With the onset of the spring and summer months comes the time of year when a huge slew of weddings are held and you may find yourself invited to a large number of them. Some of them you may be honored to attend, some you may really have no desire to go to while others you’ll have no idea why you were invited. Nevertheless, if you find yourself with invitations to multiple weddings it can start to get to you, especially if you find all of your free time being dominated by them.
One of the first things you need to decide is whether or not you’re going to attend. What you should do is make a list of everyone who has invited you, how you know them, how close the relationship is, what the likely reaction is if you don’t attend, whether the wedding is being held locally or elsewhere, and what the cost and obligation(s) would be to attend.
If you’re on a tight budget, the wedding is in another city, and it’s someone very close to you, call them and explain your situation. Someone who cares about you will either offer a solution to bring the cost down so you can attend, or understand why based on your present situation you won’t be able to be there.
If the person who invited you is someone you don’t really care for you need to consider how you’re not attending may impact your relationship with them and your other family or friends. Sometimes due to obligations to others there just is no way of getting out of having to attend and you’ll just have to get through it. This usually happens when you have family members who just don’t care for each other, but they go to each other’s wedding because they feel an obligation to another relative. Under these circumstances all you can do is to try and make the best of things and spend the minimum amount of time that you need to be there.
In the case where you’ve been invited to a wedding and you barely know the person, or worse don’t even remember them at all, you can choose a couple of different options. One is you can find out exactly why they invited you. It just may be that they don’t know that many people and they wanted you at their wedding so that someone would be there as their guest. If the wedding is local and you have nothing to do that day you just might want to attend as it would be a nice thing to do.
However, it may be a case that you received an invitation to the wedding because the couple are trying to simply maximize the gifts they receive. This usually happens with weddings that are in another city. The couple will invite various people who they know will never attend because the cost of coming to the wedding would be too prohibitive. Thus, they know that each of these people who don’t attend will send a gift, and they’ll direct them to an online wedding gift registry where there is absolutely nothing that doesn’t cost a fortune. Under these circumstances, if you still want to send them a gift, go and purchase a gift card for a store that you know is present in their city instead of selecting something from their wedding registry. There’s no reason you should let yourself be fully exploited like this.
If you find yourself attending multiple weddings during the next couple of months try as much as possible to get an outfit you can re-use if you’re concerned about your budget. This may not be possible when you’re part of the wedding party, but it’s definitely viable if you’ve only been invited as a guest.
Speaking of which, while it’s a great honor to be asked to be part of a wedding party, there is typically a considerable amount of work involved, and some cost, so make sure you ask what exactly is expected of you before accepting. In the case of a close relative or friend, usually there isn’t the option of declining, but when it’s someone more distantly connected to you it’s not disrespectful to turn it down provided you give a reasonable reason.
Should you choose to attend a wedding or accept being part of a wedding party it means though you’ve implicitly agreed to act in a particular way. Now of course an attendee at a wedding simply has agreed to not act like an idiot and disrupt the wedding by doing something stupid or malicious, which includes not getting drunk and making a scene. As a member of a wedding party the obligations may go so far as helping to plan the wedding, pick up things for it, pay for clothing, and whatever else the bride and groom may say they need. So keep that in mind before saying yes.
Otherwise try to remember that it’s a wedding and to have a good time. A wedding is meant to be a celebration of the beginning of a couple’s life together so make sure to wish them well!
