Kid Free Reception

I’d add on the invitation or an insert that it is an adult only affair.

View Quoted Comment I agree with this. Id say something like 21 and older celebration or adult only celebration. Most people will say that the best way to do this is to just put only the people you want on the invitation with the amount of seats reserved for them. However not everyone will respect that way and add their kids anyways. So I'd still include in with the invitation that it's an adult only celebration.

Generally there are two ways to go about this; either (a) specifically invite the parents only (i.e. address your invitations to ‘Mr John Doe and Mrs Jane Doe’) or (b) include a note on the invitation (or in the invitation suite) that your wedding will be an adults only evening.

Adult only is typically mentioned by word of mouth and addressing the invite to adults' names only, not "and family'.

It will create confusion and offense among your guests to invite kids to the ceremony only. Then they have to leave to arrange childcare and others wondering why some kids are there and others have to make prior arrangements. It is considered rude to invite adults to the ceremony only and kids are no different..invite them to both or none.

We’re having a no children reception except for the 2 that are in the ceremony. When asked about our wedding, we’ve told our friends & family that it’s going to be a kid free zone. We also put on turn RSVP cards Adult Ceremony/ Reception Only. To make triple sure, it’s on our website.

I'm as well having no kids at mine besides the bridal party kids. I'm putting adult reception to follow on the invitations.

We had only children in the ceremony attend as well. When we originally added all children it was 40 😬 so we opted for just kids in the wedding (6 children). We addressed the invitation envelopes to the specific adult names (Mr. and Mrs. Smith) and on the RSVP card we said at the top “We have reserved 2 seats in your honor”. We had no problems whatsoever. A few friends told us they appreciated no kids, not only did it give them a break but also because with covid, it’s really hard for little ones to understand social distancing or not to want to run and play. ❤️

View Quoted Comment I love the "we have reserved x-amount of seats in your honor" idea! Might work for letting that cousin who's always dating a different person know that they're attending your wedding solo, too! 😉🙃
Thanks for the tidbit!

We added to our invitations that it was an adult only celebration!

Sadly there's always people that will try to bring extras by squeezing them in on the invite, or scribbling out your hand-written number and replacing it with their own. When that happens you just have to call and explain the situation to them. Even putting 'adults only' on your invite (which I don't really recommend) people won't read it or they'll somehow miss it.

When it inevitably happens you call and say 'hey, we got your rsvp back. Sorry for any confusion, but we only have blank seats reserved for you and you included more than that. Invite was just for you and SO, so we understand if you're unable to make it with those limitations'.

Our ceremony is kid-friendly, but the reception is not. Our venue offers childcare during that time, which we are paying for so that our reception can be kid-free. Even the kids in the ceremony will not be at the reception. We're still debating on exactly what to do on our invitations and response cards, but we'll likely add something there about "___ seats reserved" or "adult reception". Invitations will only be addressed to the parents as well. We also have this in our FAQ section on our website:

8. Are kids welcome?

We welcome your kids to attend our ceremony; we have arranged childcare onsite for our reception. To give all our guests the opportunity to celebrate without having to worry about little eyes and ears, we politely request no children at the reception. We hope you see this as an opportunity to let your hair down and celebrate with us!

While no one will ever say anything to the couple, you will have people offended who talk among themselves wondering why some kids are welcome while most are not. Be consistent with everyone.

Address the envelopes to adults only and they will get the picture. Most guests are pretty intelligent.

For those who are inviting kids, most kids love to dance and they usually don't get in the way of adults. They don't get to dance when they're whisked away to childcare somewhere.

Address the envelopes to mr and Mrs. didn’t add and family. Even sent out in emails that I’m limited on guests and with the pandemic i used the fact didn’t want kids to be forced to have a mask on for hours. My party is in April and I don’t know if people will even come.

I would first suggest inviting more people without kids than because they might not come. My parents were people who always brought their kids with them and if their kids couldn't go, they wouldn't go. As for invitations, put the Mr. and Mrs. and say it's 18/21 and older.

Be aware people will be offended if you make exceptions for kids in the wedding party. They will not tell you. Be consistent and have no kids acorss the board.

I would just address the invitations to the exact names of those invited (i.e. John and Jane Smith and not the Smith Family). While kids are usually an all or nothing rule, the kids who are actually in the wedding party are usually an exception to the rule.

Im doing the same.. On my invitations I'm putting Adult Reception.

View Quoted Comment My parents were the opposite, my parents always left us home. I wanted to go so badly! I was so insanely jealous of the kids who got to go to weddings because I didn't get to go to one until I was in high school.

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I was invited to everything because I was so super shy and literally afraid to misbehave. So I attended lots of weddings as a guestbook attendant and had a great time. My parents were the opposite. If I wasn't invited then they refused to attend and got grief from everyone but that didn't make a difference.

Just address the envelopes to those invited by name. Most people understand that kids in the wedding party are the exception to the no-kids rule