Earn cash as you plan. Get a $20 gift card for every 200 points. Learn more
Wedding Etiquette Forum
TommyandTina2013
member
Oh Lord, Kids? No Kids? Only our Kids? Just my Aunts kids... Jimmany. Help Please!
Okay, so my FI has a HUGE family and everyone has kids 2-4 usually. My FI and I are struggling because we want our nieces and nephews there and even a few second cousins but we really can not afford to invite everyone's children as well as the adults. I personally have already had a cousin refuse to attend if she could not bring her tween son. How do I convey, politely that certain families can bring their kids and others can not. This is really difficult. Any advice is appreciated.
Tommy & Tina
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Oh Lord, Kids? No Kids? Only our Kids? Just my Aunts kids... Jimmany. Help Please!
Don't put anything like "no kids" on the invitation. It's impolite to point out who isn't invited to something.
Also, you can invite some kids and not others (though it may hurt feelings). Most people here digest to invite in circles. Only nieces an nephews for instance.
1. You and your FI need to sit down and figure out exactly how many guests you can afford to host and how many your venue will fit.
2. Write down the names of all of the adults you will be inviting and assume 100% attendance of those adults
3. How many spots are left?
4. Start with nieces and nephews, then add more kids if you have room in circles. (i.e. second cousins, children of friends) Inviting children in circles is not required, but it's a good place to start if you don't want hurt feelings.
5. Address your invitations to whom is invited
Mr and Mrs Bob Smith
Katie and Billy Smith
123 Main Street
Anytown, USA
6. Your guests will need to get over the fact that you cannot accomodate their special snowflakes. Yes, some people will choose not to attend as a result. Don't let them guilt you into inviting their kids if you can't afford it.
You do NOT have to invite all or none. You don't even have to do circles. "We are only inviting children we are close to" is a 100% legitimate cut off. That doesn't mean there won't be hurt feelings; there may be. But frankly some people are going to be butt-hurt if there's no kids at all, anyway. Invite who you want to invite. If someone's feelings will be hurt and you care that their feelings are hurt consider including their children as well. Give extra consideration to OOT kids, as its very likely more OOT people will have to decline if their kids aren't invited.
Now for my cautionary tale: if they *could not* come without the kids, would that be okay by you? We invited family and OOT kids only. That was, like, 40 children on our 370 person guest list. A close family friend declined the invitation b/c his infant was colicky and none of their babysitters could stand him (though he was fine with mom and g-ma, but g-ma was out of town that weekend). They had to decline my invitation and he still came to the church only to see kids all over the place. I so wish I had included his children or that he'd told me why they needed to decline so I could have extended the invitation.
We're doing no kids at all.
I agree that splitting families is a bad idea. My cousin invited me, my FI, and my DD, but not FI's DD - her reasoning was that FI's DD was not technically family yet... By that reasoning, neither was FI, but he was invited... She was 12 at the time, there were other kids there (younger and older), and she lives with us full-time, so to me it was very rude to not include her...
Take care,
Kim
By not splitting up the family unit she meant inviting little John but not little Suzy. It's totally okay to just invite the parents b/c then you're not inviting the "family unit" you're just inviting the couple
She has "siblings who are minors," while you have "parents and siblings who are minors."
Liatris has it right: Parents can be invited without their children, but minor siblings should be invited together, especially if they are close in age.
This is different than breaking up a couple or social unit. That's why we say to invite all SOs. I also agree that I would not invite one child in a family but not the other child in the family if they were minors. I think if they are adults, you can invite one without the other, even if their parents are also invited.
Not every event is an event for kids. Not saying weddings are NOT, but many people want them to be adult-only affairs and this is perfectly fine. Just like if you were going to a work holiday party, you are invited to bring your SO but very rarely, if ever, do they invite your kids. Kids don't have to go everywhere their parents go. But it would be rude to hold a social event like a wedding and then not invite someone's husband.
All or None just doesn't make sense to me. People might be hurt that their kids aren't invited... but I don't think that's really the hosts' problem. Children are not entitled to go everywhere their parents go.
And if you have a friend or a second cousin who is bent out of shape because their kids aren't at a wedding but the bride and groom's nieces and nephews are? That parent has a serious entitlement issue.
Or if there are kids (maybe not even relatives) that the bride and groom see all the time and are close to and they get invited, but maybe I have a kid they've never met? Who am I to ever assume that my kid, who the couple doesn't know, should be invited to their wedding? It's the same deal if say I were former colleague of the bride and haven't seen her in a year but maybe still chat with her on facebook, and then my getting upset if she invites her best friend to the wedding but not me.
Not every relationship the bride and groom have with people is created equal and I think it's silly to punish them by saying they can't have their niblings at their wedding unless they want to incur the cost and possible trouble of allowing tons and tons of kids (which might then result in their having to cut adult guests they have relationships with).
Always invite social units together (aka SOs). If you choose to extend the invite beyond the social unit to an entire family unit, don't split the family unit. Those are the only etiquette rules. The hosts of the wedding have full say over which units they're going to invite. And while it's important to be aware of possible sensitivities and the possibility of drama, and maybe it's in everyone's best interest (including the hosts') to stick to circles, I begrudge no one who doesn't.