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The Jams as wedding kiddies. Can you even handle his look?! Aww.
Note to all busybody couples out there: When planning a wedding, don’t estimate your guest count before you actually sit down and actually start writing down names. Because when you’re wrong, you will think your guest list is utterly untamable and you will threaten to cut everyone in order to reach the original number you thought you would invite.
For the Jams, the magic number was 150, which we blabbed about all over town before we counted up our family and friends. And then we started making some lovely new friends in our town, and the numbers grew bigger than the drama on an episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race.
And when we finally sat down and made the list? 213. Does our venue even hold that many people? How will we ever afford to feed all of these people that we didn’t even know we knew?
Cue major freak out.
And among those 213 guests are a whopping 37 kids, which we were advised to cut from the list by just about all who we encountered.
But, as you saw in the photos above, Mr. Jam and I were kids who loved weddings. OK, maybe Mr. Jam really didn’t enjoy that particular one, because I’ve heard from his family that he was a royal pain and refused to take group pictures and instead ran around like a nutcase. But I really did love them, and when Mr. Jam grew up a little bit, he did too. The music, the people, the energy…it’s like one giant all-ages playground. I also had my first slow dance with a real boy at a wedding, so clearly my feelings run deep.
And so we decided to not cut the kids because they’re very important people, too. They’ll be a riot on the dance floor and adorable in pictures, and it will make it easy-peasy on the families coming from other parts of the state (and beyond). Plus, the little ones eat for free, and if the even smaller ones cry during the important parts, it won’t be a big deal. Because you know what? We’ll all be crying, too.
Did anybody out there go mad over a guest list gone crazy? Were your numbers way off like ours were? And let’s get honest…did you cut the kiddies?
We invited 215 people and our venue only held 150. It was a game of hope for the best up until the very last minute! We ended up with 130 guests which was perfect for us!
Best advice I got when we got engaged (and give all the time) is whatever you do, do NOT book a venue until you work out your guest list. Seriously. It should be among the very first things you do. The size of your guest list impacts so many other things that I simply don’t understand how people book lovely venues with limited space without a firm idea of what your invitee list looks like and how many of those people are likely to make it (allowing for the normal % of people who decline of course).
We started off claiming that we were having a small intimate wedding.. 80 MAX… then we sat down… I think the total count came to 205!!!
We ended up with a total of 160 that showed.
I agree. I think it’s so easy for people to pick a number (75, 100, 200), etc. without realizing how many people they want to have with them. Of course some people have particularly small families (not us!) and can get away with it. But my Dad is one of 11 kids, making me one of 28 grandchildren, and so on….His side alone is 100 people!
I also think kids are great to have at weddings. It is always the bride & grooms choice but I can’t imagine a wedding without kids. They tear up the dance floor like they own it!
[...] The (37) Kids Are All Right | Weddingbee weddingbee.com/2011/01/28/should-you-invite-children-to-wedding/ – view page – cached The Jams as wedding kiddies. Can you even handle his look?! Aww. Note to all busybody couples out there: When planning a wedding, [...]
Yes, yes and yes.
One of the first things we did was write down our guests list. Then gave it to both our families for people we knew we were missing. Our list was right about where you are and we ended up with a 140 final guest count. Right around the expect 30% RSVP NO rate.
we did write down our list and their kids, and pregnancies. thats the list we went on. if we cut anyone we looked at the singles first cus they make the tables weird. but we have 26 under 18’s. i think it comes to about 18 under 10’s out of that. i couldnt tell my family not to bring their kids cus then our kids wouldnt have anyone to play with!
We invited 222 and 166 came (but it was a destination wedding for most people). I too, forgot about kids when counting our initial number!
goodness! 37 kids? We’re trying to keep our guest list under 150. Unfortunately, the kids issue has become one of our biggest disagreements. I’m of the opinion that it’s all or nothing when it comes to inviting munchkins… and i’d prefer nothing. I have no problem with her 2 godson/cousins (the only under 14s on her side…) but then we’ve got at least 15 on my side… and that’s just family. We’re actually much closer to my co-workers kids since they live less than 3 hours away!
I’d hate to lose important family members who would decide not to travel without the munchkins… but having 20-odd children (and the children in my side of the family are NOT known for being well behaved… screaming is constant and temper tantrums are normally not far behind) seems like a perfect way to ruin a pleasant evening.
I also hate the prioritizing of family over friends that comes… if we’re losing 20 seats to the kidlets, we lose 20 spaces for people who probably have an important place in our lives (most likely a bunch of our coworkers… i spend 37.5 hours a week with them! I know them far better than the 4 yr old 1st cousin thrice removed that I’ve met exactly 3 times in her life)
I’m so glad to hear someone else is inviting kids! I’m with @cr6zy… I couldn’t have my daughter be the only kid at the party! While I understand why some people choose to have an adults-only wedding, we knew from the start it wasn’t for us. We are just a very family-oriented group. We have 28 kids on our 156-person guest list. I have all kinds of great kiddie things planned for them, from favors to “I spy” to face painting. But I was surprised to see that many of the families who were invited with children chose to make it a date night without the kiddies. We’ve received half of our RSVPs back and so far only 6 of the 28 children are coming.
oh Jam thank you so much for this post! I’ve been stressing out about the # of kids at our 150-adult wedding (16 kids… 7 of them babies!)..
We budgeted and booked a venu for 150 guests. When we wrote out our list it came to 266. We cut all the kids except those that would be traveling from out of town with their parents, (It also happened to work out that those kids are family).
Even with cutting the non-related kids, we still ended up inviting over 200 guests. Our response cards are due next week and so far we are at 110 accepts. Crossing my fingers and holding my breath we come in at 150!!
We had the same issue. FI and I thought 150 was our ideal number (50 for me, 50 for him, 50 for us). And it was 150…. before our parents got ahold of the list to add their 50 (at least not each in this case!). So we’re up to inviting 208.
Oh boy. This is a hot topic issue! We’ve decided that we will have kids at the wedding, but it will be limited to family only. My fiance has 2 kids and 5 nieces and nephews, and another 4 cousins under 14 years old, so that’s 11 non-negotiable kids - not counting the potential 7 kids on my side! Nearly all of my fiance’s friends have kids (usually 2-4 kids per family) so if we allowed their kids, it would be completely out of control. I was shooting to keep the guest list under 120 invited (I would be happy with 70-100 guests coming), but my fiance keeps adding and adding and adding - it’s driving me crazy! Right now we are at 136, and my fiance wants to add another 20-25 people! Ahhhhh!
finally someone who loves kids being invited like us! 
We also invited the kids- we never even debated not inviting them. They were a great addition to our guest list, all 31 of them that attended. It was perfect!
Being newly engaged we’ve barely started writing our guest list (we haven’t even set a date yet) but we are adding kids to the invite. They’re part of the family, it just wouldn’t be the same without them!!
We are having a lot of kiddos too. It just wouldn’t seem right without them and we never even thought to do an adults only. FI has 2 that will part of our ceremony. All of our friends and family have kids. I think the total is somewhere between 30-40 under the age of 10 of the 216 people on our guest list
I actually over estimated on this one. I was expecting to be at like 250, my goal was to get the guest list down to 200. I sat down last night (maybe I was a little more frugal with people because of how many I thought I would have) but only came up with 140! Oh happy day! Granted neither set of parents has gotten ahold of it yet.
As for kids, I was dead set on yes, he was dead set at no. We made a deal last night, as long as the guest list stays under 200 kids are in!! Woo Hoo!
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Mrs. Jam, Chicago Age and Occupation: 25, Writer/Associate Wedding Coordinator Fiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Structural Engineer Engagement Date: December 23, 2009 Wedding Date: June 2011 Venue: Hunter’s Ridge, Princeton, IL About Me: I’m a penny-pinching cat lady getting ready to marry the frugal dog lover of my dreams. Our ideal Saturday morning includes rummaging around people’s junk at garage and estate sales followed by an afternoon date to our favorite café, where we only eat sandwiches that include the word “salad.” We actually love it so much, it’s sort of our unofficial wedding theme: Look at our delicious finds, eat homemade ham salad, and celebrate our love…barndance style. When we’re not obsessing over our love-fest shindig, we’re planning themed parties for our best friends and jamming to '90s music.
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