Hey guys. I'm in NY and right now we can only have groups of 50 total. I'm hopeful, as is my venue, that come end of October this will be increased (PLEASE SEND ALL THE POSITIVE VIBES MY WAY!). Our total, including if ALL guests came, us, and vendors is 84.
HOWEVER, if it is not increased by then- I will at least consider the idea of shortening the guest list. Note: I do not WANT to do this and I will only consider it if postponing would cause me to lose my $2k deposit that I've already put down on just the venue- not including the other deposits we've put down for the other vendors.
Now, the question is: how do you tactfully do this? I've already sent out Save the Dates, so there are people EXPECTING to get invitations to this wedding. As they should. How would we go about explaining that they wouldn't be getting invitations because we have to shorten the guest list thanks to COVID? I don't want ANYONE to feel that they aren't "important enough" to make the cut, because that's truly not the case at all.
Almost the entire guest list is family. I've gone through the list ****x and even if we removed people who truly should NOT be removed (like long standing family friends, my sisters adult stepchildren, etc), we'd still need to remove 3 more to get to 50 
I am literally so stressed about this. I don't know if we'll need to do this, but it's in the back of my mind. Any advice is welcome.
