Uninvited Drama

Welcome to WW! I think your best bet is to simply not invite your cousin and her son

I say invite them but make it clear there are no plus ones.

View Quoted Comment Thank you for responding! Do you think it would be reasonable to give them a warning not to bring whomever?

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I think it's reasonable! Explain the invite is only for her and her son, and you don't have room for any extra

View Quoted Comment Thank you for your input! If they do show up with someone uninvited, what do I do?

View Quoted Comment Whew!!! I needed to hear that! Thank you!

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No problem at all! I'm glad I could help a little. Hope everything turns out fine!

View Quoted Comment I would just let them know there are no extra place settings and their guest needs to leave with or without them. Hopefully if you let them know there is no room for extras, they will listen. Hopefully being the key word! Lol

I think definitely just addressing the invite to your cousin and her son is the first step. If you don’t think they will get the point that they can not have a plus one maybe just specify that to them prior to the wedding. You could simply say it’s due to limited space or costs.. etc if you feel like that would make it easier. And I don’t think it’s wrong to not allow an uninvited guest in to your reception.

Let them know ahead of time. If they show up with extra people after you’ve warned them, you don’t have to feel bad about having them turned away.
By the way: you don’t have to turn them away yourself. Have someone at the door checking names. Let them deal with it. It’s your wedding day!

Tell them it's invite only and you're only inviting them. Anyone gets turned away

As everyone else has said previous to my comment, make it clear and have uninvited guests removed by venue staff or whomever you have assigned to handle it. My FH and I just had a convo about different scenarios and agreed that any uninvited guests, most especially those we do not know, will be removed. I say it that way because for us someone could possibly RSVP a yes for themself and their husband and end up coming with their adult son if the husband doesn't come or becomes sick etc. For us, it's about knowing everyone there and not so much the number of people.

Wouldn't it be a lot easier not to invite them?

Thank you to everyone who has responded so far! Yes, technically I could just not invite my cousin and or her son....That is a potential family dilemma I would have to pray about..

Most likely they won't care about your wishes. If you can't see yourself getting married without them there then invite them if not, don't invite them at all!!!

Bottom line is there's no RULE that tells you have to invite all family members to your wedding. If they're drama and won't bring good to your day then don't feel obligated to have them presence at your wedding!!

View Quoted Comment Make it clear that the invitation is only intended for them, no additional guests.

And then I’d put the venue in charge of asking people to leave if there isn’t a place card for them. Let the venue be the bad guy instead of you, they’re used to doing that!

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You make sure that your DOC, or whoever is helping you from the venue knows about this situation ahead of time. That way, if they show up with "extras" they can be told that the invitation is only for them, and their guests will not be allowed to stay.

This, of course, should be made clear to your cousin before the wedding, so that hopefully there will be no issue on the day of.