How the heck do i do these invitation invitations?!. Small ceremony large reception! Help!

I would caution against having a 50 person ceremony and then inviting more people to the reception. This can be seen as very rude. It’s fine to have an intimate ceremony with immediate family only and have a larger guest list for the reception, but you’re going to rub people the wrong way when you start picking and choosing which extended relatives and friends get to attend the ceremony and who is just there for the reception. Especially when they find out that there were 50 ceremony guests and they didn’t make the cut.


In this situation, I would do two sets of invitations. One for the ceremony and reception, one for the reception only. On the reception only, I would put something like “please join us for a reception to celebrate the marriage of...”

I think two sets of invitations would be easiest in this case. One invitation for the people you are inviting to your ceremony and reception (put the info for both events on the card), and a different invitation for those being invited only to the reception. Definitely send RSVP cards with both, so that you know how many guests plan to attend, and you can get an accurate count for food/beverages. For the wording for the invitations going to those invited only to the reception, you could word it as, "Please join us for our wedding reception at [place/time]".

View Quoted Comment I feel like you're right. Thank you

View Quoted Comment Thank you! Yeah this is seemingly the best course of action 💞

Whomever is invited to the ceremony must also be invited to the reception and vice versa. There is no etiquette that allows for a larger reception. Is the bbq a reception event or a following day event?
If it's a reception event, there is no polite way to invite more people than are attending the ceremony. People will find out and be offended but they will never tell you themselves, so the hosts think everything is ok.

During Covid, there are capacity restrictions in place for a reason and they will shut you down if you go over, even on private residences.

View Quoted Comment

I agree with this. I think that 50 is a lot of people to be calling a ceremony small and intimate, and you might offend people. If you want to split it in two, then I'd limit the ceremony to family only and have 2 separate sets of invitations with Caytlyn's wording

You definitely need two sets of invitations, Caytlyn's wording was good for the reception only people. I think I'd actually send that one to everyone and send an additional invitation to the ceremony people (it could go in the same envelope) so people get the idea that there are two separate events and they won't be surprised to see other guests or be inclined to start talking to them about the ceremony.


When you say you have "a lot of people... we want to invite to our barbecue afterwards," how many additional people do you mean? I feel like there is a way to do this without offending too many people, but it's hard to know what that is without knowing how many people you're talking about.

I think it’s perfectly fine to have a separate smaller ceremony before your reception. I’d rather go to the reception than ceremony.

Having a small, intimate, family only ceremony is perfectly fine but a 50 person guest list is not a small, intimate ceremony. I agree with Caytlyn and would encourage you to rethink this plan.

I am doing this and totally forgot about 2 different invitations. Now I have some thinking to do.

View Quoted Comment Yay I'm not alone!! 🤣💞

I think in the age of Covid, it is perfectly acceptable to have some guests only invited to the reception. I would have no problem with this as a guest. If it were me, I’d do the same invitation for everyone invited to the reception, and an additional insert added for those also invited to the smaller ceremony. Best wishes!