Our baby has been NFI to all our weddings this summer! How would you address?

[hellojude]

This is a tricky one...advice please.

We have been invited to a number of weddings this summer, however all of them have said no children. When I've check this inc babies. I've asked if we can bring our DD. Must couples have said sorry no, but if it's a problem let us know... Another has said a flat no
I fully understand no children at wedding as you have to feed them etc etc no babies....Yes it's their wedding but..WTF to me this seems unreasonable? Is it?

Our DD hasn't even had her 2 round of jabs yet. And whist I don't wish to miss any of our dear friends weddings, I don't want to leave her for 12 + hours. We don't have any family near-by and any friends who i could leave her (ie. godmother) with will be at the wedding too! And I'm not getting a sitter to look after a baby all day.

DH has said we can split the wedding, I'll go to my friends and he'll look after her and vice versa.

1. We are married and I don't want to go to a wedding without my husband.
2. We have a newborn baby and I don't want to leave her.
3. Everyone loves babies and IMO surely would bring great joy at a wedding

I really don't make to be 'that' person who makes the brides life a pain as planning a wedding is tough. I know I've done it. But should I make a stand and say, I'm sorry but I can't come without my baby??

Dam and blast it's tough, what would you all done / say?

TIA

p.s) none of these couples have children...I'm sure in a few years they will 'get it' so to speak.

I had exactly the oppoosite problem. Husband's friend got married and insisted we ALL came, 2 and 4 yr old as well. I would have been delighted to stay at home with them but spent the money and dragged our arses there because it was important to them.

Another friend of mine invited me and 4 month old only, having gone through her guest list and invited only babes in arms, not older children...seemed a sensible rule to me or they'd have had 35 kids at their wedding.

i only put +guest cause it was the done thing and i didn't want to upset anyone. i wanted my friend/relative there and they wanted to be with their partner. if they had kids i would expect them to want to bring their kids too. if parents are happy or prefer to leave their kids at home for the day then that's their choice and nothing to do with me. the friend who is getting married this week was dictating my child care options for the day as it's a baby/child free wedding. a guest comes with their partner as much as they come with their kids in my eyes.

i can see the point about venues only allowing a certain number of seats in a room - and a toddler would count in that sense, but if you have to invite random partners who have only been on the scene for a few weeks/months then i don't see how you can't invite babies/children who are part of an established relationship.

i took my (then) 2 1/2yr old and 13month old to a wedding last year and they were perfectly behaved all day. small children and weddings are not a recipe for disaster.

It's the happy couples special day. they are committing to each other and that may be a solemn moment. take the option that your husband has offered, get a new outfit and wish them all the best.

I hate weddings and welcome any excuse not to go. :o

As I said upthread, their choice. But I totally agree with those who have said that it's a pity that weddings have 'evolved' if you can call it that, from a happy family occasion and gathering to a friend-orientated piss up.

TBH OP, if the invitation says no children then that's a bloody good indication of what the event will be like and all the reason in the world to avoid it like the plague.

It is up to them at the end of the day.

However, since I am a stroppy mare (sometimes), I have declined a couple of wedding invites, that I had intended to get childcare for, as they were child free weddings, upon being told that the bride and groom want me to " relax and have some fun" and "grown up time" I get unreasonably apoplectic with rage and being told that I need to have child free fun..all said with a great air of charity too!

It wouldn't have occurred to me to exclude children from my wedding - a long time ago! But tbh I can understand it. I have been to a wedding for example, where a baby screamed all through the service - and no the parents didn't take the baby outside.

I think if kids/babies are supervised properly by parents and taken outside if they are screaming, it is fine having them at weddings. But you only need 1 parent not to do this to ruin things.

I don't think it's necessarily a choice between "a happy family occasion and gathering" and a "friend-orientated piss up".

Most weddings I have been to have included children who are part of the immediate family of the bride and groom (when there are any) but not the children of unrelated guests. I don't see anything wrong with that. You have to draw the line somewhere.

Babies and young children may not take up much room in themselves, but they tend to involve a lot of clutter, which does.

Gwen the evolution has probably come about as couples are more often paying for their own weddings rather than their parents, so invite their friends before they invite ancient Great Aunt Beryl etc.

I wouldn't go

Last year I missed 2 of my good friends weddings because it was no babies. Wasn't the end of the world but it was a bit annoying.

This year I haven't been invited to any. Word must have spread

I think that some parents have become so self-absorbed in their DCs lives and doings that other people just don't register. Everything has to be arranged around the entire nuclear family and anybody that doesn't take account of the DCs is a 'wrong un'.

With moving away for jobs and house prices, many families are now not part of a community so the 'community and friends weddings' as referred to, don't really exist in every case.

It was different, back then... new set of rules now - the nuclear family has made their bed.

It will all be so much easier when Gretna Green franchises, and weddings without guests become the 'norm'.

I don't see what the issue is here. The couple have been invited to an adult only event. The fact that it is a wedding is irrelevent. I would view it like an invitation to go to a nightclub or to see an 18 cert film. You go alone, or together, or you decline.
Your ideas about whether or not weddings should or should not include children are irrelevent. They aren't invited.

Agrees with CarrotsandCelery... I think that's a fundamental reason why the 'family weddings' are disappearing.

CarrotsandCelery... you posted just before CucumberMuncher; almost a salad.

I'd like to sit next to one of Valhalla's dogs at a wedding as well! Sounds much more fun than the average wedding. I mean, seriously, you've been to one, you've been to them all.

Personally, for all this talk about people thinking their babies are so important etc etc, I actually find it more annoying just how important people think their blooming weddings are. And the grotesque amount of money that gets spent on these events that really no-one else particularly wants to go to anyway. Brides and grooms always seem to think they are the only people, ever, to have ever ever ever had a wedding. In the history of the universe.

Gah!

What Potplant said. You can't take kids or babies to lots of places, there is no automatic right to take them, you do have the right not to go.

And no, not everyone loves babies. If they did, there would not be such a thing as a baby free wedding.

I also think that some parents, having become so aborbed with their DCs, find it a challenge to focus on or talk about other subjects. I've seen this with some of my friends who seem to have forgotten that there was life before the DCs and that other people don't find the minutiae as entertaining as they invariably do. Perhaps when the prospective bride/groom tells you that they want you to be able to let your hair down, this is where the comment is born.

For those on the the thread who feel that DCs should go everywhere and anywhere, why not just decline all non-children events as a matter of course if it bothers? I don't really understand the issue nor the angst.

To be honest I suspect they invite you expecting you to turn the invite down due to your baby. It is their day and some of my nicest friends have had no kids weddings-I totally get it and weddings are so expensive today that you can see why people do not want kids.

They will not be expecting you to go but will not want to leave you out at the invite stage.

You could always think yourself lucky you have the perfect excuse to avoid a wedding

Well behaved dogs in preference to unruly kids at a wedding. I'd be up for it but I can just see the Daily Fail headlines on the-end-of-family-values as we know it :)

i agree you are trying to blackmail them i had a lot of this shit when i had my wedding if the kids cant come i am not

i paid for my own wedding and adding two children in with every couple would of cost me double they don't eat the dinners then the parents want some special thing like nuggets or something then they moan about high chairs and such

my mate spent the best part of 3k on her wedding video and you can only hear her niece screaming then her sister went out with the baby and wasn't in any of the photos. also as soon as the food was over about half the people left their excuse was kids had to get to bed gurrrrrr

not every one loves kid and even if you do you may not want them at your wedding

and i am not sure why you cant go with out your oh that sounds a bit childish

i paid lots of money for my wedding and i didn't want a load of toddlers running round whatever people say they don't tend to supervise their kids at weddings as their to busty having a drink and a chat.

didn't really want to spend and extra £60 per head for each person to bring their child and as it was my wedding it was my right

don't make a issue if you cant possibly leave your oh or baby for one night DONT GO

Don't go, don't send them a card and defiantly don't buy them a gift.

Then offer no help, no support and no hand me downs when they have children of their own.

Child free weddings are stuffy, overpriced and boring affairs anyway.