Bridal Shower - OVERbearing MOG!!!!

Well, first things first. Unless all her friends are also invited to the wedding, they don't get an invite to the shower. You only invite people also invited to the wedding. I'm guessing that will solve the problem right there! But, should it no...yes, you get a say in who is there!

Thanks @analy Yes, I'm only inviting people who will be at the wedding, but I'm not inviting every single woman. It's a wedding of 150, so conceivably there could be like 60-70 women who could potentially get invited to the bridal show. That's more people than I want to ask of my delightful bridesmaids to have to plan for! Can I just put my foot down and say this is my event and deal with it you invite who i say you can invite? I hate to be mean, but she is SO incredibly overbearing & needy. (She has two sons and no daughters so she tells me it's like "her" daughter getting married even though we in NO way have a mother/daughter relationship). I guess i'm wondering in other people's bridal shower experience, be it their own or others they have attended, how many people from the grooms side were normal to invite? Do I invited the MOG's friends that I have no relationship with to make her happy even though she's not paying for this thing? Ugh.

Nope. Like I said, if they aren't invited to the wedding they are not invited to the showers or other related parties.

I would tell MOG (assuming she's hosting) that you want no more than XX# people to attend. But, it sounds like she is NOT the one hosting, the BM's are! In which case, she has NO say.

If she wants to have all her friends over, she can have her OWN party!

I would give her the guest list of the wedding and tell her she can invite up to # people from that list.

If your family is paying for it actually they should be the ones inviting people out of your guest list. Unless it is a co-workers shower, people that aren't invited to the wedding shouldn't be invited to the shower (I read that in a magazine).

If she wants all her friends to attend the bridal shower then she should throw you a separate party. It would be one thing if she was helping throw/plan/pay for the bridal shower, but she isn't, so that isn't right! My mom and FMIL are throwing my bridal shower together because most of my BM live out of town or are poor college students and one is graduating HS this year(my sister) so they don't have the means or won't be around because they can't afford to fly here twice that for the shower and wedding. together with people I wanted to invite, my mom and FMIL they sent out 130 invites inviting over 150 women/children to the bridal shower. And most have RSVPd YES! CRAZY! we will have about 100 women there. We are inviting 380 people to the wedding so it is understandable. (his mom is one of 13 kids and he has a large family on his dads side too and I have a very large family well)

I agree. If she wants a long list of her friends, she should host a "groom's side" shower.

For my first marriage, I had two surprise showers. One was hosted by my mother, together with my BM's. The guest list consisted of all woman on my side of the family that were invited to the wedding.

My second shower, which was hosted by my ex MIL and his sisters(none in the bridal party as they were grown women), was supposed to be a surprise, but I found out about it.

At neither shower was I asked to present a guest list.

I'd kindly tell her that space at the shower is limited, since it's in someone's home. You are only inviting guests who will be attending the wedding, and you are sorry- but that does not include her friends.

As far as who plans the showers- it depends. With my first marriage, my then FMIL threw me a shower! It was to introduce me to all their close family friends- some who would be invited to the wedding, and others who would not. It was actually a very generous gesture on her part to welcome me into the family, and very much appreciated!

However, it doesn't sound like that is the intent of your FMIL...

Wow. Thanks ladies. I feel a lot better about this. @Meghan B that's sweet that your former MIL threw you a shower. I love the idea @Carolina of giving my FMIL a # that she can invite. I don't know why I'm letting myself get so stressed about this!? I don't know how to deal with overbearing people.

@Alyssa good luck with the big shower and wedding!!!!

I hope this turned out well for you Elena. I agree allowing the MIB or MILB to bring her own friends to a shower is a bad idea all around. A friend of mine has invited me to her daughter's shower, even though I'm not invited to the wedding, and have never even met the bride! I can tell you that getting an "invitation" of this nature comes across as nothing more than a low-class gift-grab.

I feel you Elena.... my hubby-to-be's mom's friend is throwing a bridal shower for me (which I wasn't sure would be possible since I'm getting married out-of-state) but they have made it into a groom's side shower... now my mom feel obligated to throw 'our side' one so no one feels left out - why can't we just have 1 big one and get it over with?! I'm only in the area for a few weeks before the big day!?! I definitely agree with Carolina though - especially if she's not hosting it even!!