70 kids on guest list! Help!

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You can't tell people no children will be invited and then invited children. That isn't the right way to go about doing it. Then people will be pissed that you lied.

It usually is just an all or none situation, otherwise feelings will be hurt, but another way I could see around it would be sending out RSVP cards saying "We've reserved ___ seats in your honor" or something of similar wording. Then you could just fill in a 2 on the people who's kids you may not want to be there. Most couples I know who have children tend to use weddings as a night out, so there's a chance they may not all bring their kids. Just don't tell people it's "no kids" and then have some children there, especially since you said you're not having a bridal party so there won't be any flower girls or ring bearers which will only leave the guests you told wondering why THEIR child wasn't allowed to come.

We were in the same position and decided to just make it an all adult event. I found that even that made people mad. Whatever you will do you will never make everyone happy. My advice is, whatever you do decide, stick with it. If you want to tell ppl to consider childcare, be prepared that none of them will.

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Yes you can. They will have to get over it. People have bridal party kids and that goes without saying. You don't need to invite 70 kids because you want a ring bearer and flower girl.

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Exactly. You cant make everybody happy.

70 kids is A LOT! No matter what kind of entertainment you provide for them, with that many kids & (majority of) parents who will be enjoying the wedding more than supervising their children, your wedding will for sure turn into a one big play date, and in worst case, into a nightmare with running around, screaming & potentially breaking stuff. And this is coming from someone who loves kids. But when you put that many kids together with very loose supervision / structure & have them up until late, with loud music & lots of sugar from desserts lol, there is no way there will be any order. In my opinion, weddings are not that fun for majority of children anyway.

I would definitely cut the number down.
It is ok to invite some children & not all, you just need to invite in circles to avoid hurt feelings: immediate family, BP kids, extended family... Nursing infants are always exception. But first, do you even know that majority of your guests will want to bring their kids? All our guests (with 4 exceptions) said they prefer to leave their kids at home & enjoy adult night where they can relax, drink etc. If many of your guests have the same attitude, this would immediately cut your kids count significantly, without you doing anything.

Figure out which of those children are truly close to you and your fiancé. I have about 10 on my list of young children, but if I counted children of all of my guests it would have been closer to 30. If the children aren’t close to you (like family), then their parents should be understanding as to why they aren’t on the invite list. Too many children will cause the wedding to become more about their annoyances and won’t be as focused and as fun as just your day!

I am going to tell it: Invite nieces and nephews and any kids in your bridal party and cut the rest. Are you having a dance? I ask this because we went to a wedding Saturday night and there were 9-10 kids who ran ALL AROUND during the toasts. Like hiding under tables and playing tag. No one reigned them in, including the bride who was the mom of one of them! Then......the dancing began but no adults could go on the somewhat small dance floor because the 9/10 of them were monopolizing it!! I can't imagine 70 kids!!! Yes there was an activity table set up but no child used it. Running around with new found friends was more interesting, I guess!! We left a bit early as the kids on the dance floor situation was not changing (I hope it did!!)

Please don't tell invited parents to consider childcare. I am a mom and had I rec'd an invite with that wording it would have offended me because it reads: "We really don't want your kids there and we are just being nice." I know that is not your intent, but that is how it reads. And I am not easily offended, lol. Now you may run the risk of people saying "Well if my kids are not invited we are not coming." Sorry to hear that, let's get together after the wedding. Frankly I don't understand that - I would have loved a kid free wedding night out!!!!

Even without a dance 70 is A LOT of kids.

We don't have that many children at our wedding, but we do have quite a few!

To help keep children distracted we are going to be getting clip boards and printing off a small stack of coloring sheets and providing crayons so that kids can color if they want to keep themselves busy!

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Thank you so much for your comment! I am happy to hear it is not always necessary to stick within the “rules” of kids, no kids, or family only. I also think people could/should be understanding of us wanting children who are close to us at our wedding, while at the same time not wanting 70 kids there. We want to invite the people who are meaningful to us but also don’t have any desire to offend anyone. Seems we should be able to invite the people we want to on our wedding day! Thank you!

I appreciate everyone's comments and thoughts so much! Thank you!!

View Quoted Comment We hadn't thought of this idea! Thank you!

View Quoted Comment You're welcome! Good luck!!

I may be wrong but it sounds like you want to include kids from your immediate families and kids of close friends (kids of your wedding party members can be included in this) . So if it were me, I would invite the kids from those two circles. We did not invite our cousin's kids and no one was butt hurt about it. Some may decline your invitation which is their decision to make. But you are right, to an extent, you are allowed to decide who you do and do not want to invite.

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Yes, 70 is a high number, but if you look at your overall list, you have invited roughly 170 adults! So, just over 1/3 of your guest list is kids, but that's to be expected with such a large guest list. I agree with PPs that the easiest thing to do is either invite them all, or none of them.

Believe me, you will be so busy on the day, with all of your adult guests, you're likely not to even notice how many kids there are.

And I personally think kids at a wedding is a really fun thing!

You can put something on your wedding website, or in an invitation insert card, that although kids are welcome, you would love to see their parents enjoying a night out without kids! Just making the suggestion may have some of your guests thinking, "yeah, a babysitter is a great idea!"