To scrap ‘evening’ invitations to weddings

[AgualusasLover]

I don’t really get it anyway as I come from a culture where you either invite people or you don’t.

BUT, putting that to one side, is this practice outdated now? More people get married further away making an evening invitation costly for what it is (according to what I read here anyway), often requiring travel and accommodation etc. For example, I’ve previously been invited to the evening portion of a wedding of someone I used to work with, we have coffee every so often etc. I couldn’t make the date anyway, but I would not have been offended to have not been invited since we aren’t close enough for ‘whole’ day.

Should we just scrap evening invitations?

God, I suddenly want a vol-au-vent…

Definitely remember evening guests turning up around 19 30 when most of day guest were getting a bit sluggish in the 80s 90s . Usually young people that are fully up for a party .It really did liven up tired wedding guests and yes they do have a lot to give and provide a livening up of the evening .

Exactly

Really? I happily travelled for three hours each way and booked a hotel for an evening do that I was invited to. Just as I had done in the past for the same family's big birthday parties.

I really don't see the difference between going to a party to celebrate a birthday with a zero on the end, and going to an evening reception. Which is basically a party to celebrate a marriage. And I'm prepared to travel the same distance and find accommodation of necessary, for both types of celebration.

There are some mumsnetters who are just incredibly full of their own importance, it seems.

There is literally a post on AIBU along the lines of, ‘I was only invited to the evening reception’ on Mumsnet every. single. day. This tells me everything I need to know about the amount of offence they cause.

This tells me how many professionally offended people post on mumsnet.

and yet over many years decades and being a person who knows many, many people from all sorts of different walks of life, outside of MN, I have never come across anyone who is "offended" at being invited to something. It is just bonkers. If you think it is too much effort for you to attend, then obviously you can decline the invitation, but the idea of being offended at being invited to a celebration party is just bizarre.

I agree @NewName24
It's bonkers. Like you, I am also friends with my neighbours and have friends that I have made at work as well. It surprises me that so many mumsnetters hate their work colleagues and neighbours. How on earth have they managed to make any friends at all?

@saraclara actually, I have just remembered an evening wedding do we went to that involved an overnight stay. A close friend of DH's who got married abroad than had a party when they got home. He hadn't sold his house, which was empty, so we stayed there for free. He had left loads of breakfast stuff for us, and a good time was had by all.

There is literally a post on AIBU along the lines of, ‘I was only invited to the evening reception’ on Mumsnet every. single. day. This tells me everything I need to know about the amount of offence they cause.

It doesn’t actually tell you anything given that nobody posts “I’ve been invited to an evening reception and I’m perfectly happy with that”

You have no idea if 1% or 90% of people who receive them are offended by them.

If you use MN as a guide then nobody likes their MIL, all step mothers are evil, all school teachers are shit and the vast majority of people earn six figure sums (despite being utterly baffled if someone uses the wrong word in a sentence). It’s not a guide to anything whatsoever

Exactly @ARichtGoodDram

I see your point to some degree . We had evening invitations but only for friends who lived in the same city as us at the time

All were given plus ones, food and drink. They arrived at 5 and caught the speeches

The day do started at 10. Ceremony meal lasted 7 hours. Then the evening shift and more informal meal from 5 till 12 another 7 hours

I just didn't have dining space or money for friends there all day but wanted them there to celebrate too so it seemed to work best.

I didn't send invitations for distant relatives far away because I thought it'd cause more offence than no invitation. My cousin set the trend two years before which helped! So I just was honest to everyone.

None of then made it to the engagement party a year before do I thought it was fair enough!

A 7 hour meal! That sounds like an endurance test.

I don't understand why more people don't get married in the afternoon. It's a very long day if you get married in the morning. It also allows guests to travel on the day, thus requiring one overnight stay instead of two.

they arrived and caught the speeches
Oh, bad luck!

Lol! Arrivals, Ceremony, travel to reception venue, nibbles, drinks, meal. All took from 10 till 5. And still over an! It was a long day but it meant the evening guests could come at 5 and have food too. We did it that way to cater for all the guests. I still had a very active social life back then. If I did it now it'd be a different story!!

Evening invitations were never a thing when dh and I got hitched, admittedly ages ago now. People were either invited, or they weren’t.

IMO it’s U to invite people just for the evening, to any wedding that is nowhere near home turf, esp. if it’s a considerable distance away. Because that means either a) if driving, someone can’t have a couple of drinks, or b) £££ to stay overnight, or c) cabs and train fares, etc.

Not really. I was ,by virtue of being quite new to town, new to a social group. Different people see things differently. Some might only want intimate circle and family, some might want guests to reflect who the couple actually socialise with and their community. Depends on outlook.

Definitely saw the evening guests liven things up as the location was a just about driveable distance for a lot of the groom's guests in the morning but far enough to make it a long day. New people in their finery ready to celebrate visibly injected some energy (not saying just me obviously!). They saved the official first dance and cake cutting until the evening (not sure if this is standard) which made us feel part of it. I remember a cousin's wedding when young, his wife's glamorous work friends streaming in for the evening really renergising the party.

Evening invitations can work well if there are a large-ish group of local friends. It's context-dependent.

We married in the town where we lived. About sixty family and close friends were invited to the wedding and the reception (sit down meal). 'Work friends' and more recent friends of us as a couple were invited to the evening party.

A group of our local friends actually asked if we'd mind them coming to the church as well, then they went out for dinner and drinks together before the party. We really appreciated them supporting us in this way, and AFAIK nobody was offended in any way.

We could never have afforded to invite an extra hundred or so people to the whole thing, but this was a nice way of including more people.

The big thing that’s changed, imo, isn’t the evening guests it’s that people take offence.

some folks get offended if everyone they invite doesn’t come.
others get invited if the guest list isn’t exactly as they expected.

And people now take offence if someone declines, and if they have to decline.

Was never a thing when I was young. You either went or you didn’t. And you were either sad you were missing a ‘good’ wedding or relieved to have an excuse to miss one that you weren’t fancying.

Too much stress and offence around a happy occasion now.

I've been going to evening only parts of weddings my whole life and I'm 50. But very working class background where it's the norm to not be able to afford big fancy weddings, and people were always invited just for the evening party.

Same.

I suspect for many if it was a straight choice between having evening guests there all day or not at all then their guest list would be much smaller.

Weddings are bloody expensive, I'd rather not be invited to one at all than put an additional financial burden on people.

If local, I love an evening invite. Because after the ceremony. Until food is as boring as fuck.

Evening invitations were never a thing when dh and I got hitched, admittedly ages ago now. People were either invited, or they weren’t.

It's unusual to have posters on here who have been married 50 years or more.