How do I politely tell wedding guests on the invitation...?

Question

Ok, my fiance and I are getting married next May. We have been going through the guest list, it is huge! We have decided to cut kids that we don't know. Our best friends have kids, and they are absolutely invited, but cousins that we have never met or only see at MAJOR family functions we want to leave their kids at home. Is their a nice way to say it? I know on the invitation we would just put the adults names and unless we put "and family" it is supposed to be understood that the family isn't invited, but few people go by that anymore.

This is a 2nd wedding for both my fiance and I, and we have 5 kids total, so their will be our kids their. I just said his cousin that we only see once a year as an example. His family is huge and almost all of them have 4 or 5 kids, so I am forced to either not invite the family altogether or limit it to only adults. We are talking like 150 kids alone!

Answer 1

No there is no polite way to do that. Really just say adults only and go from there.

Answer 2

First of all I think it would be rude for someone to tell them these kids are ok to come but those ones cant.. You would be setting yourself up for a family fight along the way.. Either invite them all or have just an adult reception and even then you will still get someone that brings their children... If you want to cut the list down you and your man need to sit down and figure who are the important people in your lives that you would want them there to celebrate your special day.. yes it may turn out there will be friends that you see on a regular basis that get the invite and family you only see once a year... it's up to you... I personal would rather be left out of a family members wedding I only see once a year then to be invite because I would feel that the just want the gift... Stick to the close relatives and freinds..most likely thats who you will spend your day celebrating with anyways

Answer 3

I married into a gi-normous family. We had to keep our wedding inviting at first cousins ONLY, and we still had 500+ guests present!

Here's what we did. #1, we worded our invitation to say
Adult Reception
At seven o'clock in the evening
blah, blah, blah

We also made sure our inner envelopes were labeled Mr. and Mrs. John Doe.

Look at this this way: Most couples WANT the night out to celebrate without the kids, and won't bring them. Like 93% of them. Seriously. But at the end of the day, you can't get real hyper over it. Someone is going to bring their kid. I promise you, they will. You can't very well kick them out!

Just go with it. There's not much else you can do, and it's not worth the drama. We had a few at our wedding. I tried to take comfort in the fact that they don't eat that much. =)

Best wishes!

Answer 4

Also put on the Reception card "Adults Only Reception". However be prepared that you will get people who write back _5_ will attend and you will have to call them up and explain that Due to the limited amount of space, I could only invite you and your husband. Children will require babysitters for this night."

I'd pre-write out exactly what I want to say so that they will not take offense and prepare to read the script to many people.

It also matters when and where your wedding is. I had an evening wedding--it started at 7, the reception started at 830, so very few people brought kids under 10 anyway. However if its a midafternoon event, people may expect to be able to bring kids. It's difficult to strike the balance between being firm and still remaining polite.

Answer 5

I design and sell wedding invitations professionally and have NEVER had a client put anything like this on their wedding invitations, or include an "admissions card" as someone suggested above. I would not recommend doing anything like that, since I don't think requesting that guests bring the invitation for "security purposes" would really put them in a very celebratory mood. Also, are you having a sit-down dinner with assigned seating? If so, won't the gate-crashers be obvious once dinner starts?

Answer 6

Put only the people who are invited names on the envelope but in the invitations where you know there will be children, make a few cards(business card size) on your computer that says " We are planning an adult only reception, if you need to hire a sitter closer to our wedding location I can provide some suggestions." . This will give the hint that they need to hire a sitter, if they take you up on it then find a few high school age babysitters and send the guests their names etc. They will still have to make the final arrangements, you are just hooking them up with a few names to chose from. I went to a wedding where they did that and actually it was really nice since we came from out of town and needed to bring our children but then we got to enjoy the wedding and reception without kids. The next day we went somewhere fun with the kids and made a vacation out of it! Best wishes........

Answer 7

If you know them well just come out and tell them. You are right most people don't look to those old customs so you can put right on the invite that you would prefer children not attend. Those who have children you want to invite just tell them it is OK to bring the kiddies but be prepared for some ruffled feathers when some little darlings are allowed to attend and others are excluded. It is more customary to either have or not have children among the guests, since this is family I think you should explain it all beforehand. You are not going to please everyone with this but the thing is it is your wedding and the only one that needs to be pleased is you and your groom.

Answer 8

"No Children" - How to Address this Situation

There really is no easy way to tell your guests that their beloved children are not invited. The most subtle approach is to spread the "no children" restriction by word of mouth. If you are looking for a more "formal" statement, here are two ways that avoid putting the bad news directly on the invitation:

On the reception card:

'Adult Reception'

or

On the response card:

Please respond on our before (Date)
M________________
Number of Adults____

My sister did this for her first wedding, and it wasn't a problem. The only children who were allowed were the kids of the best man, who were teenagers. She didn't know anybody else's kids and was also concerned about their safety as the chapel was located near cliffs. Several couples brought their nursing babies, but otherwise the kids stayed home. If someone is offended, they have their own issues and not something you should have to deal with on your wedding day. A wedding is a formal event for most people and until they are at least teenagers, kids don't really belong there unless it is planned that way.

Answer 9

My fiance and I ran into the same problem. We put "adult reception" on the reception card, and are going to leave the childrens' names off of the invitation envelopes. We're only inviting a small number of children (25) so we're personally telling those people that their children are invited even though it says that it's adults only. It's the only thing we could think of to do. But, be aware that some people still aren't going to understand what "adult reception" means and no matter how you do it, kids will be there that you didn't invite.

Answer 10

Etiquette wise, you can't realyl invite some kids and not others. Honestly, it'll be a nightmare for you leading up to the wedding and the day of when people are complaining that they had to leave their kids home when other kids are there. Unless your best friends kids are bona fide members of the wedding party, I think it's going to get ugly. It's either all or none. Besides weddings are supposed to be family things anyway. Kids are a HUGE part of families.

Answer 11

Just add "Adult Only Reception" to the invitation. We had to do it for the same reason. I'm sure there were some people pissed about it, but what can you do?? We did have an exception. The kids in the bridal party and my cousin's kids because they flew from OR & WA for the wedding in MI. If we had invited all the kids, there probably would have been an additional 100 people........