Family expectations

I would just tell them that you both have your heart set on something small, so you can spend more quality time with each of your guests. They may feel disappointed, but it's your wedding, so you get to decide what you want to do, especially if you and your fiance are covering the costs.

I would kindly just tell them that you already have plans in place. While they might not like your choice, it is ultimately your wedding. I know my family would have preferred that I had a church wedding, but that just wasn't what we wanted.

I would tell them that you guys have a certain vision and you want it to match that

I encountered something similar. We really wanted to have a small destination wedding with our closest family and friends, where my mom really wanted us to have a big, traditional church wedding in their hometown. I basically just laid out all the reasons we wanted to do the wedding our way, and made it clear that I would be highly unhappy with the type of wedding she was proposing. Then I just never even entertained the idea of her vision of the wedding again. And trust me, she brought it up many times after LOL But I would just laugh and say nope, we already have our wedding planned. It became much easier once we had put down deposits on vendors- it pretty much made it clear that this was happening and there was no going back/re-planning once money changed hands. I will say, I have been accommodating to her on a few other elements that were really important to her and that I didn’t really care about, just to make her feel involved and like she got some say in something

Sit down with your families and discuss your plans. You are the ones getting married and paying so you make the final decision. Other siblings/relatives can do it differently when is their turn. Do not let anyone pressure you otherwise.