Etiquette question: do these cases necessitate invitations?
Our wedding in October has a space limitation of 100, and we had 130 we wanted to invite so we staggered invitations as we got declines. This has worked out well - it's going to be a flight away for about 80-85% of our guests, so sending out invitations early generally made sense, and many people also knew early whether they could make the trip. At this point, we have invited 128, have 60 accepts and 28 declines. Adding in through-the-grapevine/unofficial replies, we're at an estimated 79 accepts, 33 declines, and 16 we have no idea about. So we probably have some wiggle room, but it's not certain yet. But I need some advice about whether to send invitations to a few extras:
Case 1: I have been doing some work this summer for a professor who was formerly on my committee in grad school. She knows about the wedding from others (my department is a rumor mill), asked about my wedding several times, and I told her the basics. She said something about "sending her the info" (I think she was implying about the registry) and I sort of ignored it. She asks for updates about wedding planning occasionally, and then recently mentioned a household item that she told me about "because I should consider it for the registry - by the way, are you registered? Where?" So I felt like I couldn't really ignore such a direct question, and told her. Within a day I receive a generous gift and kind note from her. I'm not opposed to inviting her - she's brilliant and I get a kick out of her, though I didn't really envision my profs at my wedding - but if I do, I think I need to also invite my former advisor, who I was closer to. With their partners that's 4 people. Also, this prof apparently did the same thing with another grad student in my department, who did end up inviting her after she sent her a gift, and she did end up coming to her wedding (which, like mine, was local).
Case 2: Fiancé's bachelor party is this weekend in Montreal, and his groomsmen plus a few others are coming from all over the US for it. Two of his college friend groomsmen went to high school with this guy my fiancé met through them, but hasn't seen since college (over a decade ago). Somehow one of the groomsmen invited him, or he invited himself? I think it's confusing, but regardless, he is somehow coming from where he lives in California to Montreal for the bachelor party. Fiancé likes him perfectly well, but obviously they haven't talked in years and wasn't someone that even occurred to him for the original B-list. No idea if he has a partner, or if he's even interested in coming to the wedding (it's is in Michigan).
I know that usually people who give gifts and people who come to wedding-related events are invited. But these seem unusual in that neither the gifts nor the attendance at the bachelor party were solicited, and we're still dealing with uncertainty about space. I'm just curious what you all would do in these situations!
Posted Jul 20, 2017, 9:34 PM UTC
Case 1: No. It was nice of her to give you a gift but she asked for the information. If you want to invite her there is not problem with that, but just because someone got you a gift does not mean they are required to have an invite (in my book at least). Case 2: I would dig deeper and see how he got invited first. If he invited himself, definitely no.
That was how my fiancé made it sound when he first told me about it - that one of his groomsmen mentioned he was helping plan the bachelor party and the guy said he wanted to come. But when I picture it, it seems way more likely that the groomsman was like, "dude, you should totally come." My fiancé has been very resistant to probing further, I think because he thinks it makes it look like he doesn't want him there, when he's actually kind of flattered. Do you think if the groomsman did invite him, as I suspect, that we should sent an invitation? I just can't imagine that he'd assume he'd be invited to the wedding of a guy he hasn't talked to in a decade. But then again, I also think it's weird that he's flying to the bachelor party of a guy he hasn't talked to in a decade, soo...