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Many couples struggle with whether or not to include children at their wedding. In fact, you can find many other posts from other bees about children in weddings from Mrs. Corn, Mrs. Tulip, Mrs Milkshake, Miss Snow, and Mrs. Gummi Bear, to name a few.
Many people have adult-only celebrations because of the hassle that are children. In our particular situation, we never once thought about excluding them. I have young cousins who will be our flower girl and ring bearer. Mr. Hot Wings’ cousins have young children. And finally, our view of marriage is that of bringing family together irrespective of age. So I guess that means including the kids. On occasion, I still am unsure if we’ve made the right decision. What if a baby starts to cry during our ceremony? What if a child decides to take a big chunk out of our wedding cake before we’ve had the chance to cut it?
I also wonder if I really want our friends and family to be “parenting” instead of enjoying the wedding festivities (who am I kidding… this just means that I want them to be able to drink freely and be wildly fun). Is it possible to still have parents have fun and stay for the “partying”? In the end, Mr. Hot Wings and I decided that we didn’t want to make the decision for our friends and family. We will let everyone know that there will be an open bar and fun festivities and allow our adult friends and family to decide if they would like to include their children. We’re hoping this is the right decision.
Then I see images like these, and it reminds me why we made the right decision. They are adorable… even when they’re being oh-so-mischievous in their plotting for the cake. We’ll have to include kid friendly activities to keep them busy enough to not take a handful of cake when no one’s watching. I’ll fill you in on the kid activities in a later post.
I’m pretty sure these kids weren’t invited to the wedding, but how lovable and adorable is this image? Love is like a bug… so easy to catch and spread. I adore this.
Are you including kiddies? Was it a difficult decision?
We don’t have any children in our family, so the decision was made for us. Kind of jealous of brides with flower girls 
I wish we had more young ones to include in the ceremony, but we’ll have a few at the wedding and reception.
no kids for us - fits with us as a couple as we choose to be childless! more power to you though - i just always end up “babysitting” when kids are present, and would rather just enjoy my day without wondering if kids are out breaking things!
but the pics are cute
I have young cousins too… so we decided early on we would have kids at the wedding. We’re putting buckets with crayons, coloring books and blank pads of paper on the tables with kids to keep them entertained.
We’re including kids as well for our reception. There was never any doubt! I’m a bit stuck as to how to keep them entertained though so I look forward to seeing your post on kids activities!
We want to include a few of our younger family, but I’ve been really struggling with this because one of my FI’s sisters has 10 (count them!) children! Needless to say, she can’t watch them very well and they run wild at every family function with the other 5 nieces and nephews. I don’t really want my reception to be invaded with children, so I was thinking of doing like 10 and up since we really want this to be a big old party. I don’t know yet, it’s tough!
Nope we did adult only. We are having a outdoor evening wedding and we didn’t want to worry about the safety of the kids and we wanted our guests to enjoy the evening without babysitting the kids.
no little kids in our families either. /sadface those are really cute pictures!
@ogreprincessinpink: oh wow. Depending on the size of your wedding, 10 would be a lot. The 10 and up rule sounds like a really good idea.
My niece and my friend’s children are all toddler age through early elementary and they were so cute dancing at the reception. And the groomsman and his pre-teen daughter were dancing on the stage together. I can’t imagine them not there!
oh these photos are so sweet. we’re not having kids, but that’s because many of our friends don’t have kids yet
Our photogs have some amazing kiddy shots on their site, but I’m not all that excited about the prospect of them at our wedding for some reason. We’re not excluding them though, if parents want to bring their kids, but not making any special accommodations for them either. Guess I’m a bad friend, but oh well!
@Miss Cola: You’re not a bad friend! You’re soo generous for even including them when you’re not exactly excited about it. I bet you’re an awesome friend 
There are lots of kid n our families (more on his side) than mine. So having a wedding without kids has never been an option. Its what works for you. N for us a wedding is about family n many of those loved ones are children. So we will be having them in our cereomony and welcoming other children 2 our reception.
I love that last picture! Out of the 24 people we invited to the ceremony, 2 will be little ones. Luckily our ceremony will be really short so we won’t have to worry about keeping them entertained for too long.
i cant wait for your kid activities post… i come from a big family… only my brother have five kids three which are going to be in our wedding and all of our friend have kids so we want to have something to entertain them… i cant wait
@Miss Cola: Not being excited about kids n your wedding doesn’t make you a bad friend. It’s actually very understandable (as cute as they can be they can also be a handful). Don’t feel bad about it. You are actually being very considerate especially since you could always have the option 2 say no kids. Which n the end its your special day n if you choose 2 say no children. it is ok n that will not make u a bad person.
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Mrs. Hot Wings, Chicago/San Diego Age and Occupation: 28, Professor Fiance's Age and Occupation: 32, Instructor Engagement Date: December 20, 2008 Wedding Date: August 2010 Venue: Ocean View Villas/Jasmine Seafood Restaurant About Me: I am a psychology grad student living in Chicago and planning my wedding to a fellow psych grad student. I am a Sunny So-Cal bred gal who trudged across the country to follow her love of psychology and ended up finding a partner in the process. I am overly passionate about anything I involve myself with. I am an activist, a foodie, a reality TV watching junkie, an over-analyzer, a photography obsesser, and am utterly cheesy to the core. This is a story of what happens when a boy and a girl meet, fall in love over academic dorkiness, and a shared love for life. We (mostly I) are planning our semi-destination wedding in my hometown of San Diego. We are excited to bring our families and friends together from across our lifespans to celebrate our future in a grand 400+ person culturally blended affair!
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