Do you really need a rehearsal dinner?

You can definitely skip it. We did and everything went fine. Our coordinator let everyone know where they’d be standing and what order they were processing in and we had no issues.

If you're having a rehearsal, I think having a rehearsal dinner would be a good idea, since its purpose is to thank everyone for attending the rehearsal. However, if you are not doing a rehearsal, it's totally fine to skip both the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner!

Rehearsal dinners are the way the couple thanks their wedding party for taking time out of their schedules to attend the wedding rehearsal. If you are having a rehearsal, you should definitely have some sort of rehearsal dinner. However, if you were planning on skipping the rehearsal, then there is no need to host a RD.

You don't have to have the dinner in the same place as the rehearsal. After you're done you can all meet up at a restaurant, or you can order in pizza at your home. It's pretty much the same level of hosting that you would do for anyone who helped you move.

If you guys want to go the upper scale route find a private dinning room in a restaurant and do that.

It's not mandatory, but in your situation I might suggest just you and your FH having a night together with your wedding party only. Leave the parents out of it, just surround yourself with friends to both thank them and recognize their contributions of time and financials, but also just to be with good friends who give you love and support the night before the big day.

Thank you all. I'm sorry I should have been a little more clear. I'm not talking about skipping just the rehearsal dinner I'm talking about skipping both the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner.

Totally fine and even normal to skip. Most venues now days don't allow rehearsal the day before so the whole ritual kinda goes out the window unless someone just loves to gather w them. Most ceremonies use to happen in churches which are usually open on the night before therefore the tradition began. Regardless do what is easiest and less stressful for you and truthful I think I would either have a word or write a letter to both parents if needed or just your mom gently describing how their behaviour has made you both feel and how you just described feeling about your own wedding and your expectations of their behavior going forward. Only you know your mom and wethwr the risk is worth the possible enlightment. Worst case she doesn't come to wedding and puts a block in your relationship, only you can decide if that is such a bad thing . Personally I would want to know if I was even unintentionally making my kids this miserable. Even if it hurt my feelings I would want to know so I could change my behaviour and possibly salvage their wedding day but more importantly salvage their marriage strife. The Last thing you want for a new couple is family strife. I lot of people don't know that some families both sides actual share birthdays holidays trips ect together because they've never experienced it they don't understand its a possibility of course that's a leap now. But once you have kids bday parties , recitals games they will be seeing each other and you want that to atleast be cordial. Let them know now you will not be allowing this kind of stress to follow you into your maggiage they need to work it out.

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It's not fully necessary. Personally I like them if you go in with a plan of attack. But if you have a layout of the ceremony space and can show it to your people there's no real need to do a full walkthrough otherwise.

View Quoted Comment That's a great idea to do a layout. I never thought about that.

If you skip the rehearsal all together then you do not need to host a rehearsal dinner.

One hard thing for people to get down is walking too quickly/starting behind each other too soon.

I don't know how long your walk will be, but when I was a coordinator I recommended each group wait until the next one was about halfway down the aisle before starting down themselves. Then once wedding is down there, the bride goes down.

When coming back up it was everyone waits until B&G are all the way up then BM/MOH go up together, halfway up the next couple goes and so on.

Fun tip! Have a photographer stationed at the end of your aisle when you're leaving, pause at the end of the aisle share a quick kiss and get a picture with everyone in it looking at you

View Quoted Comment Sorry for this being long. I did talk to my mom. But she isn't over what they did. And hates his parents because she did nothing wrong, which I agree. But before everything went bad I asked her to change the time of the shower so his mom would be able to attend so she did, after all this happened she changed the shower to later to screw over his mom which I get. But then when my fiance and his family worked through everything I asked her if she could change the time back to earlier for me so she did until she found out that my fiance forgave his parents and are still accepting their money for the catering. Then my mom started calling my fiance name not to his face but to me, saying how she hopes his family screws him over again and how she is making the shower later so she won't be able to attend. I asked her multiple times if she could keep it earlier but she refused. So I let my fiances mom have a separate shower for me with just his side. When my mom found out she was upset crying telling me how I stabbed her in the back and how she feels like I just pushed her to the side and hasn't considered her at all. I explained to her how if she would have kept it earlier I would have told his mom that there's only going to be one shower and if it was and inconvenience to her that it's to bad because she inconvenienced us with our venue. My fiance even had my back with it and said if his parents said anything about it how he would have my back. But because my mom was pissed that he forgave them she made it late to make sure she wouldn't be able to attend. I told her my intentions were never to stab her in the back or hurt her. I'm just trying to keep the peace between families and in laws and trying to keep everyone happy. But she is just so upset she doesn't see what I'm going through.

View Quoted Comment Thank you so much this will definitely help me out. 😊😊

I think as long as there is nothing complicated about the processional you should be fine. For our wedding, both of our brothers walked twice in the processional - my brother escorted my mom since my dad was walking me down the aisle then he escorted the groomswoman down the aisle and his brother his mom since she is single and then escorted one of the bridesmaids down the aisle. We wanted to make sure timing wise there weren't any issues. Our venue also has a water fountain halfway down the aisle so we had to decide if we wanted them to stay linked and walk around one side of the fountain or unlink and each walk on either side then relink so for us having a rehearsal was very important.

If you're not going to have a rehearsal, then no need for a rehearsal dinner! If you do have a rehearsal, then you should provide something to eat in some capacity. Even something like pizza or Chinese takeout would work if you're on a budget

View Quoted Comment Totally fine then!
We didn’t rehearse. Marriage went smoothly

View Quoted Comment That's awful but your mom is completely out of line. I get being upset for your child, but you don't become passive aggressive and then outright aggressive which is what your mom is doing. As the mother of the bride you should bring maturity, sanity and clarity and try to do your best to bridge any issues that occur between the kids and the families as to what is best for your daughter. I know its very hard when you have lived with something your whole life to see if for what it is but this is extremely dysfunctional behavior. I wonder if your mother would have found a way to make everything about her and create distress even if the situation had not occurred with his parents? Her calling your fh names in this situation is completely over the top. Now if he had cheated on you, stole your money, and left sure that response would be appropriate but because they did what healthy people in healthy relationships do which is talk and work out their problems and forgive.....that response is toxic and you may need to decide how much toxicity you will allow in your life and your marriage. Good for you for trying to talk to her, but it sounds like she is more concerned with herself than you at this point and will continue to disrupt things. You just need to set limits with her and let her know when she has crossed them like she sis with your fh. I personally wouldn't want her coming to my wedding if I was afraid in the least little bit that she would go off on either my fh or his family. If you think she will have grace and keep her opinion to her self then that's a different story but you don't need to be referring for your mother at your wedding. It's behavior like this that makes people elope....I'm very sorry you have to deal with this....

View Quoted Comment Thank you. The thing that upsets me is that I had her back through out this whole thing in the beginning. I've fought with his parents defending my mom and I also fought with him again defending my mom. But now she is trying to get revenge on his parents and the thing about that is that the only people who will suffer is me and him. And I'm not going to let that happen. I don't care if she hates me or is so upset with me, but I have my fiancés back no matter what. I didn't let his parents try and mess with my mom and I'm not going to let my mom mess with his parents. At the end of the day we are adults and she needs to let me make my own decisions.

I’m not having one. I don’t think it’s really necessary. Being in the bridal party is pretty straightforward. You walk down the aisle, stand at the end and pose for photos.


However, it’s a nice way for the families and bridal party to meet beforehand if they haven’t.

If you have a rehearsal, you should have a dinner to thank them for their time. If you don’t want a dinner, skip the rehearsal. Also it’s so interesting people feel it has to be a lavish expensive event “because it’s a wedding” when many people go simple and relaxed with pizza and beers/sodas.