to think that if you're having a child-free wedding you should tell people ASAP?

[b00kw0rm]

As title really- we've got good friends getting married in less than 3 months time, still haven't received an invite, but have now heard that "children cannot be accommodated" at the wedding.

We have 2 young DCs, all close family members going to the wedding too, so arranging childcare is not going to be easy. We've also had lots of chats with the happy couple over the past year about the wedding and they never mentioned anything about children....

So, AIBU to think that perhaps it would have been considerate to have mentioned it sooner?

It's no stranger than excluding children from a 40th birthday party IMO. If you want to have a birthday party during the day at a venue suitable for children and invite all the children in your life (and those in your friends' lives too) then you absolutely can. If you want to have an adults-only posh dinner at a restaurant and exclude the children, then that's fine too IMO.

I think the point is that it's for the couple to decide. I do agree with what you say though about the fact that other people are affected - I think it is so important to make the day nice for the guests, as seeing your friends and family enjoying themselves was what made our wedding day so lovely. I didn't want anyone to be put off coming to our wedding because their children couldn't come, although it was lucky for us that there weren't a huge number of children involved anyway so it made no difference to our logistics/budget. I can see it would be more problematic for people who have a large number of children in their circle.

Acceptable to just say in the invitation IMO.

Acceptable to make it childfree before/in the invite, what's not on is what my BIL and now SIL did, invite DCs, put them on the invites, decide a few weeks before the wedding to change their minds and uninvite the DCs the bridezilla felt would "ruin the day". Only those ones, others were allowed. DS was considered too young to behave. She uninivted the DCs of one of her brothers, but not the other - bitter? Me? Never!

we had a childfree wedding. We had a very small, simple wedding, total of 40 people. Civil ceremony and then sit down meal, no evening do. Numbers were limited due to the venue (insurance and space), but it was where we wanted to get married. We only wanted close family and friends. If children had been invited, we would have had to reduce the number of friends we invited. We also felt that with no evening do, space to run around etc this would not have been the most exciting event for children.

Our plan was to have a small intimate wedding where we would be able to talk to all our guests. We did not have a top table and just moved round the tables chatting to everyone. A number of our friends who we invited had children, 2 of them had babies. As soon as we chose the venue and numbers ie very early in the process and well before we sent out the invitations, we spoke individually to them to advise them that we could not invite children. I would have fully understood if some friends declined, especially those with babies, but bless them they all came. I suppose it helped that without an evening do and it being local, childcare might not have been too much of an issue.

If we had gone for a big wedding, evening do etc then we would have invited children, but that was not the sort of wedding we wanted. I hope that does not make me a bridezilla

Backforgood

"Whenever we've been to a wedding or something where we've wanted to stay overnight, we've split the dcs between various people who just supervise / tuck them up with their own dc, and it's no big deal"

I assume you're talking about children aged at least 4 or 5 here? Personally I find it hard to imagine leaving a baby or toddler with a friend for 24 hours and describing it as no big deal. In fact I'm due to have my friend's 3yo and 6yo DCs for the best part of a weekend this summer, and I'm not describing it like that!

Annakin31, I think that was a slightly risky strategy! Some friends of mine put a similar sentence on their invitations and one couple said 'well actually it is difficult for us to leave our DD, can we bring her?'. This caused mumblings among other guests ('how come they are allowed to bring a child and we aren't' etc) - it genuinely turned into a big issue for the couple! Safer I think just to exclude children completely!

"If getting married is just about the couple or simply a legal commitment, then why have a wedding at all? You can get married down the registry office with a couple of witnesses - no one would expect kids to be included in that. "

Sorry but this attitude of 'if you don't do it the way I think it should be done, you might as well not bother at all/just go to the registry office with a couple of witnesses of the street' is quite annoying - especially as we are dealing with similar in real life at the moment!

For us, yes getting married is primarily about us making a legal committment to each other, but it's also a happy occasion and we would love to have our closest and oldest friends there to witness our vows and celebrate with a nice meal and some drinks afterwards! We've also invited parents and siblings as a courtesy in case they would like to be involved (which most of them would as it turns out) but I can't imagine why on earth I'd want to invite someone's kids.

Like Annakin31 we didn't actually say 'no children', we simply didn't invite them, and if anyone asked we explained that the venue is not very child-friendly, numbers are limited and the occasion probably wouldn't be very entertaining for a child. Most people got the message and were fine with getting a babysitter for the afternoon - only problem is future-MIL who objects to her grandchildren being 'excluded' and is pushing BIL/SIL to make use of this 'loophole' and bring them anyway. So with hindsight I probably would just have said straight-out 'no children' - the reason we didn't was in case anyone genuinely couldn't sort out babysitting, it would have been a shame if good friends were unable to come for that reason. But there's always someone who takes advantage....

(witnesses off the street, not of the street...that sounds a bit wrong...)

3 months sounds like a LOT of time, YABU.

It may seem like a no brainer to you Annakin31, but that's not how people actually reacted in the case I'm referring to!

Yes I guess that's true!

MrsPepperPotty - well, yes, when they are 5 they are easier than when they are babies or toddlers, but, equally, no, we've left ours as babies and toddlers on occasion too. We've also looked after other people's LOs as babies and toddlers. That is harder work, but it's what you do to help other people out. It's how the world goes round IMO.

I don't agree with babies being left with anyone who'll have them for all day & overnight just to attend a wedding, it may well be hard work but what about the poor baby wanting its mum or dad! It may be how your world goes round but certainly not mine!

They are also breastfed and I never got the hang of expressing milk -so leaving a baby wasn't even possible with my nearest and dearest-never mind 'anyone'!

Up until planning my own wedding in 2006 and going on a certain wedding planning forum I had never heard of childless weddings. I always went with my mum to weddings as a kid and never knew anyone leave out their guests' families. It's a bit odd IMO. But each to their own as long as they realise that it may mean people can't / won't come.

I've looked after toddlers from 2 years up (no kids of own) so parents could attend a wedding or go away for a weekend (40th birthday celebrations & the like). They weren't being left with just 'anyone' but with a trusted family friend; an honorary auntie & we had fun!

surely when you have children you realise that some of the things that you did pre-children will either be more difficult/impossible with children.

A couple of years before we had ds we were invited to a wedding in Australia, the bride was Australian, not being a complete bridezilla We went and treated it as a trip of a lifetime and spent 3 weeks visiting various parts of Australia. A few months after we had ds we were invited to a wedding in South America (we have very cosmopolitan friends!). We didn't go.

Even for weddings in this country if we were invited to one that involved a number of hours travelling with ds we would have to seriously consider whether we would all go, or just DH or myself, especially if the wedding was taking place on a weekend in term time. If it was for a close relative then yes we might all go (if children invited), but if for a friend, even if very close, then one of us would probably stay at home with ds or get a babysitter. Weddings are not always that exciting for children.

I always went with my mum to weddings as a kid and never knew anyone leave out their guests' families.

What a bizzare attitude. I dont KNOW many of my friends children or work colleagues kids, why on earth would I extend an invite to them because they're faaahhhhmileee of someone I know? In that case why dont we invite people's mothers/father/uncles etc? Its a wicked thing to realise but your kids dont mean the world to EVERYONE!!

Fourlots - and that's absolutely your choice. An invitation - be it to a wedding or a Golden Wedding anniversary or a birthday or anything else - is just that. People are absolutely free to choose to turn down something they get invited to, but it's the weekly threads you get on here where people are complaining about being invited to things, because the host hasn't given them the invitation that would suit them, that is so unbelievable.

It was always just assumed that dependent children came with their parents. Adult children and other relatives obviously don't require babysitting so it's not quite the same. It doesn't seem bizarre to me but as I said it was normal. No one we knew invited half a couple or parents only to weddings. It never occured to me to not invite our guests along with partners and children and I was surprised to hear that others do. However, it is the hosts choice who to invite, agreed. But they must realise it can mean that guests are sometimes unable to accept because of their choice and they should not then lay on the guilt about it. There were many stories of this sort of thing on the wedding planning site.

I used to think that too, DrC. It's only reading MN that me realise how many child-free weddings there are. My aunt had one 19 years ago & we all thought it was very peculiar.

But It was fun for being child-free, was a very evangelist Southern USA wedding & we spent the evening telling rude jokes, mostly about every religion we could think of.

YABU. They haven't sent the invitations out yet . Surely it's this, the invitation, that informs invitees of all the relevant details? And you are being a bit presumptuous anyway with your "Oh, dc will love that" comments before any of you have received your invite. Hope you get one!