Kids seated or not?

[Newhere1993]

Hello

We are just starting to plan a wedding and have currently 180 guests on the list which is proving difficult to accommodate (both from big families) however a friend of mine suggested thinking about not seating children between 4-12 and having a children's entertainer/games for them to play,located just outside of the wedding breakfast so visible to parents but being entertained. A lot of the children know other children there and at recent weddings spent most of their time playing football ect. What I was wondering is how comfortable would people be with this arrangement?
We thought that if it was clear when inviting that due to space they won't be seated but there would be picnic style food and entertainment provided next to where we are and would still love them to join and enjoy the day, that makes it clear and leave it up to parents? It would be a relaxed wedding breakfast so they would be able to flow in and out as needed, both sides of the family are used to chaotic busy family events and all help in with looking after children. But also allows us to have everyone there, just don't know how many parents would feel happy with this?

Please help out a stressed bride to be 😂

My cousin had 3 kids when she got married and they did something similar, but for younger kids. I think they hired staff from their kids’ nursery who ran a children’s party in the next room for duration of dinner and the speeches. DD was about 2 at the time and had a ball. And we got to eat in peace. It was brilliant. I think they did it for up at about 8 year olds. I also think 8-12 year olds would happily be somewhere else during the meal and speeches (which are hideously boring). And picnic food and football would have gone down well with mine. We were at a wedding once where there was a big green outside and lots of kids were running out to kick a ball around between courses.

I think it sounds fine and kid friendly.

I think it’s more common for kids to eat with parents and entertainers to be running a room off to the side for kids to duck in and out of.

My SiL did something like this at her wedding, it worked out really well. The food was definitely more child friendly than the wedding breakfast.

Entertainmentment for the children is a lovely idea. Though you might need to check with the hotel regsrding how many adults they could insist on being with the children to supervise them.
I would keep the invites to family children only. Family children at the weddings I went to, were all happy & wanted to sit with each other.

You would lose a lot of the adults as they will need to help the younger kids with their food, or the children won’t go to the entertainer without them.

As others have said this won’t work for older kids. My ten year old would be mortified. At 8 she sat perfectly nicely to eat a wedding breakfast and listen to speeches.

Maybe you should just be making the whole thing less formal with a buffet ? Other than that, when I was a child it was normal to have children’s tables and a teenage table. We really enjoyed being served like the grown ups.

Oh come on. They don't need a hot meal/something substantial necessarily.

Kids eat 2 bites of cheese sandwich, a handful of crisps and a sausage roll at parties and manage just fine.

I'd do kids at table for food, give things like colouring books and crayons on table etc, so they can do that whilst at the table, waiting for food.

Then have option of sending the kids to entertainment for speeches/ boring bit, with a chill/quiet room for older kids if they want to go and listen to music/gawp at phones for this too.

Bring them all back for cake and disco and close those spaces. If older kids want to doom scroll, that's up to their parents. If younger kids need to go home, well, that would always happen, regardless.

I’ve been to a couple of weddings where the children have had their own table but it’s still been in the main room. Some had to have their parents pop over to help them with one thing or another, but resoundingly the parents and children were happy with the arrangement. The parents got to enjoy their meal in peace and the children got to feel like grown-ups. But as I say, they were in same room and may not feel so welcome being put in a different room with different food to everyone else.
They also got goody bags as their wedding favours with things to keep them entertained and there were loads child friendly parts to the wedding too (a bouncy castle, pick n mix) that they could go off and enjoy when all the “boring” stuff was happening.

I love the idea of this. I’d have loved it with all my cousins as a child.

I think asking children up to 12 to be in with the small
children could cause a problem though, at that age they will want to be grown up and sit somewhere. If you’re happy for children to be in and out of the main room as they please you will get some children sitting on parents laps during the meal but I don’t think that’s ideal if the food is on grazing boards. They are usually not very filling and parents will use them for their children too. It would work better if parents had their own plates so if they want to share with their dc they aren’t taking away from anyone else.

Mine would be ok now at late primary/early high school age but when younger they’d have been back and forward every few mins. Parents of toddlers likely won’t get any peace and will need to be up and down seeing to them. Doesn’t sound like a great plan 😬!