Friday Night Brides... When's your rehersal dinner?

I am getting married at the Reception hall and they only do the rehearsal 20 mins before the actual wedding. This takes away from the theory of a Rehearsal dinner.

My FH and I are thinking that we have lots of out of towners and we still want to thank those in our family for anything they may do and give out small gifts so we are planning for a BBQ the night before hand (Thursday) so that those from out of town can get some free dinner and we can still say what we need to say :) Maybe even have an unofficial run through of who is walking with who.