Post # 1
Member
879 posts
Busy bee
My Fiance and I are tossing around the idea of not having kids at our wedding, although I’ve always imagined there’d be kids since I do think they bring a certain lighthearted fun to weddings. The problem is I have many MANY little cousins. Most people say you can just invite immediate family, but obviously that won’t work for me. I cannot invite a few and then not invite the rest, right? I do feel bad that certain relatives may not be able to come because of this. We are planning on having a ring bearer (my nephew) and a couple of flower girls so we will have at least a few kids.
How did you pick which kids were invited? Luckily, most of our friends were fine with not bringing their kids, if not preferred it. I’m worried with my relatives people may think we’re being selective or feel insulted we could not invite their kids too. Part of the reason why we’re thinking no kids is to keep our guest count down (if I invited all my little cousins, they may end up being maybe more than 25% of our guest list!) and a few places we looked at did not have a kids meal option.
Post # 3
Member
1636 posts
Bumble bee
We had 5 under 12 and 5 under 20
4 of the 5 under 5 were in the wedding and also 4 of the 5 under were in the wedding.
Post # 4
Member
1271 posts
Bumble bee
I have two children (4 and 5 years old), so our wedding will be a family-friendly affair. I negotiated with my venue for the children to be charged a much lower rate (25% of the cost of an adult meal) and not be attributed to my “total guest count” (for food & beverage minimum purposes). That allows us the freedom to welcome all children at our wedding. I’m estimating that we will have 25-30 children at our 130 person wedding.
Post # 5
Member
319 posts
Helper bee
I L*O*V*E kids at weddings! They are so fun. Also, for us they add no expense as the caterer doesn’t charge a meal for kids under 6 and virtually all the kids we invited were under 6.
Everyone’s kids were invited to ours… but many people decided to get sitters anyway! I would say about half of the invited children actually RSVPd.
Post # 6
Member
235 posts
Helper bee
I think if I had children and couldnt bring them but showed up to yours and saw other kids there, whether they were included in the wedding or not, I’d feel like you were being selective. I dont have kids but I have heard from the boards how CRAZY people can be about this situation. I would maybe have your fam spread the word about your guest list issue and maybe people will choose to leave them at home. Otherwise, I’d go completely kid free- you dont want to piss people off my inviting some and not others. It’s a tough spot to be in- I feel for you! We’re having a Destination Wedding, youngest guest will be 9 just because we dont have any kids in the fam now.
Post # 7
Member
1092 posts
Bumble bee
We’re inviting 20 kids and 180 adults. We’re letting any and all families with kids bring them. We hated the idea of someone not being able to come because they couldn’t find a sitter.
Post # 8
Member
6432 posts
Bee Keeper
We’re having 2; a 10 year old and 12 year old. We know both really well, they are very mature, and we’re happy to have them there.
We don’t really know any other children, and even if we did, 10 is the youngest we’d contemplate inviting. We are tight on numbers, we don’t particularly like children, and don’t believe children ‘make’ a wedding; in fact, the worst parties I’ve been to have been family ones, my OH and I, and everyone we’re inviting for that matter, much prefers adult parties.
No-one has had an issue with our decision; in fact, everyone’s been pretty happy that they get a night off!
Post # 9
Member
685 posts
Busy bee
Two. Their parents weren’t going to bring them but couldn’t find sitter. They had the full adult meals and everything. It was not biggie. Their mom was my manager and she had been very good to me, so extra $200 on the kids weren’t a big issues.
Post # 10
Member
879 posts
Busy bee
@Lexy: I actually love kids at weddings too!! Just can’t get around not having to invite them all while keeping our guest list and budget in check. That’s nice your caterer did not charge for kids under 6! We’ll have to inquire about that!
Post # 11
Member
879 posts
Busy bee
@sassypants: I really wish I could invite them all! Either way, unless we do invite them all I know some feelings may get hurt and I wouldn’t want our relatives to feel we did not invite their children because we didn’t want them any of them there 🙁
Edit: At this point our guest list is so tight we can either invite someone’s kid or invite another grown up. Since I come from a large family, we’ve already cut our guest list dramatically.
Post # 12
Member
1271 posts
Bumble bee
@arabesque: Could you talk to some relatives and ask them if they would be willing to get a babysitter? What if you paid for a babysitter to watch kids during the wedding?
I would be extremely offended if I was a relative that couldn’t bring my kids and I arrived and found out that other kids had been invited (outside of bridal party). Unless, of course, the bride called me and explained the situation, in which case I would hire a babysitter to accomodate.
Post # 13
Member
1111 posts
Bumble bee
We will be having a few teens at our wedding (FI’s first cousins), but no very young kids. We enjoy children and it is nothing against them whatsoever, but we had to draw the line at first cousins because if we allowed our cousins to bring their kids, it would have added SO MANY to our guest list. Hopefully people will understand.
I think in order to not hurt people’s feelings and offend them, you have to draw a firm line and not make exceptions. You can’t invite this cousin’s kids but not that cousin’s kids, you know?
I feel your pain because my cousins have AWESOME kids who are well-behaved, but FI’s cousins mostly have kids that misbehave and never get reprimanded for poor behavior… But we couldn’t let my cousins bring their kids & not his, you know? So we just had to decide to draw the line at first cousins, both because of budget and *ahem* behavioral issues…
Post # 14
Member
4149 posts
Honey bee
Only the kids in our wedding party, which are my nieces and his brother.
Post # 15
Member
233 posts
Helper bee
We invited close to thrity children to our wedding (222 guests came), and about 20 children came to the wedding. They were a blast, and they STILL mention our wedding when we see them, 18 months later.
Post # 16
Member
2521 posts
Sugar bee
We’re having an immediate family only ceremony, so 3 children (my FSIL’s kids) will be there.