The Wedding Guest List: The Art Of Choosing.

Hello everyone. It’s Tuesday, which means its #weddingserieswithMJ time! If you been following me on Instagram, you know that I started this wedding series about a month ago where I share some tips, advice, and some realness to my future brides and also to anyone interested in knowing my thoughts/feelings. Today is no different. I usually post to Instagram, but I felt like this post would be a little more lengthy and it’s worthy of a blog post! Keep up with me on Instagram, by following me HERE.

Now that that’s in order, let’s get into the good stuff.

Wedding Guest List

This is possibly the worst part of wedding planning, in my opinion. It’s literally bittersweet. This is the day you would have to put on your big girl and big boy underwear and make some tough decisions. Honestly, it took me and husbae A LONG TIME to get our list figured out. It was so hard. It wasn’t that hard. No, it was hard. 

Before you make the tough decisions of adding and subtracting names, you have to first have these things covered:

• Your wedding budget
• A specific # of people you want there
• Whether you want a small, intimate wedding or a big one
• Family and close friends only or friends from near or far (associate even)
• People you’ve known for a super long time but lost contact
• All your relatives or just the ones that have been close to you

Once you have these covered, you’ll be on your way to making your guest list official. The thing that can be stressful is wanting to invite more people than your budget can afford. Do not get caught up in that endless number game, adding past your initial number! It is not worth it, trust me. Save your coins, honey. 

Set your number and do not go past it. Period!

It is so easy to keep tricking yourself into believing that you NEED to add this person or that person, but if you are surpassing your number then that means you may have to reevaluate if that person would just not be added or you may have to subtract another name and add theirs instead. That is the reality of it. 

Do not feel guilty

It is easy to feel guilty. Guilty for not inviting someone, guilty for having to take someone’s name off the list, guilty for forgetting to add someone to the list, or guilty for just not wanting someone there that your spouse wanted there. Take it easy on yourself. This is not the end of the world. 

Of course, we wanted to invite ALL of our friends/associates/long-distance peeps, but we could not. It’s nice to have great social media friends, but those friends are not all eligible for a wedding guest list, especially if the only time they actually talk to you is when they comment under your photo. Be REAL people! That is not how life works and you (you as in the ones who would not get the invite to that wedding) should not feel upset or be mad at the bride/groom. It is not until you endure planning a wedding would you truly understand why. And please remember that it is not always about “who you knew the longest”, it’s actually about who have been constant + consistent with you until this very day. That goes for NEW + OLD. Brides tend to feel obligated to invite people based of of long time periods of knowing them, trust me when I say that could be lit on fire and blown up in an instant. I can attest to that fact. I speak on this a little more in my previous post HERE.

Money does not grow on trees. People are not rich out here.

I mean, unless you are and you could invite as many people as you want with no worries!

Do not be afraid to cut someone off the list if they are not going to bring you the positive energy that you need on your wedding day. Remember it is YOUR DAY!

One piece of advice I remember getting A LOT was to also invite people with real-life jobs. Yes, it’s cool to want your friends there, but are your friends really interested in giving you a great wedding gift or they just want to turn up with you? Be REAL. Be SMART. I’m not saying that they would not have your best interest at heart, but there are some older folks who want to help you start your life off the best way you can and that blessing is a blessing in itself! Don’t disregard them. Don’t keep them off your list because they’re “old”. They are needed for their wisdom and they deserve a seat at the table for all they’ve done over the years. All the love they have shown.

Be wise. The old show us their wisdom in many ways.

Last thing: Do not invite someone you have to think hard to remember. If the names do not come flowing as you’re making it, then they were not supposed to be on the list. The names should flow easily as you and your husbae to be is making it!

Okay, I think I covered it all tonight for the wedding guest list. I hope this was helpful to someone out there!

Thanks for stopping by! XO MJ.