A ‘children at wedding’ one….

[TemporaryName123]

First off, 100% accept that wedding is about bride and groom, not my family and I (before I get flamed lol!). My conundrum is as follows:

• 2 kids (4 and 8)
• Cousins wedding
• save the date was almost a year ago, wedding now in 8 weeks
• 5 hour drive away, hotel booked. Total cost of attendance will be around £1300 (petrol, outfits, gift, hotel etc).
• this evening cousin messaged to say official invites in the post. Fab!! However in the same message, said that our kids welcome to the ceremony and reception but from dinner (5ish) onwards it’s adults only…

We were all so lookIng forward to it, especially as we only see my extended family once every few years. But don’t feel comfortable travelling all that way to have our kids only enjoy half the wedding day. Plus our whole family at the wedding so we would need to get a babysitter or someone they aren’t familiar with to mind them in the hotel. Which seems rubbish for them to have to leave the fun (very social kids!!!!) and sit up in hotel room.

So as not to drip feed, my dad lives close by (parents seperated so he won’t be at wedding) but my girls see him at best twice a year for a couple of hours and while I know he’d offer to have them, we wouldn’t be comfortable with this as he doesn’t interact well with them and they don’t know him enough to be solo with him for 5 hours or so. So this is not an option really for us.

We have said all along we would go, my AIBU is:

Would we be BU to politely say we can no longer make it (and please, any short and sweet suggestions of how to reply much appreciated!)?

YABU: suck it up and go to the wedding and find a babysitter
YANBU: the goalposts have changed and it’s fair that you change your mind and RSVP no

I’d see it as the wedding couple’s responsibility to say if they weren’t. It’s not something that occurs to everyone to ask and it’s a key detail.

That's rubbish. They haven't really thought it through have they? How's it going to work for those with kids.

Ha, knew it. Bet that A) the bride doesn't realise the extent of the precedent on the groom's side and B) she thinks he told you all this ages ago.

That all depends on whether you see howling children legging it about as inconsiderate? You are invited to a wedding, it’s not three-line-whip. If ever a host makes things tricky, I’d tend to think they’d rather you didn’t come at all.

Who only sends out invitations eight weeks before?
How weird.

If you do go I wouldn't bother with entirely new outfits for the DDs. Just get them to wear something smart they already have, or buy dresses from Vinted.
I'd also cut back on the wedding gift, as they aren't paying for meals for your DDs ( which would have cost less than adult anyway) I'd say £100 bearing in mind all you other expenses.

I'd also argue that since you have a wedding breakfast in order to thank people for attending the ceremony it's quite rude to invite people to the ceremony and then expect them to bugger off and find their own dinner.

Honestly I'm surprised that your expected children of first cousins to be invited as a given . It's a very distant relationship -and I'm sure it would drive their guest numbers mental If they invited children of all their guests. Honestly they should not have included the kids in any part of the day as I understand that is more hassle than it's worth.
Just decline citing child care issues if you don't want to go without your kids .

Personally I would leave them with your parent they don't know very well. But if you're not prepared to do that I wouldn't go. I think it should have been made clear children weren't invited to the evening long before people made their travel arrangements.

If you want to go to the wedding go and get a nanny or one of you go with the kids.
If your feelings about the wedding are meh, just cancel it.

I would just like to point out that not having kids at the evening do these days isn't always because the B & G are selfish, entitled gits.
They should have said earlier, that is on them. But, by the sounds of the WhatsApp group, it wouldn't just be your kids. Most venues are much stricter about capacity, now, so it's not just cost, it's volume of people.
Traditionally, the evening do was when people invited their wider circle of friends/work colleagues they couldn't fit in for the day do. If you have a venue with, say, 100 capacity, and a big family with lots of kids, the numbers stack up really quick. Be honest, how many of you would pick your cousin's children who live 5 hours away over your mates?
In this case, OP is focussing on her wider family and what they always do, forgetting that a marriage is a joining of 2 families. What about the half of the couple that isn't related to OP? What if they have a massive family with lots of kids? Something has to give, somewhere. It isn't always about not wanting kids there, especially with costs these days. Sometimes it just isn't practical.
I love a big wedding, loved going as a kid. Didn't have a big one myself, couldn't afford it, and was fortunate that at the time there weren't many kids in my family, so I didn't have to say 'no kids', but I do understand why some people do.

Never understand this view. Most kids aren't so cute as to make or break wedding photos.

They've been invited to enjoy the ceremony, see their cousins and second cousins, have a bit of fun. And then head home as feeding them would cost the bride and groom a fortune, likely mean they could invite fewer adult friends (who they probably want in the photos more than their cousins' children they rarely see!) and change the vibe in the room.

The only way the bride and groom have been unreasonable here is the slightly short notice, although formal invitations at 8 weeks isn't so crazy.

Everyone saying they 'don't blame bride and groom for not wanting kids of cousins at the wedding' seems to be missing that they ARE invited to the expensive meal part of the wedding, but not the disco.

@ElBandito No, they aren’t invited to the dinner

Being invited only for the day then bye kids at 5pm would be difficult for most to achieve. Just taxing them off somewhere, babysitter, not realistic.

Other people’s weddings are an expensive waste of money so I wouldn’t ever contemplating spending that sort of money and time on attending a wedding unless it was my own or adult DC.

And why exactly is that? If you’re going to be so unnecessarily rude at least explain yourself. If they have in-laws/friends other family etc that live near them the children get a nice time with relatives and they get adult time.

Shame the children will miss out but tbh that’s her own fault for telling them before having an invite with their names on. We don’t know the full context of the WhatsApp comments and could have been directed at ‘closer’ children.

I have children with not a lot of family support and would do exactly this, we don’t get much time as a couple and this would be a perfect excuse.

I didn’t have many children at my wedding. Because I wanted an adult vibe and not a kids party with 50 kids running wild. And it’s easier to keep it close to immediate family and say no to everyone else than pick and choose and deal with politics and upset.

@ColleenDonaghy you think it is fair to invite someone to a ceremony 5 hours away and then not feed them?

I had a child free wedding, so I don’t have a problem with them, but either they are invited to all of it or none of it

I think what would annoy me is that they have left it so late to tell you. Had they of made it clear at the time of the save the dates you could have made an informed decision.
If it's not too late to get your money back for the accommodation then I would be politely declining and not going.
They have clearly realised how much it costs to feed people and trying to save money which is their prerogative but to leave it so late in the day makes things really awkward for people with kids.
If the official invite hasn't been sent you can still decline. It just doesn't work for you but wish them well.

I expect it's a cost/numbers things.

I would leave them with your parent they don't see very often. They should be able to cope with that for 5 hrs at their age.
But if you're not prepared to do that then I would pull out.
Just send a message saying now you've seen the update about no children from 5 pm sadly you won't be able to attend as you've no-one you can leave the children with for the evening.

Well I think really they're not invited. But have been told they're free to come along to the ceremony and hang out at the drinks reception, which is a nice courtesy of the bride and groom to extend. Given most family are nearby that's fair enough IMO. We're just all looking at it from OP's pov because she has to travel but it sounds like most guests are local with local family. I doubt one cousin's travel arrangements are high in the couple's mind!

Having an all adult wedding is fine, if that's what you want.

What's not fine is not telling DPs with young DCs that the DCs are invited to some, but not all of the event, with relatively short notice and all other similar previous events having welcomed DCs.

I'd wrap a crappy toaster in a photocopy of my bum as a decline.

In this case, I either wouldn't go, or I'd go to the whole thing myself, leaving DH and DC at home.

You won't be able to get a babysitter who will take the children for dinner, so your DH would have to miss the dinner in order to go out with the children for food. This is an added expense, plus it means that DH is attending just for the ceremony and canapés.

The save the date was addressed to ‘All’ so I think it was reasonable to assume the whole family would be invited. Evening parties with children are different to adults only, and I think it’s also reasonable for B&G to prefer one over the other. I don’t have strong feelings on whether children ‘should’ be invited to weddings. However this scenario is logistically the worst possible. If it’s child free and you don’t have suitable childcare for the weekend you don’t go, easy. In this case the children aren’t even going to be fed and it’s massive extra stress for the parents having to look after them in a hotel room. They won’t be able to relax and enjoy the evening together. I wouldn’t travel 5 hours and shell out for accommodation to juggle two kids in a hotel room from 5pm after they’ve had an exciting day.