Our production assistant, Patrice, is recently engaged and taking you along on her wedding planning journey. Check back every other Monday for more real-life wedding planning insights – or follow along here!
We finally got our wedding invitations out – which means that this thing is actually happening (yay!) and boy did I learn a few things along the away. Just a quick google search of “how to word wedding invitations” or “wedding invitation etiquette” will yield thousands of results about how you *should* send out your invites. But I’m here to tell you that there are a few rules you can break. Here are the ones we decided to ditch:
1. Wait until you’re about to send invites to order them
I am not ashamed to admit that we took advantage of Black Friday sales to order our wedding invitations 6 months (!) ahead of time. If you know all the details of your day, and you can take advantage of sales, I highly encourage it! So many great retailers from local to online offer deals and great customization options.
2. Address everyone by their formal names
Seriously, this one messed me up. As I was filling out our guest list spreadsheet, my mind was reeling trying to figure out how I should address couples that were married but had different last names, couples that were dating, or families. Finally, I called my mom and asked her “do you think anyone would mind if I just address our invites as (First Name, Last Name)?” Our wedding will be fairly informal and it just felt so unnatural and forced to follow this old-school rule. Just keep in mind the formality of your wedding and your guests!
3. It is proper to include an inner envelope within the outer envelope
WHAT?! What even are inner envelopes? I am a busy bride and let me tell you ain’t nobody got time for that! I opted to include all names on the outside envelope and note “and family” where necessary and just let everyone know they are welcome to bring a plus one. On our RSVP cards, we included a spot for people to write the number of people attending and write their names. So far, we haven’t had anyone miss the inner envelope.
4. You must include stamps on your RSVP envelopes
Instead of spending an additional $50 on stamps for our RSVP envelopes, we gave our guests the option to RSVP online. That way, everyone can choose which option works best for them!
5. Do not include rehearsal dinner invites with your wedding invitations
This was probably the hardest rule to break. A lot of what I read said you should absolutely not include your rehearsal invites in your wedding invitations because they are two separate events. While I can appreciate that, I also felt like it would be easier for all of our guests to plan their weekend if they had all of the information at once, so we went ahead and tucked it on in there.
When it comes to your wedding invitations or planning your wedding in general, follow your instincts, not everything you read online! Some things will fit in with you and your event, some won’t and that is totally okay.
