Brother’s wedding help!

[WeddingDilemma2]

First time poster- sorry if this is long but didn’t want to drip feed!

My brother is getting married this summer. The wedding reception will be outside at my parents house (lawn/marquee). DB and SIL want the wedding to be child free and feel strongly about this.

My issue is that we will have a 5 month old and a toddler at the time of the wedding. I would usually be up for a child free wedding and OK with leaving the toddler, but the baby is mostly breastfed and I don’t feel comfortable leaving her for a long period in any case. This is particularly the case as my parents (who would be first choice to care for the DC) will obviously be at the wedding themselves, plus it is a long day (12 plus hours taking into account travel time to our house).

We had thought it would be OK to have the DC stay inside my parents house (so not actually at the wedding reception itself) with a babysitter taking care of them, so we could pop in and out for breastfeeds etc. However I’ve realised my toddler could get quite upset in this scenario as he will be able to see the party going on outside with us and all extended family there.

I asked DB/SIL if the toddler could possibly attend a couple of hours of the afternoon reception (not the ceremony or speeches/dinner/dancing), but they do not want the DC to attend at all. We suggested that perhaps me or DH could instead leave the reception for a couple of hours to take the toddler off somewhere so they are not left upset in the house. However I think DB/SIL are not particularly happy with this either.

Reading between the lines I think DB/SIL are not happy we are planning on our DC will be on site at all (albeit not actually at the reception) as we will inevitably end up a bit in and out of the day. If it wasn’t DB I don’t think we would have said yes to the wedding in these circumstances, but even suggesting that we don’t attend at all would go down very badly I think.

AIBU to expect DB/SIL to be ok with us having the DC cared for in the house and possibly us leaving the reception for a couple of hours in these circumstances? Any practical solutions/ideas of how to approach the issue would be welcome as we generally get on well with DB/SIL and would not like a falling out over this.

I would leave the children at your house with your husband and go alone.

@MollyRover What?! You made me drop my tea lol I absolutely was not giving my baby cows milk at 5 months!! What sort of a mother do you think I am?!?

Madness.

Again, why can’t people read posts. I said that OP would probably need to buy bottles anyway when returning to work from maternity. And mentioned breast milk, formula, cows milk as what would go in those bottles - at a year old. Since corrected that some can go without ever using bottles and bravo to them!

I expressed milk for my baby at 4 months whenever time between feeds was longer. This was used a few times during the week to get baby and Dad used to it, in preparation for me being away for a 2 night trip when baby was 6 months old. Baby took to the bottle well, there was plenty of my milk left and husband was confident.

The whole thing came in useful a month after the trip when I had to go in for emergency surgery and needed to stop breastfeeding for a number of days (pumped and dumped)…. Whole situation would have been miles worse if baby had no experience of bottle at that point, so I’m glad we had introduced alternative to the boob.

I am totally on board and understand why somebody would draw a line at friends bringing children and all babies banned from the actual ceremony, but honestly cannot fathom why somebody would not want their younger relatives at what is a family event. I wouldn’t go.

These are all good and valid reasons for introducing a bottle.

I introduced a bottle early because I knew I would be going back to work at 7-8 months postpartum and I didn't want to formula feed if possible. It worked well with my son and is working well with my daughter. I am also comforted by the fact that if something were to happen to me making me temporarily unable to breastfeed, there is a small stash of milk in the freezer and we know she will take a bottle.

But facilitating someone else's child free wedding is not a good reason to do these things.

My son cried a lot the first time he was left with the childminder for a couple of hours. He was nearly 8 months old. We persevered because we both work full time and he needed to get used to being in childcare.

I absolutely wouldn't leave my young children with a babysitter they didn't know for a full day as a one off so I could go to a party, even if that party was my brother's wedding. It would be traumatic for them, with no long term benefit.

i don’t like child free weddings, I thought that as a single person- but to use a family home and exclude the kids in this way?

fair enough if you are having a swanky black tie wedding- get it. But to have a party in the grandparents garden and exclude your niece and nephew. Weird.

I wouldn't have been able to attend a child-free wedding in that situation when my children were those ages so I would probably have husband look after the children while I popped in for the ceremony (since it was my brother and I would have wanted to see him married).

Also @MollyRover it’s 12 hours… not 24 so 3-4 feeds, and she could bookend with one of those at either end, so the most sitter would have to do is 1-2 feeds, with an extra bag or two on standby.
Big whoop.

@Robinni I did outline that it had been said, and that I wasn't sure if you were the previous poster.

In any case, the OPs breastfeeding journey shouldn't be dictated by something as frivolous as a wedding. I say this as someone who had a partially child free wedding, babes in arms and children of those who had to make an overnight journey were the exception. There's no way I'd leave my 5 month old (breastfeeding or not) with anyone other than my DH and my siblings wouldn't even ask let alone demand it.

Forget the feeds for a moment.

Have you given any consideration to how the OP's baby and toddler might feel being left with someone they aren't used to for 12 hours?

Nobody would exclude my dc from an event in my parents garden.
If they don’t want your dc there then they should pay for their own venue imo.
I wouldn’t go.

Sure. If you've already gone to all the hassle of training the baby to take a bottle, pumping for hours to build up enough stash, buying a pump and all the other gubbins needed just to satisfy the demands of a couple of brideandgroomzillas.

I had no reason to go through all that with DC2 so I didn't bother. And a wedding wouldn't have been enough impetus for me to do so.

Big whoop? Seriously?!

It's great that bottle feeding worked for you, but your comments on this thread are bordering on mummy shaming the OP and anyone else who didn't or couldn't go down that route.

Getting a baby to take a bottle who is a refuser is incredibly hard. DD took a bottle until 4 months then completely refused.

i get it. I had to leave her at around 11 months, so we built up to taking a bottle.

it was absolute hell on earth. Caused an oversupply one tit so stopped pumping, £££ spent on wasted formula. 3 weeks of screaming at bedtime, constant false starts, her beside herself and constantly rooting, taking hardly any bottle so up all night feeding anyway. It was horrific.

it’s not straightforward for everyone.

i absolutely would not have gone through the above for a couple who held a wedding in my child’s grandparents garden and then excluded her for the ceremony.

I agree with @GulfCoastBeachGirl There's no way your toddler wouldn't be brought out to join the party

I like a PP's suggestion of putting all the possible options to your DB and asking which he would prefer

This ^^

What does your brother suggest as a solution?

I think this too.

We had a similar issue except they wanted the older child in the wedding party (to look cute in pictures I suspect).
Anyone who could have babysat near the venue was at the wedding. Anyone else we could have left DC with was too far away, it was a bank holiday weekend so travel was already unpredictable.
We ended up saying they're both coming or DH and DC stay at home and I'll attend on my own.
The compromise was youngest DC stayed away with DH from the church so they couldn't possibly make a noise in the service and they attended the reception. They behaved impeccably.

I don't get child free weddings at all, its so self absorbed, however it's a really good indicator for me that those are people I don't want in my life, not a chance I would be going in your shoes op.
If my brother thought that little of me he would put me in that situation, then I would be making zero effort to attend.

Is the ceremony elsewhere?
Is a solution you all stay at grandparents. Just you (sister of groom) go to ceremony. When they come back to marquee you say goodbye and wish them well and all 4 of you leave.
If baby breastfeeding then leaving with paternal grandparents isn’t an option.
The babysitter in grandparents house works just if baby but won’t work with toddler.

Oh man…. @Tandora …. months …. Are you for real.

So, for pumping to fill a freezer bag you are talking 20mins max. Let’s say over an 8 wk period to practice twice a week (IF the baby takes to it) that is a total of 5hrs 20mins. With a further 1hr 40min to supply 5 bags for the day of wedding (excess incase a bag rips or whatever).

And you don’t need to use a machine, you can use a hand pump which is quicker.

Absolutely shouldn’t be expected that OP HAS to do this. I posted in the first place, as I couldn’t understand why anyone hadn’t suggested expressing as a viable solution to her problem.

@inkpotlover I really don’t get all the fuss about shoving breasts into pumps and what not. But each to their own.

And again - pumping and dumping takes about 15 mins, over a 12 hour period if she feeds the baby at the beginning and end she should only have to pump and dump twice to deal with engorged breasts….. So you think they’d prevent her going to the toilet twice??

The issue with having the baby there is that if they invite one they have to invite everybody’s and 20-30 kids+ and multiple babies doesn’t usually go down well at weddings..

Personally I think they should let family children come but then how big is the family?

We had a similar set up for my brother and SIL wedding. My kids were older at 3 and 5.

Kids attended the ceremony (behaved great, but DH was poised to remove them if not) and then played around outside at the drinks reception part on the lawn. If attention was taken from the bride by the children then she didn’t seem bothered by it in the slightest. Then we arranged a babysitter to look after them in my parent’s house from about 4pm, so they didn’t attend the meal or the evening do.

I’ve also been to friends weddings where there were family children and my kids weren’t invited. I don’t immediately think my kids should attend because other kids are there. Most people understand the difference between the couple’s close family and children of friends.

Reminds me of a similar thread where the 0p wanted the same, she solved it by using her golden child powers to get her parents to withdraw promised financial support to the bride and groom until she got what she wanted.
I never understand the 'weddings are for faaamily, how dare the 'happy couple' think of themselves, don't they know its about what other people want and they need to suck it up'.

I don’t think you can go and to be honest I don’t think you should have accepted the invitation knowing that it’s child free and you should respect your DB and SIL’s wishes.

With all the best will in the world I could see how there could be disruptions either way and very unreasonable to say you’ll bring your DC in briefly and hope they’ll be ok/hope everyone else is ok with this.

I’m not against child free weddings at all either.

This. DB is being unreasonable to think you can do something else with your children during their wedding, what's he expecting you to do? I'd be massively pissed off with my DB for being such an absolute arse, that their idea of a perfect child free wedding takes priority over his sister being there. If they're worried about what other guests who can't bring children will think, I'm sure everyone else will understand and be fine with it. Most people are reasonable, excluding DB and SIL of course.