Night before the wedding dinner dilemma Pt 1

[Suzymouse]

Sorry, this is a 2 part question & I thought 2 separate posts would be easier...

We are planning an escape wedding with roughly 16 guests. On my side, we have 8.5 family members in total (the .5 is my future SIL's baby who will be very young & likely not eating any menu food). We will also have about 7.5 of our closest friends (the .5 here is my BFF's baby. He will be 2yrs old then)

Anyways! I thought it would be nice to have a night before the wedding dinner. But I'm not sure if it should be just family members or everyone? I feel like our families might appreciate just having all of our family members since they don't know each other very well an it might be nice to have that time together, the night before our families join. But on the other hand, I feel like I'm being rude by not including our friends in this dinner, since they are flying all the way out to WDW to be with us. Our friends of course will be there for all of our festivities the next day for the wedding!

Just to add-this is not going to be a big renting out a restaurant dining thing-just a large party at regular restaurant hours.

What would you guys do? Invite the whole gang (friends & family) or just keep it as a family dinner only. I'm leaning towards family dinner only, but not if it means being rude to our other guests for not including them.

 

[SarahInMN]

I'm leaning towards family dinner only, but not if it means being rude to our other guests for not including them.

I say do what you and your fiance want to do. I read in another post (and I had never thought of this point until then) that maybe your guests would appreciate "time off" to go do whatever they want to do.

We're having a welcome dinner the night before the wedding, and everyone who comes to the wedding is invited. We're fortunate though in that both sets of parents (and associated step-parents) are going with us this week on the site visit so they'll get to meet which is different than your situation where your families haven't spent alot of time together.

Short version: Do what you two want to do!!!!

 

[alissa2008]

We have a similar situation -- I think leaving it up to your guests might be a good way to go -- perhaps saying "ok, we're going to have dinner at this place and if you'd like to join us, RSVP, and if not, don't feel obligated and head out on your own. We're all arriving on that day, so I figured some people might be tired from traveling and might want to just have a quiet dinner with thier immediate family members. But, if you don't want to dictate - have a free for all hope this helps!!

 

[Suzymouse]

Ok I think we are definately going to do an intimate family dinner. It seems like the right thing to do. I think it will be a respectful way to begin joining our family together.

maybe we could meet up with our friends later for drinks???

I just dont want my friends to feel bad like we are leaving them out. But on the other hand, maybe they'll understand and/or like you guys said-prefer to do their own thing that night.