My wedding is not your family reunion! Vent!

This is common for family members. I also though do not mind it. All the people I am inviting I want to be able to come not only to see me, but to see others they may not have seen in a long time, it makes it more of a priority for them to come in my opinion. But it is YOUR wedding, and if you don't want to invite distant relatives, don't.

It would be different if my fiancé wanted them there. He does not. He hasn't seen many for years and many he wants no association with them at all due to their life styles. Apparently alcoholism and drug abuse have been common in her family. He just doesn't want them there at all. Myself. I do not know them, do not hang out with them and in the 5 years we have been together, haven't even heard the names of many of the people she thinks we need to invite. Each and every day she complains about it and makes comments and asks...oh, can we just invite so and so and then pouts when we say no...for the tenth time. It is just so frustrating.

My wedding is not a family reunion for her side of the wedding. I have even told her that I will assist her in planning a reunion if she would like to do one. Ugghhhh....it is just killing me.

All of our family weddings are basically family reunions, so this doesn't seem unusual to me at all. But, like @Stephanie, I'm not bothered by it. I've met my great-uncle like, twice in my life, but he made the trip from California to Oklahoma for my wedding and my grandmother was so happy to see her brother she was basically glowing.

You don't have to invite distant relatives if you don't want to, and it sounds like you'll need to put your foot down with FMIL. But it's a really common thing.

Hey, future MIL. It's $125 per head for food, booze and all the extras that would be needed. Give me cash for the 20 family members you think should be invited. Maybe that will finally shut her down.

Stick to your guns. It sounds like you are planning a wedding with the people that really matter to you.

Yeah, my mom invited several family members who I haven't seen since I was a child. But she's been through a lot lately, and it makes her happy, so I'm just letting it happen. Luckily, I live in a rural area, so my $/PP is a lot less than urban areas! I think it would be different if the cost was higher.

MrsMPhil, I would think your assessment about your mom not realizing how much it costs, is right on. Those of us who were married in the 1980s did have way lower costs, of course. In my case, at least, though, the expectations were also lower. Reception in the church basement was great for us!

Yep my FMIL says she doesn't want any family at her table at the wedding. FH and i think it's weird, we'll look over and his family won't be at the first table, they'll be scattered because FMIL wants her friends at her table... she almost considered breaking up her friend's families by putting their kids at another table... not okay.

If they want to have a family reunion? They can plan and pay for it. Your wedding is a rapid fire serie of pictures, dances, mini events. You won't even have time to interact with these people and if they are just there to interact with each other?

They can do it on their dime

Let's see, what is it i always say?

No is a complete sentence. Accompanying it with an icy stare is the bomb.

I completely hear you on this. My parents are helping pay for the majority of our wedding and their invite list is maybe 40 people. However my FH family talks to everyone second, third cousins etc. but thankfully FH doesn't want to invite people who doesn't even talk with or care for. When we asked his mother who we had to invite and who we didn't after we gave her the amount of people they could have she kept wanting us to cut people that we both knew and actually liked to invite those that she wanted there. She even offered to pay for those extra people she wanted but I put a stop to that as I don't want people I've never met there. I told her that the venue only allows so many people and that we would already be at that number. I'm slowly learning to smile and say ok to the things my FMIL is saying about the wedding and then plan to do what me and FH see best. Good Luck!

Been there done that, still doing that actually, probably even have a similar post somewhere from 3 months ago on that! lol! My FH's family wanted 400 people and we are doing 200 which is still HUGE to me but tiny to them. they have 90 people on our guest list and it still feels like too much sometimes. I remember one time I mentioned Fh's college roommate and his parent's said "oh yeah we will meet his parents at the wedding" and FH was like ummmm no, why would we invite his roommates parents?

But yes, this is very common and totally understandable, just let yourself be mad for a few hours and try to shake it off as you go. I guess if you're a positive person you can try to think at least she is excited about it, but it's still aggravating as I know.

If she isn't paying she has no say in the guest list, quit showing it to her or talking about it, if she brings it up and says "oh aunt sue" you can either say "we can't afford that" or if you don't think that will work and want her to stop talking about it say "thank you for the suggestion" and don't comment on whether or not she's invited.

My situation is different since FILs are paying a little bit so we just said okay no more here's your number and if you want someone else you need to take so and so off.

What Asta says, stop talking to her...She can call/text/visit with her son, but you are under no obligation to talk to her about your wedding.

Amen sistah!

Megan...problem being, she is living with us while her new home is being built. I have her in my house for the next six months. Unless I hide in my bedroom or do it while at work by myself, it is hard to plan with her not hearing. That I should have included in the first post. She is living with us, that is making it so much harder to deal with.

Ugh that totally sucks Mozabrat. So I guess here is what I would do, FH and you secretly come up with your guest list while she's gone or go to the library, then just count up how many people she had on that list and when she asks say: "That person sounds nice but I'm sorry we reached our limit for the budget and we can only afford to invite X amt of people, right now you have 20 people on the list, would you like to trade that person for someone else or provide some money to pay for these extra guests?" .

Another response is "we would like a small wedding and only want our nearest and dearest so that we can actually greet all of them, although that person is family we just have friends and other family that are closer, sorry"

so hopefully both of those responses would work for most of those situations?

Yuuuup, we are currently on the ... FMIL's cousins cousin... like seriously? I've never even heard of this person. No No No. No pay, no say.

My FMIL did the exact same thing. Literally had people RSVPing to our wedding last week that I don't know if I've ever met. We allowed her two people, and ended it at that. Stick to your guns.

Very common and happened to FH and I. After that we kind of just kept the list to ourselves. If anyone had input on who they wanted to be invited then cool but we ultimately made the decision o put them on the list or not.

FH's family is totally expecting our wedding to be a family reunion, it is so frustrating. FH did, however, ask his uncle if he'd like to give up his spot to invite a person he was complaining about not being included. Not that it stopped his complaining though!

I'm worried about this happening too. I've cut my guest list extremely...but in-laws haven't seen it. Fmil is his step, and he really only associates with his dad, his brother and little sister, and then his stepmom. But not the other 4 kids that aren't blood. And his dad's family is broke up weird too. The ones I listed are the only ones he wants there. I feel like when she sees it she's going throw a fit. They have no money in it though. I'm also worried about family talking too much about it and people assuming they're invited...lol

I had that issue with my parents and paternal grandmother. They were all unwilling to discuss the rough guest list until I flew home to tour venues and they all jumped on me to complain that I was excluding lots of extended family. I hadn't included any of my parent's cousins because my dad alone has thirty first cousins and I didn't want to pick and choose people that I barely know. I gave each parent ten people and my grandmother six and that seemed to make them happy. They get their "family reunion that's not a funeral and they don't have to pay for" and I get to have a wedding of one hundred people max.