dd is not invited to DH brother's wedding

[argyll]

DH brother is getting married in Dorset in Sept and we live over 500 miles away in Argyll. Although being initially told it would be ok to take dd they have changed their minds and now said it would not be fair on all their friends with children (who all live locally) to make an exception for us. dd with be 18 months at time of wedding and as all dh family will be at wedding and my mother is not physically able to look after her we have no-one to leave her with (not sure i would be happy to leave her that distance away anyway). Our only solution as i can see it is for dh to go himself, as it would cause to many problems if he didn't. Do you think im being unreasonable to be upset over this.

Pobble, lucky you to have the option of grandparents doing babysitting.

I've been to a few child free weddings since DS came along. For one, I organised a pretty complicated childcare arrangement with friends as we'd be gone for so long, even though it was local. Then, gods be praised, my mum decided to come for a holiday at quite short notice (she lives a 24-hour flight away) and the dates coincided. Made the whole thing manageable when it would have been dreadful.

The other one was difficult. It was in Ayrshire, we live in London. Managed to leave DS (then 9 months) with the friends in Edinburgh we were staying with - we spent 2 days there pre-wedding but he was still pretty miserable. I was still BFing so was expressing in the loos and in agony. Had to drive back so no getting merrily drunk and had to leave relatively early. I am immensely fond if the bride but in retrospect I wish we had politely declined.

We had kids at our wedding, ranging from 5 weeks to 6. They were fab and a lovely part of the day. Many of the people I love, or who DH loves, would have had a tough time attending without their kids, and I wanted them to have as enjoyable a day as possible - that was a top priority for me. Some people had childcare available and were chuffed to bits to have a day without children, but others later thanked me for giving them options (including making our hotel rooms available for mothers of breastfed babies). For us, our wedding was about sharing our celebration with loved ones - and that meant making sure their day was as easy as possible so they could enjoy themselves however they saw fit.

Exactly Jassy. Surely hosting an event (especially when for friends and family) is all about making it as enjoyable as possible for them and showing some consideration. So planning the day so it doesn't start at an awkward time, no hanging around for hours for food or waiting for the photographer to take several billion photos.

Happy guests = happy day

I agree. For a start I am fortunate enough that OH's and my family had parents that would stamp on bad behaviour in children. Also, I would hate to have a room full of resentful guests who would want to be away at the first opportunity to get back to their children. Happy guests = happy wedding party.

We had a small wedding with just close family. We were the only ones with a kid and we didn't invite him . He was 18 months old and we left him at his childminders for the day . Our wedding was small and very unweddingy (no invites,photographer, cake etc) but after the registry office we went to a really posh restaurant where we had an 8 course tasting meal.

It actually didn't cross our minds to 'invite' our son. It was a fantastic day and I don't regret him not being there.

A cautionary tale about leaving your baby to go to a wedding. I minded Dbro's & Sil 2 Ds while they went to a wedding in Dec. Baby no. 3 due in August!!

abrahamlincolnsghost. A cautionary indeed.

Pobble, lucky you to have the option of grandparents doing babysitting

Yes, but both sets live 120 miles away in opposite directions. It takes a lot of planning and asking way in advance. It's not like they're round the corner.

True, abrahamlincolnsghost

::glances at DC2 and counts back to friend's wedding::

We had this op. Exactly the same. No one to take the kids, although I wouldn't have left the for the whole weekend anyway. I was happy for dh to go on his own but he didn't want to. Relative eventually changed their mind and let kids go to the wedding. Which was their choice. I wasn't fussed about going anyway. But they obviously decided they wanted dh there more.

Well, DH's parents live 4 hours away, never leave their county and would be nervous about babysitting. Mine live on the other side of the world. We live where we have jobs in our fields.

So, yes, I think it's luck to have your parents around and have them be willing to babysit. You may be in a position to have partly engineered this by having a life near your family - and jobs that enable that - but the fact they are alive and willing to babysit is, frankly, luck.

I've built my own network of people who help each other out because we're all in similar situations. Which is also lucky, to a certain extent. And there is no way I'd ask any of them to have my toddler overnight.

We were invited to a friends wedding with our 3dcs all were under 5 at the time. It was very posh, several lords and ladies.
I was worried about dcs making noise so sat at the back. I took a packet of digestives and a number of comics for them and they were awesome.
We warned dcs that there would be boring bits of the day(speeches etc) where they needed to be quiet and a gentle reminder of this at the time meant they were again really well behaved.
We did take them round the grounds to let of steam during photos etc.
I had so many compliments about their behaviour it was embarrassing.
We declined an invite to a child free family wedding at a zoo.

I prefer weddings without children, on the whole. It depends on the children and on the balance of adults/children. The weddings with children I've enjoyed have had a small number of well behaved children. I've also been to weddings where there's a horde of kids, most behaving, but some running riot as a big group tends to gee each other up, they dominate the dance floor so adults can't dance without the risk of toddler-trampling, kids fingers have been in all the food, and it's more like a kids party/family Christmas party than a wedding.

It was quite rude to un-invite your DD, but other than that I don't think they've done anything wrong.

YANBU to not go if you don't want to go without your DD- either your DH could go alone or you both politely decline the invite. As long as they accept your declining their invitation with good grace, I really don't see the problem or any reason to be very upset.

I don't get this "family children are different"- I don't think it necessarily does. Doesn't that depend really depend on how close you are as a family? If I was limiting children, I'd rather have the children of close friends, who I have a relationship with than my nephew who I see once in a blue moon (and don't get on at all with my DB and SIL).

And surely if the couple don't want children (even nieces or nephews) at their wedding, then that's up to them- no need to get excited? As long as they don't get annoyed if those guests who have children don't want to/can't come to their wedding as a result.

Contrary to the advice of some posters, I wouldn't be running to your MIL to try and get her to intervene- the guest list isn't anything to with her (unless she's paying for the whole thing) and dragging is likely to lead to further resentment on all sides. If my MIL tried to tell me who I had to invite to my wedding, I'd tell her I was sorry she didn't agree with our decision, but would politely suggest she mind her own business. If she threatened not to come to the wedding if we didn't invite someone, I'd be upset on my DPs behalf, but I don't think I'd let her dictate how we did things.

I think one of the reasons I don't have a problem with children at weddings is that none of the weddings I have been to have been spoiled by badly behaved children. so perhaps I am looking at it through rose tinted spectacles.

I still think it odd to ban children though

I find child free weddings odd. Also odd not to gave your own child at your own wedding - I bet they'll feel loved when you tell them when they're older.