Inviting Cousins

I would either invite all or none. If you only invite specific children, it will definitely ruffle some feathers.

Eh, I'm in your boat exactly. Aunts and uncles are invited, but I'm only inviting cousins I know and talk to. Everybody else would have to travel, and most of them already have kids. Nobody had the budget for an extra 30 people you barely know! That was my decision at least lol

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I agree with this. The best thing to do is all kids or no kids.

To be honest, I feel like this is family specific. What does your mom think? My cousins are a big, close knit family. Though there are a couple with whom I have no real relationship to speak of, I don’t feel like I could’ve just not invited those odd few individuals. But that was my family. My husband’s family is very different — they’re more distant, there are some more estranged relationships. He chose to invite only one cousin from a family of 3, as he really is completely out of touch with her siblings. But she lives locally and has made an effort to maintain a relationship with him. Within their world, it wasn’t weird. I do think it’s easier to include only a few clearly close cousins than it is to exclude only the few distant ones.


**everyone I am talking about here are adults, grown and independent. I think that it is a different scenario if you are talking about actual children.

We had this issue. I have very few cousins and we are all pretty close but my FH has like 250 first cousins so we had to invite NONE of them. It works better for us even though we are pretty close to our cousins, we just thought it would be unfair to invite some and not others — we didn’t want to start any drama between aunts/uncles either

My mom is one of six and I have a lot of cousins and about half of them are married with children. I invited my cousins and their families who I like and interact it! I have a few cousins I don’t see often and when I do it’s not always pleasant the last time I spoke with a cousin he said “if you get sick in Africa don’t come back”. I don’t feel like I want this person at my wedding!

I’m in the same boat... I only invited one of the siblings because she’s the only one that lives in the same state as me and her dad will be flying in early to stay with her. If I invited all of them my list would be VERY long.

I agree with PP, a lot of it has to do with the family dynamic and if you are okay with their reactions. Would it bother you if a whole group, including people you potentially really like, did not come or were clearly upset that you left someone out? Do you even think that would happen?

For example, my mom is one of 5 sisters. She does not get along with her oldest sister and I only see her children at large family events (funerals, weddings, baby showers etc.) I know that if my mom could have her way, we would have not invited this sister or her children. However, my mom also knows that not inviting this sister would have created a lot of drama and potentially would have caused sisters/cousins we do want at the wedding to back out. We had to make the choice to just invite everybody.

If you don't think your family would react like that and you are able to make a case by case basis without any drama or backlash, then I would totally do that!

I would just invite the ones you’re close to, that’s what I’m doing.

We faced this. My mom has 7 sibs, dad 3, FOG 9. Separately, my mom and his gave us the same advice . With 105 first cousins involved here, many kids, some grown and independent, some also married with kids of their own.
We could judge that since we were having a formal 7pm to 1 am wedding, ceremony 15 minutes, then walk in to cocktails and reception, it would be inappropriate to have younger children, and we could just have high schoolers and up, or 18 and up. But anyone in that age group would have to be invited with their parents. No picking one cousin's 16 year old, not another. But those who were 18 and finished high school, now fully independent adults, we could choose to invite only those we had formed adult friendships with, outside of just seeing them at parents houses or weddings and funerals. But anyone now adult, who did not have a relationship with us, we did not see each other, do things together, could be omitted. Since we were both 26, and luckily there was no 1st cousin age 13.5 to 15.5, we chose to invite all 15 and up. With their parents. And only grown up cousins we had bonds with, about 9. Plus SO. And 2 16 yr olds of theirs. So we invited only 21(plus their SO .) Plus some infants . Not inviting 84 first cousins under 15.5, or ones grown up whom we rarely saw since moving from parents homes. With SO counted, that saved over 140 first cousin guests we could not afford. I imagine it would be harder if B and G were age 19, and many cousins were close to the same age. Cannot say to a 20 year old, well you and I have been on our own for 6 years and never visited each other. Easy to be 26 and not invite 30 yr old cousins never visited for more than 3 or 6 years. 2nd cousins, we only invited adults near our own ages, who lived in our neighborhoods and went to school with us. A bunch, each of us. And those rarely seen, even though equally related, no.

My grandma has 2 sisters who each have 2 married children (who are like 50ish, my parents age). I invited 1 of aunts 2 sons (+wives) and their kids (who are my age; 1 is a teenager, 1 is married, and 1 has a live-in boyfriend I invited). I did NOT invite her other sisters 2 children (both are my parents age plus have a spouse) OR their kids (3 of which are under 10 years old, 1 is a teenager, and 1 is my age with a boyfriend I'd also need to invite if I was going to). That is NINE extra people I haven't said 1 word to OR SEEN in three years.