This is a topic that many couples who are getting married struggle with. Should you invite children to your wedding or ban them from attending? Will they ruin it for everyone else? Will they scream during the vows and spoil it for the happy couple?

Deciding whether or not to invite children to your big day is an important thing to think about. Some people instantly decide one way or the other. For example they may have heard nightmare stories about other people’s weddings and decided not to invite them at all. Other people may think that if they have children in their family, they have just as much right to attend as everyone else.

But of course it isn’t always as simple as that. For example if you ban children from attending there is a real chance their parents won’t be able to attend either. If they cannot get a babysitter – or are not willing to do so for some reason – they won’t be able to come.

On other occasions the parents themselves may not agree with their children not being allowed to attend, so they won’t want to come themselves. This does happen, but it should be remembered that this is your big day and you will need to do whatever is right for you. If you don’t want children to attend, this is your decision.

Some people decide to split the decision and ban kids from the actual ceremony but allow them to come to the celebrations afterwards. This is actually a good middle ground because no one really minds children running around during the celebrations. There will be music and dancing going on anyway so they can join in with that.

It is different during the actual ceremony though because the happy couple will want everything to go as smoothly as possible. There should be silence during the vows. Adults can understand the importance of the moment but children of a certain age and below will not. We have all been to a wedding where an embarrassed parent has to take their child outside at a key moment.

If you do want to invite children to the whole day, it can work well to make sure you have some activities on hand for them to do. You cannot really expect young children to sit through a long service without doing or saying anything. So you need to bear this in mind and see if you can make alternative arrangements for them. This is what some couples begrudge doing though. It adds to the cost of the wedding and the parents may not agree with the plans either.

In the end you need to put the focus on you and your partner. Do you really want to have all the children you know present at your wedding? Or would you rather them not be there until the evening? Whatever answer you come up with should be respected by everyone else – after all, it’s your wedding day and you want to remember it for the right reasons.


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