Skip the drama when addressing wedding invitations
Friends & Family Advice
By
on April 24, 2008
45
I can't handle addressing these wedding invitations. Everyone says I should address it to "mr. & mrs. man's-name last-name" but it pisses me off — addresses like this completely blow past the female component of a relationship. Any ideas for how to be true-to-self without trying to make an in-your-face statement?
I'm not sure what etiquette would advise, but my solution was to skip last names completely on my invites. I addressed them with first names and affectionate titles, ie "Dad & Andrea" (for my father and his gf), "Auntie Cherie & Dave" (for my aunt and her bf), and "Dallas & Erin" (for my married friends). I usually listed whoever I felt like knew better first, i.e. "Susannah & Michael" for my best friend from high school and her husband.
Obviously, your mileage may vary with this technique and it's probably not up to any sort of etiquette, but it felt like the simple, straightforward solution to me.
About Ariel Meadow Stallings
Author of Offbeat Bride: Creative Alternatives for Independent Brides, Ariel acts as the publisher of all the Offbeat Empire websites. She lives, loves, and dorks out hard in Seattle, WA.
Rachael said
This is great advice! I did this on our Save the Dates (and plan to for the invites) and it saved a ton of etiquette stress and it sets a nice tone.
Katie said
I love just using first names, but if you want something more formal you can write: Mr. and Mrs. Chuck and Kate Lastname. If you're concerned about etiquette, I read somewhere that using "Mr. and Mrs." with both first names is completely appropriate.
Jennifer said
That's exactly what I did Ariel! I even went so far as to address to 'well known and frequently used' nicknames.
Karen said
I used the nickname approach on our engagement party invites and it actually caused some problems. I had a couple of the invites returned. These were friends who were renting and possibly still had roommates. It that case it apparently can cause confusion at the post office. But, in general I love the casual/fun approach!
Vanessa said
Must admit- I too am guilty of indulging in first name invites. It has worked perfectly so far (*fingers crossed*!)
Hazel said
I also abhor "Mr. and Mrs. Hislastname"
I just went with omitting the "Mr. or Mrs." from all of the invites and just went with first and last names. "Steve and Lisa Johnson" or "Paul Brady and Lisa Johnson"
It saved a lot of headache for me.
michelle said
I omitted the Mr., Mrs., Ms. titles completely from the invites because I felt that it was a silly thing to do, seeing that I normally never use titles when I send Christmas cards, letters and things like that. ymmv, of course.
So, it was just first and last name (in the case of couples, like Ariel, I put the person's name first that I knew better.)
There were no complaints and I felt good knowing I didn't do something just because "that's the way it's done", when it didn't make sense to me to do it that way.
Caitirin said
My wife and I just said, FEH, forget about addressing etiquette. We addressed the invitations in the same way that we always addressed the people receiving them. Or the way that we thought the invitee would most like to be addressed.
For example I knew my grandmother would like to be Mrs. First Name Last Name. So I wrote that. For aunts and uncles I wrote Auntie FirstName and Uncle FirstName.
Everyone seemed to be happy, or at least we had no complaints
and it made us VERY happy.
Sara said
Etiquette schmetiquette =-)
I wrote mine like this:
John & Jane Doe
Virginia said
We're doing the same thing and we are even handwriting them. If anything, we will momentarily shake folks out of the societal conditioned trance. It's a great thing!
Yvette said
See, that is how I always send out my invitations for everything! My mom always makes fun of me for it so for our wedding invitations I just put everyone's full name, It felt weird addressing my grandma as "Margarita Menchaca" instead of Grandma Marggie. Honestly I don't think I will ever do it again.
Ariel said
I think this is yet another one of those things where people feel like there's a special way to do something, because it's for a wedding … which in actuality it's like, "How do you normally address your envelopes? Do it that way."
For me, etiquette usually feels like a way to make simple things way, WAY more complicated than they need to be.
(hmm: maybe I should write a post about my thoughts on etiquette…)
Tulip said
Yes please Ariel! That'd be a great post!
I adressed my invitations to
First name (woman's usually or who ever I know best) & First name (or guest) Last name.
I used people's regular full names, except for a few exceptions (Mike instead of Micheal things like that) just because of the postal service, I dont have great faith in the USPS.
Is it considered bad etiquette to use address labels instead of hand adressing them?
brandy said
I did the same as most on here with either just first names or the way I'd write their Christmas cards or whatever.
I don't have a huge problem with the "mr. and mrs. his first and last" and I had heard from my sister in law that her mom was demanding she do it…she didn't of course..but when I went to invite her parents, I did do theirs "mr. and mrs. john smith" just because I knew her mom would like it LOL. Sister in law called me the next day to thank me for the wonderful phone call she got about how I was doing things right. She'll only ever see her invite, so I don't care, just did what I knew would make her happy, and it makes me laugh cause she thinks I'm so proper.
Erin said
We haven't sent our invitations yet, just the save the dates, but we are only using Mr. and Mrs. HisFirst HisLast for people we think would prefer that. Otherwise we're doing Mr. and Ms. HisFirst and HerFirst TheirLast or Mr. HisFirst HisLast and Ms. HerFirst HerLast (adjusted for whoever we know better being first), along with at least one Ms. and Ms. HerFirst and HerFirst TheirLast.
Meg said
And if you are going to write a post on etiquette (which sounds cool) do pick up Miss Manners wedding book first. It's awesome in deeply offbeat in many ways. I have that book and your book by my bed. Only worth reading on weddings.
Meg said
Oh, and etiquette, as in Miss Manners (the sane source) says that you always address someone as they wish to be addressed. Which seems really fair. IE, Mrs. Jon Doe for your grandmother if thats what she likes, and Ariel & Dre if that's what y'all want. She also says the womans name always goes first, for whatever that's worth.
Laurel said
Second the motion, Meg–I have a huge pet peeve about people hating on etiquette without reading the divine Miss Manners first. She is eminently sane, practical, and feminist (oh yes! Believe it!). Not to mention hilariously witty.
And she has no love for the wedding industrial complex, either–she has some wonderful snark about the petty questions people ask her, as though it's engraved in stone how to arrange the wedding party in photographs, etc.
Lani said
I just wrote down people's names. No Mr and Mrs. Just John and Jane Doe. It's funny though because when my fiance's mom gave us her list she didn't have any of the ladies names and I asked her for them and told her that there would be no Mr and Mrs stuff happening. She didn't seem to mind – she knows that we aren't having the most traditional wedding ever so no big deal.
I highly doubt anyone will even notice or realize that we weren't all professional or traditional or whatever we were supposed to be.
Ariel said
Oh, and etiquette, as in Miss Manners (the sane source) says that you always address someone as they wish to be addressed. Which seems really fair.
Miss Manners and I are in complete agreement on this point. Thanks for the book recommendation, ladies!
Lauran said
Hooray! I had a big feminist crisis about this and polled my colleagues for what they did…
I wanted to be a little formal but still use everyone's first name, so I did it like this:
Mr. John and Mrs. Jane Smith
or
Mrs. Jane Smith and Mr. John Garcia
I also put whoever I knew best first on the list.
Me said
I agree with what people have been saying about either using only first names or using both first and last name. Like Lauran, I also plan to put the person I know best first, even if (gasp!) that means putting the woman first. I firmly believe that etiquette should not be an excuse for sexism. Plus, most of the time when people say, "this is how it should/must be according to etiquette, they actually have never read an etiquette book, and certainly don't know that different books have different opinions!
Nena said
this is EXACTLY what I did. I even used some people's Burning Man names, like "Wonderboy" and "Captain Hook"
Cate said
I've never been to Burning Man – I didn't know their were Burning Man names. Takes me back to Woodstock (G-D, yes I am that old).
Ariel said
Ah yes. Burning Man/playa names. Here's a hilarious discussion about them.