My fiance and I will be getting married on July 2 of this year. We've been engaged for over a year and have been quite vocal with our immediate family that it is our intent to exclude small children from our wedding. It actually worked out quite well in that the smallest/youngest of the kids in the family were all my fiance's cousins' kids. Basically, first cousins are invited, their kids are not.
As time as passed and we're getting closer to our big day, a number of these first cousins with small children have been planning a great deal around our wedding, including making a vacation out of it and staying the week up where we live (Rhode Island is beautiful in the summer).
As I realized this was starting to become a real issue, I got in touch with one of the cousins and explained that knowing she is looking to plan more than just the trip up for the wedding it was important that everyone was on the same page, and that Gary and I would be having an adults only wedding. I received an email back about 2 weeks later from this cousin which basically said "I regret to inform you that we will not be attending your wedding"....we haven't even sent the invites yet!
Yesterday in speaking with my future mother in law, she told me that the whole side of the family is upset with us over this. Since when is it anyone's place to judge the decisions surrounding someone ELSE's wedding day?! To me this detail is no different than the color of my dress or types of flowers we'd like to use (okay, I realize it's a bit more involved than that, but from our perspective it was just another decision).
Basically, I'm curious to see if anyone else has dealt with this issue, and is there a good way to smooth things over?