have huge weddings in stately homes but scrimped on numbers and had it midweek so they could afford it.

Again prob being VU, but if you can't afford to invite your friends and family on a Saturday to see you get married, you can't afford that wedding and you need to rethink.

Right, rip me a new one MN!

We got married on a Sunday and it was so good because the family etc that we had to invite cos they were family didn't come. I was shocked by the turn out and the amount of people who made the effort and came and booked the next day off work, it was also in the middle of nowhere! We had a free bar to make up for the hassle! But in the case I'd decline and I understand why you're hurt!

I tend to decline invitations to evening only events now as I can’t be bothered with them. When I was young and single I would have been happy to go if there was food and music and alcohol (even if it was a pay bar). When I got married my parents paid for most of the reception and they clearly felt that meant they could control numbers and who was invited (and virtually everything else but that’s another story....) The evening do we had was the only way we could have a proper party with our friends. We laid on loads of food in a cold buffet and a number of bottles of wine specifically so evening guests could at least toast us at our expense not theirs. After that it was a pay bar. OP in your shoes I would just politely decline and not bother to offer an explanation unless specifically asked.

Evening only invites are totally the norm around here and again its another "only on Mumsnet" thing to me, that people think it is off to receive an evening only invite because it happens all the time here.

I had 100 guests to my wedding, that was immediate family and a few close friends of ours and our parents. (I am from a large family). We invited a further 150 to the evening party, and those people were all people whose evening do's I had been to, work colleagues, employees, social friends, hobby friends, my parents cousins, cousin's children etc. I was not close enough to any of those people to invite them to the actual wedding, plus could not afford it either, but it is the norm round here to invite more people to the evening do and have a damn good party.

OP, I would decline an evening invitation if it meant travelling for hours, same as I declined 40th/50th party invites rather than travel for 4 hours each way and pay for a hotel.

I don't blame you for not wanting to go. I think invitations like that are very rude as well for non-local guests.

And, yes, mid-week weddings may be saving the B&G money in their mind, but it's also putting their friends who have work in an awkward position. (Unless it's during school holiday times and everyone involved works in a school.)

I'm with OP on this. Of course people can do whatever the hell they want, but it's symptomatic of a shit society where money and appearance are paramount and real honest values have taken a back seat. Spending ridiculous money on a stupid dress and poncy venue to look a certain way at the expense of actually seeing the real meaning behind spending such an important event with the people who matter? Stop the world, I want to get off!!!

YANBU
Some people lose the ploy over weddings.

plot even.

Funny how when you'll decline a weekday or otherwise awkward invitation the B&G generally get the arse though.

'But you've known for a year.'
'Indeed I have but that doesn't give me any more annual leave to cover my childcare commitments, does it?'

I don't think there is anything wrong with evening invitations by the way, just not for people miles and miles away.

It's their day and their money!!! I think you are very ungrateful. Why can't you just be happy you got an invite.

Going through exactly the same thing, my father has 8 siblings each have a family of at 3-6 and then the cousins even want plus ones. Haven't spoken to them in years, yet they think it's cheap not to give the cousins plus ones!!

What's the matter with choosing an expensive venue and less people? I want to spend 30k on a holiday wedding for those who are closest, not those who complain that I'm not inviting their new girlfriend!!!

Some people have a cheaper venue and fewer people, but still need an evening do in order to be able to involve people that they'd like to share their day.
My daughter is only having me, her sister, her two aunts and uncles two cousins, and her three best friends, as main event guests. But of course she has other friends and colleagues that she'd like to celebrate with her.

I find it a weird assumption that the only people having evening dos are the ones massively overspending. Sometimes it's the opposite. The budget brides can't run to having lots of main event guests.

Evening only=we want a present so we’ll invite you to the cheap bit.

We're rarely asked to weddings so I go to everything.

I find this whole thing about evening dos very interesting. In my day (a long time ago) people expected to only be invited to the evening do, unless they were in the immediate circle of family and close relations/friends. It came as a very nice surprise if you had the honour of being invited to the whole day. This certainly wasn’t expected and an evening do invite was more often the norm. I take it things have changed? The daughter of one of my very dear friends is getting married next month and we have been invited to the evening do only. I’m not offended and just pleased to share in part of the day. I did wonder if we might be invited to the whole affair but I get that there has to be a cut off somewhere. Nobody wants to bankrupt themselves for a wedding. My dilemma now is how much cash to give them as they’ve asked for money towards the honeymoon. Now that didn’t happen in my day!

Book a babysitter for that evening anyway and just do something nice.

Last evening only do I went to, I was very bitter that I was having a shit time on a rare night out.

I had evening guests. I was married at 10am in a public place where many of my evening guests also chose to come along and see. The venue was small so limited inside but lots turned up to see me in my dress and do the photos. My wedding breakfast was close family only. That’s all we could afford per head. We then had a break of a few hours and the evening started. The evening guests were many. Work colleagues from both sides mounted to quite a few. We also had extended family who’s many teenage children weren’t invited to the wedding breakfast (their parents were) but who came to the evening and had a fab time. My only regret was not inviting a friend of my mum’s to the wedding breakfast. She did travel for the evening part and appeared at the early morning ceremony too. I wasn’t really aware until after the event and no one had made a fuss about it.

I’ve been invited to evening only things and if they were far to travel mid week then I’d decline - teacher who can’t just take days off work. We have been invited to many evening only parts and if they’re close by have always attended and not really been upset at not being part of the daytime bit. The only wedding I was cross at was when my 9 month old wasn’t invited and we did have to travel meaning she stayed with my mum for the weekend. It was a cousin of dh and I really didn’t want to go but was pretty much forced to. Had I have been breastfeeding it may have been a different situation but I wasn’t. What actually made me cross was that there were children there, because they had travelled from abroad - probably just as far a flight as we drove.

I got married on a Thursday. Worked for me as me and my DH work weekends and I hate weekends. I wanted to celebrate my wedding not have a weekend piss up. I didn't scrimp on numbers either, we paid extra for extra guests. A couple of people invited didn't turn up, but the majority of the main ones I really wanted there were there (there was only one missing as he died a couple of months before hand). The rest that couldn't make it were the diplomatic invites, so no problems.
If you can't go, RSVP no.

I think people should not choose venues or dresses over people just for the photos. A £300 dress and a free bar is less selfish then a £3000 dress and a bar your guests have to pay for.

I thought you had a point until you said the above.

It's their wedding, they can be as selfish as they want! If they'd prefer to have a $3k dress and a paid bar then that's their prerogative! As long as they don't get a huff that people drop out that's fine 🤷🏽‍♀️

It's not selfish to want what you want for your wedding.

WTF is this a new thing on a Thursday! Sounds like they do not want anyone to turn up, even local friends do not want to go out on a Thursday unless they are students. It might be cheaper to get married and have a reception for close friends on a week day but sensible to invite everyone else to a weekend party.

I think what it comes down to is that to some people a rude invitation is worse than no invitation

The thing to do is politely decline the invitation and, at the same time, don’t get too upset about it.

Midweek and evening only invitations cause problems for the guests and I think it is only civilised to be understanding if working people cannot attend at these awkward times. If the venue is hundreds of miles from where the guests live that is another for being tolerant of a refusal.

Weddings are a minefield for giving and taking offence.

I do understand why you are annoyed but I think you just have to try to get over it now. Politely decline without a reason on the invite thing. Then when she asks you just be really lovely about it and say so sorry I hadn't realised it was mid week and it's just too much for us what with babysitters and annual leave to be able to make it. Sounds like you will have an amazing day though blah blah blah

you don't need to make this a big thing.

YANBU

Their day and their way. Everyone makes different choices at the end of the day. You don’t need to go, l would just politely decline if you don’t want to go or logistically it’s too difficult

But yeah l think it’s unreasonable to be annoyed by the way some people have chosen to do their wedding -date, location etc. I’m sure some people didn’t approve on some aspects of you wedding but were probably too polite to tell you