Rehearsal dinner

Our church required a rehearsal. Yours may not or if you are getting married outside of a church, you don't really need a rehearsal. If you have one, you need to have a dinner. You're on the right track inviting the bridal party, but you also need to invite their SOs. Including the immediate family is lovely, though strictly not required.

If you have a rehearsal, you need to host a rehearsal dinner to thank the wedding party for their time. It does not have to be formal. It can be as casual as pizza and beer. It's actually nice to have something casual instead of two dressier evenings in a row.

The guest list should include the officiant (many will decline), your parents, your siblings and their SO's, the wedding party and their SO's, and anyone with a role in the wedding (like readers) and their SO's.

Because most of our guests are out of town, we are going to do a cocktail and hors d'oeuvres reception instead that all guests are invited to.

Most people don't need a rehearsal; they need a solid order of processional and someone good to make that happen on the day. If you don't have a rehearsal, you don't need a dinner.

If you have one? Yes, you need to invite everyone who rehearsed and their SO's to a dinner, no matter how simple.

My sister had a pretty lo-key rehearsal "dinner" (more like late lunch) her bridal party was small, after the rehearsal we all went to a nearby beach and had a picnic with (catered) sandwiches, WP (& SO's), immediate family, a couple oot guests. No toasts or anything like that, just sort of a casual get together before the formal event the next day.

I didn't want a rehearsal but my planner assumed we were having one so we just went with it. It was really quick and actually was helpful and eased our nerves. But I def don't think it's necessary. We had it directly before our welcome dinner pizza party (where we invited everyone who was invited to the wedding the next day, we had a semi-DW wedding).

When my best friend got married, we had a 30 minute rehearsal and then had "catered" KFC. It was short and sweet and let people know exactly what to do. There were no questions the next morning.

@rica It was! It felt very relaxed in the middle of all the hubbub. My FH and I have actually not thought at all about or discussed what we want to do rehearsal-wise, but may very well end up doing something along this same vibe.

We are going to do a rehearsal dinner, at a restaurant, to include the wedding party, their kids, out of town guests, parents, grandparents, and we will offer alcohol to all who are over 21.

We are doing a rehearsal and then we are having a casual dinner back at our house afterwards.

I am not having a rehearsal, but I am having a pizza party the night before for any guests who decided to come the night before. We booked the hotel bar area so they will put up a sign for our guests.

Thanks for all of your input!