East Coast Wedding, West Coast "celebration"

I'm looking into doing something similar so I'd love to see the comments you get.

Mine is a little different as we are having our ceremony (10 guests) on the beach the coming back to our home state and having a large reception. But the reception will be a month out from the ceremony so we have time to come home and settle down. Just be careful you don't make the 2nd reception seem like a "B" list party, guests may be offended.

Me to Rosemary!

Im doing the same thing. Wedding in CA with approx 115 guests then flying to NJ for a 2nd reception and after that we leave for honeymoon. My grandmother is not well enough to travel and my east coast family have small children. I dont expect them to spend thousands of dollars to come to my wedding so im going there. We will have it at a clubhouse with approx 30 people on the east coast. We will have music and alcohol but food will be more casual. Im actually happy they all arent coming to CA. It saves me money but i can still celebrate right after our marriage. Im bringing my wedding dress so my grandmother will see it .. but i dont think ill wear it to 2nd reception

I'm doing the same but backwards of @future Mrs b

I live in NJ but much of my family is either too old/too many health problems to travel or they have small children they wouldn't be able to leave for a few days. My mom had offered to help financially with the wedding so I asked her instead to put that money toward a 2nd reception in California. I let her take the reigns on all the details- the venue, catering, decorations... we just haven't nailed down exactly when we're doing that yet.

Wait until you leave for your honeymoon to mail the invitations to the West Coast Celebration. Schedule it for about 6-8 weeks after the wedding, so you don't get too close to Thanksgiving.

Thanks @muriel. Our wedding is 8/18 and FH wants CA celebration on 9/1 (Labor Day weekend!) with the honeymoon in between. I think it's way too close considering time off work and just my general stress level. FH's local family will also be invited but I don't want them to have the impression that they shouldn't come here for ceremony just because we're having a BBQ for the grandparents.