Wedding invite policy on children

[wellisawstar]

A friend of ours sent us a wedding invitation for her wedding in June. The invite tells local wedding guests that they cannot bring their children. Guests from out of town are supposed to contact the happy couple to see if their children can be accommodated.

Thankfully, we don't have children and don't have to worry about this. However, this policy seems weird to me, and I was wondering if there is an etiquette perspective on this.

[Sharnita]

Yeah, that one strikes me as odd, too.

[SPuck]

They might be in a situation where they are paying for outside childcare for some of their guests, but there are only so many children they can accommodate.

[Tabby Uprising]

They might be in a situation where they are paying for outside childcare for some of their guests, but there are only so many children they can accommodate.

That's what I thought too. 

What do they mean by "accommodate"?  Because like SPuck said, it could mean they would arrange some sort of childcare not allow them to attend wedding events.  Their thought process might be that it'll be easier for local guests to get a babysitter for a night, but out-of-town guests would have to arrange/pay for a full weekend (or whatever) of childcare. Finding overnight childcare can be more difficult as well.  So the HC may be worried that out-of-town guests with children will decline the invite because the childcare issue is too tricky. 

If the HC knows there aren't many out-of-town guests with kids, they might feel able to provide childcare for that limited number and then those guests will be more apt to attend the wedding.

Am I making sense?  Daylight savings brain might be getting me!

[LeeLieLow]

I see this as the HC wanting their friends and relatives to attend the wedding and reception and trying to find a way to make it work.

 In town guests can find sitters for their children for a few hours or say 6 hours.  Out of town guests would have to find sitters for over night or even a whole weekend.  Trying to find a sitter in HC's location would not be feasible.

So maybe the HC has space and or budget that would allow some of the guests to bring their children or as pp said maybe there will be a group babysitter available.

When I had my wedding I had many out of town guests and my thought was that I would invite the children because I wanted my friends and relatives to attend and I could fit it into my budget.

What happened was all of my high school friends came without their children and all of my college friends came with their children.  My in town friends did not have children.....fixed typos

[Mikayla]

I see it as two separate issues:  their policy and then the expression of it on invites.

AFAIK, they're free to break it out any way they want where kids are concerned.  But on the way they handled the invites, I think they're begging for trouble by putting their thought process in black and white.  What happens if one local couple gets told their kids are fine, and the next door neighbor gets told theirs didn't make the cut?

I don't see that this B&G have a separate problem from anyone else including kids.  But they'd be better off figuring out their "formula" and then inviting accordingly.  That way, they don't have to say anything unless asked about it.

[Just Lori]

I don't think there is anything wrong with inviting some children but not others, but I do think it would be better to send individual notes or invitations to the people whose children you want to try to acccommodate.  The generic message seems off to me.

[twilight]

It is not 100% clear to me what is meant by "accomodated."  It could mean she is willing to arrange for childcare for the out of town children and they are not actually invited to attend the festivities.  If this is the case this seems reasonable to me.  In towners would have access to and knowledge of childcare recources while out of towners would not.  I think it could have been worded better though.  Personally, I would have just indicated no children on the invite and then personally reach out to any out of towners that I knew had an issue or even put an extra slip of paper in their invites only indicating they could contact me seperately if childcare was an issue.

[Aeris]

I see it as two separate issues:  their policy and then the expression of it on invites.

AFAIK, they're free to break it out any way they want where kids are concerned.  But on the way they handled the invites, I think they're begging for trouble by putting their thought process in black and white.  What happens if one local couple gets told their kids are fine, and the next door neighbor gets told theirs didn't make the cut?

I don't see that this B&G have a separate problem from anyone else including kids.  But they'd be better off figuring out their "formula" and then inviting accordingly.  That way, they don't have to say anything unless asked about it.

This is exactly how I see it. I have zero problem with the 'policy' - the B&G can invite and/or 'accommodate' whoever they feel like. But they REALLY should not have put the 'policy' on the invitation. They ought to have simple addressed the invitations to all the adults, then either included a note to those parents for whom they would provide childcare, or otherwise contacted them privately.

People sometimes try to accomplish too much in a one-size-fits-all invitation.

[sweetonsno]

Well, couples are allowed to invite kids or not as they wish. The phrasing would rub me the wrong way if I were an in-town guess. I can only speculate at the reasoning. I suspect that previous posters are correct and the couple realizes that arranging longer-term childcare would be difficult.

Perhaps the wedding venue is able to provide a limited amount of childcare, or the HC has hired some local sitters for the evening. That would explain why they could "accommodate" some kids.

[Just Lori]

Is the couple prepared to accommodate every child of every out-of-town guest?  If not, I can envision some awkward conversations:  "Well, yes, we do have babysitters, but they're just for the people whose kids we like."

[Piratelvr1121]

Like PP's, I expect "accomodate" means babysitter.  An aunt and uncle of mine had a childfree wedding years ago, I think I was maybe 8 or something, and they arranged for 2 babysitters to look after the kids at my grandparent's house. 

[Pen^2]

It doesn't sound like the invitation is saying, "local guests can't bring kids, out-of-townies can." It would probably have said as much. Saying that children of people travelling a long way can be "accommodated" sounds more like they are trying to be mindful of how hard it is to get someone to watch over children for a few days, and maybe they're going to help out with finding babysitters or something else of the sort.

I read this as "no children at our wedding thanks, but if you're travelling a long way and that makes things difficult for you, let us know and we'll help sort things out." It really sounds like they're trying to be very hospitable.

It's their wedding. If they don't want kids, there's nothing wrong with that. If they're going the extra mile by trying to help out those for whom children make attending the wedding difficult, good on them for that.

[Winterlight]

It is not 100% clear to me what is meant by "accomodated."  It could mean she is willing to arrange for childcare for the out of town children and they are not actually invited to attend the festivities.  If this is the case this seems reasonable to me.  In towners would have access to and knowledge of childcare recources while out of towners would not.  I think it could have been worded better though.  Personally, I would have just indicated no children on the invite and then personally reach out to any out of towners that I knew had an issue or even put an extra slip of paper in their invites only indicating they could contact me seperately if childcare was an issue.

That's how I read it too. And yes, this should not have been put on the invitations.

[doodlemor]

It is not 100% clear to me what is meant by "accomodated."  It could mean she is willing to arrange for childcare for the out of town children and they are not actually invited to attend the festivities.  If this is the case this seems reasonable to me.  In towners would have access to and knowledge of childcare recources while out of towners would not.  I think it could have been worded better though.  Personally, I would have just indicated no children on the invite and then personally reach out to any out of towners that I knew had an issue or even put an extra slip of paper in their invites only indicating they could contact me seperately if childcare was an issue.

That's how I read it too. And yes, this should not have been put on the invitations.

POD to this. 

Perhaps the clumsy wording is because the HC is willing to pay for childcare for the out of town guests, but doesn't want the additional expense of paying for the childcare of local guests.