I don't want kids at my wedding but

People can travel without their children, bring a sitter with them or hire a sitter locally, depending on the age of their children. Most parents will not leave their children with a strange sitter until they are older and only then if they are a bonded professional who is recommended by a hotel etc.

You can choose to have a child free wedding, but you must graciously accept that it will mean some of your family won't attend.

You can't tell people not to bring their children. You can address the invitations by name to those who are invited, use the rsvp card to indicate how many seats you are allotting them, and mention a child free wedding on your website.

Ditto ^^

Some may decline and you have to be ok and prepared for that. Otherwise hire a sitter at your wedding in a room where you can provide movies and little things like coloring books to keep them entertained if you can't imagine them not being at your wedding but they can't find anyway to get a sitter.

Lots of people travel without their kids, if not... they can decline. 90% of our guests are from out of state, and kids are not invited with maybe the exception of a baby.

You address the invite to adulra only spread word of.mouth and expect some declines. let the adulta decide how they wanna plan.

Whenever you send the invitations just make sure it says "adult only wedding".

If people dont want to leave their kids, they just wont go. Its your wedding, do what you want

Do not put "adult only wedding" anywhere near your invitations. That is rude.

It may be rude but it gets the point across. Then be rude. Sorry. Some people just don't get the not so subtle hint.

Here this may help you: https://www.theknot.com/content/adults-only-wedding-etiquette-no-children

We dislike children too and we had to make a bunch of calls. Don't back down if it's your vision. My aunt who has triplets literally thanked me at the wedding because our wedding was her first night out since they were BORN that she went out without them. She and my uncle had a blast!

If they want to come they will find a way to coordinate child care if they want to come to your wedidng.

I've received wedding invitations that simply say *adults only celebration* and I never found it rude. I included this on my wedding invitations as well.

If you don't want kids and your FH doesn't want kids, then don't invite them. I personally don't think anyone traveling should be exempt from the no kid rule. Children shouldn't become guests as a convenience to their parents. They can either travel without the kids, one spouse could stay home with the kids, find a babysitter or stay home.

Your family can absolutely hire a sitter for a night or find someone else to watch their kids. I'm traveling out of state next week without my 10 mo for an adults-only vacation with my sisters and their friends. There's no crisis. The "you can't ask people to travel without their kids" argument that some people like to use is BS.

Send the invite as an adult only wedding and then just be prepared for responses. Many people won't want to leave their children with a sitter for so long just to attend a wedding and some might even be offended. Just stick to what you want and you'll get it, you just might not have all them willing to attend.

I put it on my invitations and I have triplet girls and my kids aren't going to be at my wedding or reception nor do I have a wedding party just a Best man and on geoomsman/replacement father which is the same person .

Denise, I couldn't imagine my son not being at my wedding. He and FH have such an amazing bond. I asked my son if he wanted to be at the wedding, he was so upset thinking we wouldn't let him be there.

He's our RB and my FH is going to ask him to be a little groomsman and stand next to him.

I couldn't imagine excluding my son, but again that's just MY personal choice.

OP just address invites to Mr & Mrs So So. On the rsvp card you could even put "we've reserved 2 seats in your honor".

I have no problems traveling without my son, however I'm lucky enough to have family close by to watch him. I'm not sure my aunts would leave their kids with family for a few days to attend my wedding, but it is possible. I do know that I'd never get a sitter in a city I wasn't familiar with.

ETA: words

We invited 250 adults and 225 attended. Only two couples had issues; one couldn't secure a babysitter (given 10 months notice) and the other decided to boycott, and didn't have the courtesy to respond. One family drove a whole day each way and sorted out local childcare.

We never would have given a pass to out of town kids. We either had never met them or only met them a few times; there were under 21s who were local, who we knew better and didn't invite.

And the couple who boycotted? They had a nanny. We had a fabulous time without them.

I'm having the same problem. FH has spoken to his siblings and asked them if they could get a babysitter with about 10 months notice. One of them has already told him that they probably won't be able to attend because they won't get a babysitter. All I'm asking is that they try. And they won't so I would love to say "We'll miss you there!" FH is very close to his siblings and I can't do that to him. So I will have to suck it up and allow them to come, and hope that his niece and nephew with behavior issues don't cause too many problems.

We are doing an adult only wedding. We put it on our RSVP page on our website, and addressed invites to "mr and mrs." We have tons of OOT family with kids. We did offer to find a sitter, most coming said no, they'd leave their kids at home. Some have declined all together. FH's only first cousin has 3 kids under 10. She is furious. Went so far as to find pictures from her own wedding where FH was in attendance, but was also in his teens. She declined the invitation to the ceremony, which has FH super upset. I considered letting her kids come, for HIM. But he said no, this is what we want and if she doesn't want to be there, she can stay home, with her kids. Plus it wouldn't be fair to everyone else TRAVELING with out their kids. (She's local!) People aren't going to like it no matter what you do, but it's your day, do what you want.

I have mixed feelings on this. Having an invite that says adults only can be ugly or considered rude. However, sending out an invite and the recipient not knowing the wedding is adults only until after you RSVP to the wedding and the bride calls and says, "umm I'm sorry no one told you, but it's adults only", is also rude. This happened to my sister when she RSVP'd and she was really offended by it. Apparently she fell through the cracks on the "word of mouth" announcement on kids not being welcomed.

This "kids at wedding" is totally the adults fault. My parents never took me to a wedding when I was a child, and no one never had to worry to address that in an invitation because it was common sense that children don't belong in wedding or adults events (funerals, viewings, wineries, etc)

We have no children at our wedding and we have people from out of town and out of country, My cousin who has 2 years old twins and lives out of the country will not bring her children because as she said, "I want to have fun and enjoy my time" she arranged everything to leave her kids with her in-laws for 10 days.

My FH's groomsman has 2 kids (3 and 5) he is from out of town, they live in Phily and they don't have family where they live, so his wife arranged that her parents will come from Boston to Phily for the weekend to babysit their children so they can come at our wedding and enjoy the weekend in NJ.

Bottom line here is that if people really want to come to your wedding and they respect the decision of "no kids" they will make the effort to find a sitter.

Btw: in our RSVP, we wrote the number of guests we wanted at the wedding. so for a family of 2 adults and 2 kids, we wrote 2 guests....(easy to understand that kids are not welcome)

I'm a little confused on the verbiage "we dislike children" that being said you could say something like "In order to allow all guests, including parents, an evening of relaxation we have chosen for our wedding day to be an adult only occasion. We hope this advance notice means you are still able to share our big day and will enjoy having the evening off!"