Large Families and Wedding Parties

Carrie0930

If you have a large family, how did you or are you involving them in your big day?

I have 2 sisters and a brother and they are all married (although one of my sisters is separated) and each has 2 kids (4 boys and 2 girls).

My sisters will probably be BMs and maybe my SIL as well.  And my brother will be in the WP too.  I am wondering how to involve my nephews and nieces, if at all?  They will be ages 19, 16, 14, 11, 5 and 3 at the time of the wedding.  The girls are the two youngest.  The older girl is my goddaughter, so I was thinking of having her as a FG and leaving it at that, but the oldest and I grew up together (I was 7 when he was born) and the middle two boys spend pretty much every weekend with me, but I'm not sure I want to have the WP with a gazillion people in it.

mbcdefg

If it were me, I'd keep it simple and not include any kids in the wedding party at all. Just to keep it fair.

jagore08

Not everyone in your family needs to be a part of the wedding.  Remember that having an entire family in your wedding is going to be a big cost for them, as well as yourself.  If you only want your goddaughter as you FG then that's fine.  Also remember that your brother can stand on your side if your FI already has his own people picked out.

CA2MT4EveR

Most people are much closer to a friend or two than to a sibling.  If you are truly close with them- as in you can call them at 3am for anything, then go for it.  As for the kids, I say skip them all unless you feel the need to have a FG, then have the youngest one.

The teens are too young to involve as WP members.  Just allow them to enjoy their time as guests.

trix1223

I wouldn't worry about the nieces and nephews, to be honest.  I'd just keep the WP to adults, and be sure to have some nice family photos taken after the ceremony or at the reception.

aerinpegadrak

We had all of our siblings in the WP, but that was a grand total of 5.  We did a kid-free wedding, so the only niece or nephew in attendance was my sister's five-month-old, who she didn't want to travel without.

Whippet8

To give you an idea of what we did with out huge family...

I have one brother, and DH has 8 siblings.

We had all three of his brothers and my brother as GM, and two of his 5 sisters as BMs. We also had two of our nieces as our flower girls. I'm really close to those two sisters, so thats why I wanted them to be bridesmaids. I also took the lead from the best man's wife (now SIL) because she only had one of their sisters as a BM. From what I understand, there were no hard feelings. As for the kids, some of the nieces and nephews have already been in other weddings, and I know for a fact that others will be in future weddings. DH used to live with his brother while our nieces were babies, so thats why we chose them as flower girls.

we had a HUGE picture taken after the ceremony with the whole family.

Beachy730

H has a small family, and I have a huge extended family.  H has 2 brothers and a half sister, and I have one.  He as 2 cousins that are 18 & 20.  I have 15 first cousins from my mom's 7 siblings, and they range in age from 2-28.  I am very close with my family so we wanted them a part of it as much as we could.  With a Catholic ceremony we had a few extra parts for people.  H's 2 brothers were GM.  My brother did a reading and walked my mom in.  Our other 2 readings were by his 18 y/o cousin and my 28 y/o cousin. 

There is only 1 girl young enough to be FG so that was an easy choice of my 5 y/o cousin, and my 3 y/o cousin is my Godson so that made it easy also.  2 more of my boy cousins who are 15 and 16 had been altar boys for  years, so we had them as our altar boys.  I have twin girl cousins who are 11, and they along with H's half sister passed out programs to people as they entered the church.  The gifts during the mass were carried up by my Godmother and H's Godfather.  We loved having as many people as we did as part of our wedding.  At the church we also took one giant group shot with H and I and all my aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents and great grandma, which was so meaningful to my family. 

It is alot to figure out how to involve them, but you can be creative.  Having family be a part of it was important to us, and we received so many compliments on our ceremony for that reason.  We still had a lot of people that weren't personally involved in it, but we had at least 1 person from each individual family. 

MrsG2B83

My FI has a HUGE family. He kinda went of blabbing at the mouth and we ended up with 7 BM and 7 GM with 2 Jr.BM, 1 RB, 1FG, and a coin bearer (we're using the Mexican tradition of using arras). I have a brother, a sister, a cousin and a best friend that I wanted to include... that's all.

 I WISH HE DIDN'T. I'm all about "the more, the merrier" but the logistical issues will be plenty.

But now that he has, I'm using ALL of them to help me with behind-the scenes stuff. Everyone will be coming in for favor-making parties, they're helping with the set list for the DJ, etc, etc.....

Since we're doing a Catholic ceremony with TONS of traditions so family members who are not in the WP will be lighting unity candles, doing readings, and blah blah...

lenergyrlah

To Carrie, If you really want to include them all, you could have two flower girls.  Have them walk up together (that way they won't be as nervous anyway).  Then have one of the guys man the guest book, one of them hand out programs, and two of them be ushers. 

You could also include some of them and not others; however if you're equally close to the girls I would make them both FGs (I wouldn't think guys would get as jealous about not being an usher).  My FI has 3 young female cousins age 4, 6, and 8 that I am equally close to, and I would never dream of picking a favorite so I'm having 3 FGs; 2 walik together and the 3rd walk with the ring boy.

I also have a big family situation though;; between my sibs, FI's sibs, and FI's cousins (who I'm also close to) I have 3 little girls, 1 little boy, 4 teenage girls, 2 teenage boys, 3 adult women and 1 adult man.  I've decided to leave out the toddlers.  I was thinking of making 2 sisters BMs, 2 sisters and FI's female cousin do guest book and programs, and have the teen boys and my almost 10-year-old step-nephew be ushers.  I would have 3 FGs and 1 RB.  I'm wondering if it is rude to leave out my older brother while including my 8-year-old step-nephew; and what about leaving out my two oldest sisters while including all of FI's cousins?  My oldest sister would probably be my wedding coordinator but the other one wouldn't be included at all.

BTW my family doesn't like my FI and both my older sisters didn't invite him to their weddings (even though I was in both of theirs); the first one didn't acknowledge our relationship and the second said he couldn't come because she didn't want there to be a problem (??) presumably with my parents perhaps?  I didn't want to ask them to be BMs when they obviously don't approve of FI's and my relationship and also we're not extremely close so I don't want to make them BMs and have to leave out some of my friends.  Also my older brother is a convicted sex offender and generally a creepy person which is why I don't want to include him but i'm worried about it seeming that I don't like my 3 oldest sibs (I've tried to come off as nice even though we're not close and even try to be civil to my brother who basically stalks me).  I'm nice to them in person but it would be obvious to them that they're left out.