Seating Chart-Mixing Families

My parents have been divorced 20 plus years and they still are awkward. I figure they are all adults and this is the last wedding they will be at together. So I plan to enjoy the seating chart phase! ** insert evil laugh.

How are you planning this with no rsvps back?

We didn't combine families. Most of our guests, family too, traveled so it was nice for them to get to have dinner together. People can mingle after dinner.

We didn't combine families. I wouldn't put guests with a bunch of strangers and hoping they'd make new friends.

So you had just tables of single couples? I have never been to a wedding where there wasn't someone at my table I didn't know.

I'm in the same situation, and I want the families to "come together". All the weddings I've been to, you can literally cut a line down the middle. People tend to mingle with only the people they know.

I will keep families together at their table, but might mix the tables around so FH's family isn't on one side and my 3 sides are on the other

The traveling family already booked their hotel rooms ie coming. The rest is like my parents and such who are coming. We know which family members and the wedding party and their guests, so i was attempting to get a head start

Forcing people to bond with strangers should not be your primary goal when creating your seating chart. Focus more on people having fun. Usually people have fun with people they actually know. For my seating chart, I will keep an eye toward having folks with similar personalities and interests sitting together. For instance, I will have a group of my high school friends that love to party and have a good time sit with a group of my work friends that are just as fun and energetic. FH and I plan to share a table with our immediate family members, that's really the only mixing of families that we plan to do except for having our grandmothers at the same table because they're so much alike.

@Sunni that's my goal, but we have tables of 10. My father's side only has 6. My mom's side has 14. See my dilemma? If i start adding their friends to the tables will some feel left out since they're not at a family table? Do i mix my families so that the seats are filled?

My parents have been divorced for over 16 years, my my mom's family is on good terms with my dad, and so are my future in laws. But i don't want my dad to feel like i lumped him in somewhere. It's kinda complicated >.<

I'll try to have my parents and FH's parents at the same table (FH's parents are divorced and remarried/recoupled and civil). Other than that I might mix some of FH's friends with mine, but most of the family will be seated with family. My family is a lot bigger than FH's (both his parents were only children, and my parents have 9 siblings combined), so there's not too much mixing that can really take place

ETA: my mom requested she be seated with people she doesn't see all the time after I told her I would be doing a seating chart.

I had a similar dilemma. FFIL has no family coming to the wedding and FMIL didn't want to sit at the same table ( they are divorced) so we grouped people in 4-6s and placed them. Everyone will know some people at their table just not everyone. I'm not married quite yet so I don't know how successful it will be but it made the seating chart SO much easier!

@Elise.b. Most weddings I have been to have seated people this way, it works. Try to make sure there is at least one chatty person at the table. Its a good way of getting to know others at the wedding.also I think weddings are ment to be about two families joining together, how can they do this at opposite sides of the room!!

I did the seating charts for my wedding and the weddings of 3 of my daughters (they had final approval). I took GREAT pains to NOT mix the tables with strangers. My girls were very pleased with that decision.

@Kelgy - your families will not come together at your reception. They have no interest in coming together at your reception. The reason you see this not happening at receptions is because people are busy visiting with those they know and want to spend time with people they don't get to see often. At every family wedding I have attended, I have been introduced to the "other side" been polite, but I have absolutely no interest in getting to know them at the reception because there are so many people there that I like/love that I don't see often. for the most part I will never see them again anyways.

For me, I hate the idea of mixing sides and causing awkward conversation. My FIL is a really great man, great human being, but if you are seated at his table you are gonna be chatting it up for the entire meal whether you want to or not! He never meets a stranger. Some people enjoy that and some people really dislike it.

I don't want to go to a wedding and be stuck at Weird Uncle Harold and Bat Shit Crazy Aunt Maude's table. I want to sit with people I know and enjoy and catch up with them!

We actually shorted a couple of tables at the weddings to avoid mixing people who didn't know each other. No awkward conversations, no one feeling left out of dinner conversations because they were the odd ones out at the table.

I would try and seat people with those they have met before (even if only a few times). I am going to have the same things with inviting my mom's side, dad's side, stepmom's side and FH's side, but fortunately, my dad's side and stepmom's side all know each other, so I will mix and match their tables, but I will have to seat everyone from my mom's side on the other side of the room. Hopefully in the end, everyone will just be civil and happy for one day! Fingers crossed

The seating chart is one to-do that I just don't think you can do early. Say you fill a table with your mom's family, and then a couple you didn't expect to come RSVPs "yes". Now you have to either stick them at a random table or completely redo that table, which affect the other tables and so on. I think it's ok to think about whether you want to mix families, but I wouldn't put too much effort into actually doing the seating chart.

We did mix families for a few reasons. Firstly, H's parents are divorced (and very acrimonious) and he didn't have too much family attend, so some of his family sat with some friends and some of his family sat with my family. We also mixed my dad's side and my mom's side, for two reasons, 1) I thought it would be unfair to have my dad sit with all my mom's family for vice versa, so we mixed, and 2) they all know each other (my cousins in particular). So, for example, I ended up with 2 full tables of my cousins, but they were both mixed with mom's side and dad's side. Honestly, people will talk with those they don't know and it'll be fine. And once dinner's over, they'll get up and socialize with whomever they want.

I'm all about mixed families. Our families (for the most part) hadn't met before the wedding and since they're all related now, why not mingle? It was easiest to do based on age groups and interests. Obviously keep couples together and make sure everyone knows at least one other person/couple at the table and you'll be good. People love catching up at weddings but it's also two families coming together so why not give them time to meet?

Frugal has a great point. I was making changes to our seating chart up until 3 days before the wedding. People get sick, family emergencies pop up, surprise additions.. Lots of changes can happen.

On your question about mixing families, I wouldn't. My parents are divorced and DH's mom was also present. We had 3 separate tables for them with their family members (step siblings and their spouses) and if needed added a couple of friends that they were familiar with to even out the tables. I tried not to mix strangers as much as possible, but a few here and there were inevitable. I just made sure I kept like personalities together. I wouldn't dream of putting my super liberal massage therapist friend with my super conservative gun toting dad. You know your guests, try to be nice and keep like minded people together.

We mixed them and got lots of positive comments. You know your guests best