No children at destination wedding

[RubyRed6878]

Apologies if this should be moved to Wedding thread but think it's more suited to AIBU...

Wedding is being planned in Mexico, about 100 guests will receive invites. Before people jump on and say we're being selfish, in invites are exactly that, invites not expectations at all. We'll also be having a UK celebration so will emphasise that it would be amazing for as many friends and family to be there as possible but we totally understand if people can't / don't want to make it.

The issue: DP and I are 100% sure we do not want children at the ceremony. We've been to too many weddings / events where screaming/chattering babies / toddlers have disrupted and we are too scared to take the risk for our own day. Children are more than welcome at the reception.
The issue is DPs brother, we are 99% sure they'll come to Mexico (invites not sent yet) but I'm very nervous about saying "no children at the ceremony" considering they'll have travelled all that way. DP is determined to stay firm and insist on no kids.
WWYD? Is it totally U to ask them to put their child in the kids club for an hour or so during the ceremony? I'm nervous of backing down and then having a 2 year old screaming over our vows and wishing we'd stuck to our guns, but equally am aware of what a big ask it is to leave a young child in a hotel kids club

The whole thing just sounds so silly. Go and elope abroad. Come back and have a party in the UK. It's one thing having it in Spain, 2 hours away, but 7 or 8 hours time difference away and inviting 100 guests? Get read.

'If the two year old is welcome at the reception then it's one hour or so of being with a nanny. Only the most precious are going to have an issue with this.'

Seriously? I've been to Mexico many times as my dad's family is from there. I wouldn't leave my kids with the hotel nanny that I didn't know at that age. But then, I wouldn't go to this type of silly wedding at all, either. So yeah, expect your 'D'P's brother to fall out with him because the pair of you are quite silly.

I don't understand your plans at all. How can you send invitations without a venue? How can. You book a venue with no idea how many people are coming? I'd be amazed if more than a third of the people you invite come to Mexico. Have you done a preliminary assessment of how many of your potential guests would really come?

It doesn't sound like you thought this through, without even getting into the idea of forcing people to use foreign childcare.

You can request anything you like for your wedding.
Whether you have any guests is another matter.

Maybe you should get married in Maui instead.

Step back and look at this without concentrating on BIL for a moment.

He won't be the only one thinking ''bloody hell all those miles, time off work, and all that money to support ruby and fiance on their big day and see them married but they don't want our kids there!''. Trust me it wont just be BIL having face.

You want to get married in Mexico without kids about.
You aren't particularly bothered who joins you and who doesn't.
Some of the family will find it difficult to do that.
Some friends have said they'd want to come.
What's the answer?

Well - i'd tell family (especially all the ones with the kids) that you're having a tiny wedding in Mexico with just a couple of (childless) friends who will find it easy to join you and that there'll be a big do later for everyone when you're home. Don't invite the 100 people.

YABVVU
You cannot expect people to travel that far and then dump their kids with a stranger, especially a toddler who is so young and may get distressed being left (as mine does).

You shouldn't even ask this of them. It's so rude.

expat what's silly about it? We'd rather invite and be turned down than not invite and have people think we don't want them there.
We are having a party when we come back....

I think the issue is that the op has not confirmed that the hotel does have nannies or crèches available. This is something that the op absolutely must check is available if she wants fsmily not to bring the kids to the actual ceremony. The mega resorts with 3000 hotel rooms doing 10 weddings per day probably do but not everyone wants that .
Mexico is ver,y popular with Americans for weddings but I haven't ever seen fsmily groups bigger than about 60-80 people even though USA is a 3 hour flight away. Most are about 40 people. Tend to be young people's type events, no kids no oldies. Like an extended hen/stag. But very lovely all the same if you don't mind quite a public event. Yes most have chapels but then you could be anywhere, under palm trees on the beach is nicer. You can get a chapel in any uk town.

Well - I've been to a wedding like this and it was lovely. Not in Mexico, the Caribbean, but same deal - no kids at actual ceremony, but invited to reception, so the couple paid for a couple of nannies from the (very smart) hotel to play with the 5-6 young kids (including our 2) that were there, aged from about 1-6. Worked fine. Wedding was attended by about 40ish people.

However, most of the attendees were wealthy enough that this wasn't their only holiday for the year, and all of the children had some experience of childcare before. So it wasn't a huge sacrifice to be there and most of us made it into a week's holiday together.

I think you need to do more research on the kids club before you know if you can rely on it. Some won't take kids that aren't fully potty trained for example, or have a minimum age.

If you can guarantee (and pay for if not free) kids club spaces for every wedding guest who has kids then it's not unreasonable for the kids to be entertained elsewhere for the 45 minutes of ceremony.

If you genuinely want to be clear that families are welcome, add a family friendly entertainment to the reception events once the kids are allowed to rejoin their parents.

But I think it's weird to invite 100 people to a transatlantic wedding. You are asking people to decide whether they want to spend £5000+ on being at your wedding. That's only really appropriate for really close family. Yes you might get a handful of people out of the 100 who decide that they would like a holiday in Mexico and choose to come. You then have a weird dynamic where the guests are 10 of your nearest and dearest closest people, and 4 people who are probably (if you put all invitees in order of how close you are to them) about number 87-91 in how close you are, with numbers 11-86 unable to be there.

Why don't you see if you can find out if there's any suitable child care before sending out the invitations? If there are only a couple of kids it may well be possible to accommodate them. You are the one asking something quite tricky, so while you don't need to arrange it all now, it would be friendly and polite for you/DP to have a quick look at the options.
Otherwise you could easily be seen as deliberately excluding certain people from your wedding.

sorry but having your wedding at some flash destination is a bit silly in itself.

Why should people fly to some weird foreign country to see you get married? honestly? it just seems really egotistical.

I wouldnt bring my baby to some hot mosquito ridden country to leave them with a random hotel nanny, and expecting people to do this is just.....well there are no words tbh.

And why would you put your friends and relatives to such expense? Are you trying to weed out the less well off ones?

I'm all for weddings abroad and all for childfree ceremonies but I don't think you can have both.
You can't expect a family to fly to Mexico to attend your wedding but exclude their DC. Remember not only the financial cost but they'll be using annual leave and possibly their main holiday.
You're essentially having two weddings.
I suppose the sweetener would be if you and DF were paying for everyone's flight and accommodation.

It's entirely up to you whether you want children at your wedding or not, of course. But be prepared for many guests with children to say "sod that, I'd love to see RubyRed and her fiance get married and I'd even be willing to take leave from work and spend thousands of pounds on it, but if I have to park my kids somewhere else for an hour or two then thanks but no thanks".

Also many hotel chains only take children from aged 4, and only open for a few hours a day. Eg 10-12 then 4-6. What are your guests supposed to do with their young children if you're getting married at 2?

'Maybe you should get married in Maui instead'

Exactly.

Only the most precious are going to have an issue with this

I must be really precious then because there's no way in hell I would fly off to a country with one of the highest kidnap rates in the world to leave my child with a stranger.

OP, if it was me I and we wanted to come to Mexico, either me or the OH would stay in the hotel with the kid/s during the ceremony. Wedding ceremonies are pretty boring anyway so I'd happily skip it and then come to the reception.

Having said that, I'm pretty chilled and it sounds like your OH's family are the kind to make a fuss over things, so... sorry about that. Sucks for you I guess.

Your wedding, your choice, but people will be understandably marked about paying for their child to come with them, but being banished to kids club.

Ruby I'm just saying that there are a lot of factors to consider with inviting so many people and with having a wedding abroad (I say this as someone who got married abroad). What if your closest friends/family can't come, but less close people can? How would you/close family feel about that?

We went round in circles about who to invite and went with just our parents in the end (both only children), which put a few noses out of joint but we made up for it by having a large celebration when we got back.

Ultimately you have to make the most important part, ie the ceremony, special to you and worrying about guests and childcare could detract from the day, so why not just go it alone (or with a much more restricted guest list)? Just a suggestion.

I've been to a large destination wedding but it was very informal, which suited the couple down to the ground (they had their own four children there). Think shorts, t shirts, trainers, kids milling around everywhere - as a bride it would've been my nightmare but they loved it and it was what they wanted.

Some things to think about. Have the wedding early in the holiday so everyone isnt red and sunburned in the pictures. Think carefully about the dress code and how to word in invites. Check the weather for the time of year carefully, especially things like hurricane season. How are you going to transport gifts home? Might be worth asking people to wait for UK celebration.

Sorry, that was ridiculously long!

You asked if you are being unreasonable - you have been told you are. It doesn't matter that you don't 'expect' their attendance (as if you could!). You should be massively grateful that people are prepared to travel so far and at such expense for you, because you want a destination wedding and you should stop pretending this is all for them and a matter of no concern to you. If that is the case and you genuinely don't care whether they come or not, please tell them so they can opt out rather than thinking they are going because you would like them to be there. You are coming across as completely ungrateful and a bit of a bitch, if I am honest.

Asking someone to put their 2yo in a kids club in Mexico?
Sorry but even though my dc are now much older, at 2yo they hadn't even started nursery and hell would have frozen over before I put them in a kids club in a different country with complete strangers. I think if you are referring to your nieces/nephews then yabvu.

As an aside lots of kids clubs abroad only take kids from 3yo so watch out for that.

I would be delighted to attend the ceremony knowing I could relax and enjoy it without trying to keep DC quiet. However,mint needs to be your responsibility to ensure there is childcare arranged for those who chose to come. If you are spending so much then organising a few nannies for a few hours ( less, depending on numbers and ages of the DC?) is surely doable?

It all sounds a wee bit bonkers but I'm older and when we had young DC we would have been utterly baffled to be asked to attend a wedding in Mexico or Maui. Surely most people simply cannot afford it and therefore it does slightly say, 'we don't mind if you are there or not.' That's fine for non close friends but not siblings IMO.

You put it so much better, Brat. Spot on.

I'm genuinely puzzled about the amount of people who are criticising the fact that the wedding is another country and people are actually invited. They may go, they may not. It's their choice, just like it's the OPs choice where and how she gets married. She's not saying that she's going to throw a massive strop if people decline the invitations.

2 sets of guests have children. Both of which will scream the house down. Neither of which will take their child away from the situation if screaming occurs because they will want to watch their DB say his vows.

So are people suggesting we don't invite them? Because that is far ruder IMO. My (baby free) family will be there, DPs parents will be there but BILs miss an invite entirely because of their DC?

I cannot express this enough...we don't mind if we're on our own. People have said they'll be upset if we assume they don't want to come due to the distance, we want to give them the choice.

Yes we've looked at wedding plans - we'll book for us and upgrade as necessary, the hotel are fine with this within a set time period.

No we have not looked at creches as we are just in the discussion phase of this bit, I thought MNetters would have helpful opinions, which bar the "a destination wedding is silly" ... you do have, so thank you :)