“We're going to keep it to just close friends and family.”

You've gotten engaged, and now you're planning your wedding. You don't want to have a big wedding. Now you're talking with a friend and you say this about your plans.

We're going to keep it to just close friends and family.

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(someone) is going to (do something)

You use "going to ___" to talk about what will happen in the future. "Going to ___" is more natural than "will" for most situations where you're expressing someone's plans to do something:

They're going to meet us at the airport.

I'm just going to stay home and relax this weekend.

English learners often over-use "will" when "going to" would be more appropriate. In general, when you want to talk about something that you've already decided to do, use "going to":

Next up is Steve. He's going to walk us through the new home page redesign.

Starbucks announced that they're going to offer free Internet access at all their locations.

We're going to keep it to just close friends and family.

If you've just decided something and want to announce your decision, use "will":

Fine! I'll take it back! 

I guess I'll thaw this out.

keep it to (a number or group of people)

The phrase "keep it to ___" is a casual way to talk about putting a limit on something:

I want to keep it to about 25 people at most.

close friends

Your "close friends" are the friends that you spend the most time with and feel most comfortable with.

English speakers also use the phrase "best friend", but the word "best" usually refers to only one thing. So you can use "best friend" to talk about the one friend who you are closer to than any other friends. But it's a little strange to say "my best friends".

You can think of the circle of people that you know as falling into these groups:

  1. your best friend (just one, technically, but sometimes people use this for more than one person)
  2. your close friends
  3. your friends
  4. acquaintances (notice that I didn't say "your acquaintances" because we don't "own" acquaintances. You describe someone as being "an acquaintance", not "my acquaintance".

friends and family

The words "friends and family" often appear together.

For example, some telephone companies offer a "friends and family plan" that makes it cheaper for you to call people who are in your "network" of friends and family members.

Here's another example. This describes how someone got money to start a business:

They raised most of the money to get started from friends and family.