My mom and I have been going back and forth on this and can’t seem to come to an agreement. Any advice you ladies can provide would be much appreciated.
I have a half sister (my dad’s daughter from a previous marriage) who has an eight year old son, she is a single mom. My sister and I are not very close, she is much older than me, didn’t live in the same house as me while growing up, lived out of state most of my life, we rarely talk or see each other etc. She is also not very close with my parents, they talk every several weeks over the phone and that’s really it.
My FI and I decided we do not want to have children at our wedding. There are at least eight kids under the age of ten on his side of the family (all cousins) and at least six on my side (again, mostly cousins except for my sister’s son).
My mom and dad think that my sister’s son needs to be invited to the wedding; additionally they think it would be nice to have him as the RB. Their rationale is that it’s different with him because he is my nephew vs. a cousin, that she would be offended and hurt if he was not invited, and that because it’s just the two of them, that they come as a set, and because she’ll have to travel for the wedding, it could be challenging for her logistically if he’s not invited.
I’m struggling with this because I don’t want it to seem unfair to all the parents who weren’t allowed to bring their kids. I’m not sure if having only one child, who’s my nephew, makes it ok and guests will understand, or if singling out one makes it even ruder.
My FI and I have considered hiring babysitters to take care of the kids during the wedding (we’re not yet sure if there’s room in the budget for this), so as to ease the no kids rule from being a deterrent. If we do this, I thought perhaps a good compromise for my nephew would be to have him as the RB at the ceremony, but then take him to the babysitters with all the other kids for the rest of the night. I’m not sure if this would be a breach of etiquette though; must you invite FGs and RBs to the reception?
Would love to hear what you all think, if you agree with my mom & dad, if you understand my concerns, etc. Thanks!!