As a bride-to-be, one of the most difficult decisions you will face will be to determine the number of attendants you should have. Obviously, there will need to be fewer attendants than guests, even though you don’t want to make any of your family or friends feel left out. Think about who you want to be closest to you during the preparation and the celebration of your big day. You will be spending a lot of time with whoever you choose because it is the responsibility of both groups of attendants, the bride’s and the groom’s, to help plan and take care of the wedding details. Don’t forget, they will also be in your wedding pictures, and they won’t ever go away!
Here are some principles to follow to help you choose the perfect number of attendants for your wedding:
A Simple, Close Knit Ceremony
If you are planning a simple, close knit wedding ceremony with just your family and friends that are closest to you, you won’t need a large number of attendants. If you plan to have less than forty-five guests, you may decide to just have one attendant each. At the very most, it would be best not to have more than a maid of honor and one bridesmaid plus the best man and one groomsman.
A Medium Sized Ceremony
A medium sized ceremony is one that would include anywhere from 50 to 200 guests. In a ceremony of this size it would be proper to have anywhere from one to six attendants for each one of you. The key is that the fewer guests you have, the fewer attendants you should have, and the more you have, the more attendants you will need. A good way to determine the exact number is to remember that you will need one usher per 50 people. Since the groomsmen may serve as ushers, too, that will help you determine the number of attendants.
A Large, Luxurious Ceremony
If you are inviting 200 or more people to the wedding, you will need a minimum of five attendants for each of you. For a ceremony this large, it is common to have both a flower girl and a ring bearer. Because of the size and the enormous amount of things to take care of, it is not uncommon to have groomsmen and ushers. You will need to consider recruiting family members and friends to help with the organizational part, making sure that everyone is where they should be at the proper time.
The two main things that you need to consider when determining the size of your wedding are the cost and the amount of stress that will be created. The larger the wedding the easier it is to end up with hurt feelings because someone close to you feels left out. Those you chose should be available to help out in any way necessary, and they should be free to attend any parties, fittings and rehearsals that you schedule. If you have to work around everyone else’s schedule, the stress becomes too much. Regardless of the size, you can have a stress free ceremony if you follow these principles that have been laid out.
