This is more of a vent post, but will take advice if you have any.
FH and I created our guest list pretty soon after getting engaged. We included all our family as well as friends and family friends from both sides.
His parents have WAY more friends than my parents do, they're very social people where my parents are not and that's fine. We didn't include every single one of his parents friends, just the ones FH WANTED there. We both come from pretty large Italian families, but FH's mom, places a lot more importance on the obscure cousins than my mom does. I have first cousins I'm not even inviting.
When we created the guestlist, there was just one set of cousins my mom wanted me to add when I went over the list with her, and we then went over the list with FH's parents and they started rattling off names of people that I didn't know and we explained we were trying to keep the guest list low since my parents were paying, at this point his parents said "oh no we're gonna help pay too" This was in January, and we haven't seen any money from his parents, but have let them know when we booked the venue, photographer, DJ so they know money is being spent now.
I read the list to my FH probably 20 times before ordering STD's and FH said the list was good to go so I ordered and mailed out STD's. One of his cousins who I only met once (FH and I have been together for 7 years) at a funeral a couple months before I sent STD, got her STD and his mom called us screaming about how embarrassed I (why me when it's not my family idk but everything is my fault with this lady) should be because I didn't get her last name right (she's married and has a different last name from the rest of the cousins in this part of the family and like I said, I only met her once at a funeral and we weren't introduced at said funeral) His mom has not let this go, even after we apologized to FH's aunt and cousin and they both said it was fine and laughed it off (I also got this cousins name (the wrong name)/address from my FBIL's wedding guest list)
We sent the STD's last month, and this past Saturday FMIL asked FH if we sent one to *insert obscure cousin here* and FH asked me and I said "no she wasn't on the list" this is an obscure cousin who I asked FH about probably 10 times and every time he said he didn't want to invite her so we didn't. FH then went to his parents house, that same day and just told his mom we'd send this woman a STD. I told my FH that I wasn't sending any more STD/adding anyone to the guest list from his parents side until we have an agreement on money they're contributing/I see money from them. He snapped at me (which I'm marking up to mercury retrograde cause we've been pretty much on the same page and haven't argued at all about wedding planning up until now) that he didn't want to ask his parents for money and he didn't want to approach it.
Our guest list is 130-132 if I add this random cousin, 40 guests are mine, the rest are his family/family friends. My parents have written every deposit check/vendor fee/EVERYTHING we've had to give money too, I don't want my parents footing the bill for his parents friends to have a great time at our wedding when they don't even know my last name. I can't approach his parents cause his mom already thinks I'm disrespectful cause I don't kiss her butt like everyone else, but I can't just keep inviting these people when his parents aren't doing anything to contribute to our wedding but want us to invite all these people I don't know, and he just keeps saying "yes, we'll send them a STD" and leaves no room open for a discussion on contributing.
My mom told me to give her an ultimatum, tell her we'd make the guest list 70 guests his and 60 mine so if they wanted to add more people they had to get rid of people, but I literally don't have 20 more guests to add. I could add my random first cousins that I didn't originally invite but I really don't want to add them just to add them, I call them the "funeral family" cause they're just family I see at Funeral's and to me thats not people I want to be at my wedding day. FH also feels this way when speaking with me, hence why we didn't originally invite this obscure cousin because she makes FH uncomfortable, but he HATES confrontation with his mother cause it always ends up in a blow up where I get screamed at by her for ruining her life cause I don't give into her narcissistic childish antics. I literally have no idea what to do. I've always heard, he should deal with his family and I should deal with mine, but he just gives into his mom to avoid a blow up which I GET but I can't justify my parents paying all this money for his parents friends.
/ vent
