Children at the wedding?

View Quoted Comment You totally get me! I love kiddos especially the ones that would be coming if I decide to invite them but that being said I don’t need a whole family reunion at our wedding. We will have our ring bearer, flower girl and 2 other children that are already accounted for that they are there. These children and kids that I see very often, know how they behave, know their parents won’t let them get crazy or act a certain way. Its all the other ones that I kinda don’t even want to find out about. I know everyone talks about people not being come because it’s not child friendly and I am wondering if I’m totally in the wrong and if I’m am being rude assuming that it’s too hard for people to find child care? I know people most of care.com and sitter city for those reasons specifically so I honestly can’t see why it would be too difficult given the time in advance.

Not having kids at our wedding besides the wedding party. It is fairly common in my area to have no kids wedding receptions. Budget played a big role. I feel bad for our out of state guests, but my family is local and if I allowed kids for our out of state guests - I would have to include them for local too (otherwise my family would make life really hard).

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That is exactly my worry. I know that my sister has raised her children to be respectful and they are great kids! but my friends and some cousins....their kids are not well behaved.

Many kids and a very crappy parent ruined my sisters wedding...and I will not be able to keep my cool if they act like brats. or if the parents disrespect me for asking them to put down the alcohol and take care of their child. Too much drama.

I think they have plenty of time to find a sitter...and you think they would appreciate a night off!

the way I worded it on my invitation made it seem like a really good idea for the parents to find a sitter and most of them have been excited to find a sitter to enjoy the evening.

My FH has a large family and we are inviting about 60 kids to the wedding. I saw about 25 of these kids at a party on Mother's Day and I'm really rethinking these kids at the wedding. Most of them are in families with a bunch of kids 7-8 and they are not well behaved. My FH thinks we have a corner of the room designated for the kids and their older siblings can sit with them. That's totally fine, but I think we need to have a few adults or have a few babysitters (not related) over there to supervise. The older kids shouldn't have to watch their younger siblings and their siblings won't listen to them anyway. I really don't mind having these kids at the wedding, but I don't want them playing tag and screaming for each other across the room.

Unfortunately for this wedding I'm feeling like the spotlight is going to be taken away from me. My FH decided to have 9 groomsmen and I am only having one bridesmaid. We also have my niece and nephew that are 5 being a bridesmaid and groomsman. My FH brought up that he wants to have them all walk into the reception with their wives, which I okayed. The other night he brings up (in front of his sister) that he wants them all to be able to announce themselves and for how long they have been married (because they are all so happily married). I tried to say no to this, but with his sister there defending him, I lost that one. I feel like him and his family are the main focus at this wedding. He has 75% of the guests which are his family and should know each other anyway. I just hope I'm not sitting at my own wedding as a guest!

Our age cut off was 18. We had a non traditional midday boozy brunch wedding dance party on a Sunday with open bar. It was critical to us for our guests to enjoy themselves and unfortunately it meant not inviting the kiddos. We wanted an intimate time for our 98 guests. Without kids it was easier for people to be more present and enjoy themselves.
We love babies and have many kiddos in our families and they understood. Parents were glad to have a day off.

My wedding is capped at 65 people, we included the kids. A lot of people are unable to leave their children for many reasons and I knew saying no children meant I would have a lot of no RSVPs. I figure if someone is close enough to me that they are invited to my wedding I am close enough to them to understand children will always be their priority. The last wedding I went to had kids and honestly I loved it. There were infants and special needs kids and everyone behaved.

We've decided to allow kids because our venue doesn't charge full price for them and because we have a 12 year old who'd enjoy seeing her friends and cousins there. Surprisingly, most people have decided not to bring their kids since many are making a full weekend of it with us (we live near Chicago and our venue is in Milwaukee).

I def feel where you are coming from. I was a teacher for 15 years so I absolutely love children. But I had to make the tough decision of saying no children at the reception. At this point I have got a little push back, not too much but I have about 40 days left. I am like you I didn't want to add to the numbers drastically and unfortunately an invite for 2 does turn into 4 or5... Heck ppl do that without kids bringing friends and other people. I just tried to get ppl to look at it a different way out. An all adult event almost like a date night. You wouldn't take your kids on a date night for you and your spouse. In the end it saved me a lot of money. My opinion people that bring kids tend to leave early to get them to bed ( which is understandable) or they let their kids run crazy cause they wanna have a good time and feel like its enough family there to watch them and I don't want that to be anyone elses experience. Plus I told my guest I have a bar and I don't want no ones kids getting anything cause that would fall back on me... Sooooo its a hard decision especially with family, but I pray everyone understands.

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OMG.... I am so sorry to hear that maybe you and FH need to have a serious one on one talk. This is suppose to be the greatest day of your life. Yes, we know that it is our husband day but you should not be feeling like you might only be a guest at your wedding. And why does his groomsmen need to walk in with their wives. Their wives aint in the wedding, and no offense no one needs to know how long they have been married this day is suppose to be about you two. Take back control of your wedding and your special day.

I love kids. My cousins have kids. If I okayed for kids to be at our wedding, there would be 22 little ones running around and screaming their fool heads off. There'd be a chance of kids crying during the ceremony or hearing "mommy, I'm bored." Our wedding will be a night for the adults ti have fun, let loose, and not have to cater to their mini mes. We are doing an adults only event with an open bar and a late night.

We chose to have a child free wedding as well mostly due to the amount of children that could potentially be present the day of. Between our families and friends we were looking at close to 30 kids being invited. That was far too many for our liking. Ultimately the only kid that will be at our wedding is our new nephew but it’s because he will be only 5 months old. It’s a personal choice. But it did improve our budget. It allowed us to invite at least another 15 adults in place of the children.

FH and I had SUCH AN ISSUE with this topic. It was so hard to decide what to do. We decided our wedding would be ages 15+, with the exception of my 9 month old niece (flower girl) who will leave during cocktail hour with my brother-in-law's mother. One of the main factors for us, was that I flat out couldn't handle the idea of my step-sister's three wild sons (all under age 3.5) coming to the wedding and her using my father as free on-demand childcare (as usual). So we said no kids.

We went childless and very glad we did. We would have had 160+ people (and mouths to feed) at our wedding). Without kids our guest count is 120. At $50 a plate (yes, kids plates are still expensive, especially if you're having a buffet) we saved $2,000. money aside, every wedding I go to there are kids running around and parents having to chase them. We wanted our guests to relax and enjoy their evening.

I have been to weddings where only the "close" children of the couple(nieces, nephews) were invited. I don't recommend that, it consisted of half the guests complaining that there were still kids there and they had to find a sitter for theirs.

I was surprised that with enough notice, basically none of guest list backed out. We started making it known by word of mouth at least a year out, and everyone has found a sitter and plans on coming childless.

Hope that helps! Don't let anyone's opinion change how YOU see your day!

Were having only our immediate family kids there thats all

We’re having kids, but with some rules about it. No kids under 6 at the ceremony. If they arnt old enough to know how to sit quietly for an hour they can’t be there. I really don’t want little kids fussing and causing a scene during the ceremony. I was at a wedding this December and a 3 year old started throwing a tantrum during the ceremony so I would like to just avoid that situation! And then all ages are going to be welcome at the reception until 8, which parents would probably be leaving a bit before then anyways because our wedding is on a Sunday so the kids have school the next morning.

Lately I’ve been seeing more wedding that are adults only except any kids in the wedding party (flower girls, ring bearer). We decided not to have kids at our wedding for the several reasons:

- kids will not eat the value of their plate
- kids would push our guest list/cost out of budget
- none of the kids are in the ceremony and all kids are seconds cousins vs nieces/nephews, god-kids, our kids, etc.
- most importantly, we considered the specific dynamic of our parent guest with their kids, and can’t be sure that all kids will be closely monitored based on their ‘let them run, they’ll be fine’ parenting style. Sounds minor but the stairs in our venue don’t have risers (floating running boards) so there’s a safety element for young kids not being careful watched. For peace of mind for all, we skipped the kids.

We made sure to address the no kid rule on our wedding website in a delicate manner. I created an FAQ section and addressed kids.

”Children - We love your kiddos as much as you do, however our venue is not child-friendly. We thank you for your understanding and hope arrangements can be made that allow you to still attend our big day.”

Sorry for the long response! Hope this helps.

This has been a huge debate for us as well. As a school teacher, I always have gotten a kick out of watching the kids dance at weddings. FH and I both have very large families, and we are the last few of our friends to get married, most are deep in the having kids phase of life. We reached out to them and most said they plan on leaving the kids home with a sitter for our Friday night reception. We made the preliminary guest list and it was 200 people over- cut the kids and we were only 25 over! 175 kids are too much to pay for. The only kids who are invited are our God children. (And even those parents are not sure about having them).

We are having a small wedding no more than 75 . We decided that only our immediate family with 4 kids, my daughter and two couples who wouldn't have a babysitter are bringing their kids, fyi we invited the aunts and grandparents who would normally watch the kids. My bbf's total have 33 so that was out between the ages of 6 to 22. I'm the last one of the group to get married and they all deserve and want an overnight trip. I spoke to my crew already and all is good.

So my fiance and I decided to put on our website and invites, "no children over the age of two.". We decided this because kids who are younger don't count as a seat.

We are, however. allowing the children of out of towners to come. I have a large family flying in from Florida, California, and him from Canada, Georgia, and we can't expect them to find child care on top of hotel stays, flights, car rentals, etc. So we are only allowing the kids of out of town family.

Out of the 148 people we're inviting, 41 of them are kids. I can't imagine not having them there for our wedding. They're family too