Big Fat Bridal Blog: To invite or not? Children and weddings

For two people that have relatively small families and don't claim to be any sort of social butterflies, we already have a wedding guest list  that seems to be spiraling out of control.

I've always envisioned a wedding where I would be surrounded by people I could easily sit down and have a conversation with. Those are the people that I want to share in the celebration of our special day.

For my part, that includes most of my family, my closest of friends and my dearest of coworkers. For my fiance, it's largely the same, with the addition of many of his parents' long-time neighbors. Hopefully we can keep this shindig under 150 people - 125 would be about perfect.

What we both agreed on early in the guest list creation process was that we weren't going to include children in the mix. Plain and simple, we just don't know that many kids. Of our friends and family, only a handful have children - most of them extraordinarily young.

When I considered making an exception and inviting my good friend's daughter to the wedding, both her and her husband responded with a resounding no! They explained that while they love their little one, they were looking forward to a grown-up night on the town. That was enough to squelch any guilt I might have had about excluding the younger set.

Sure it's always cute when kids surround the bride at the dance and look at her like she's Bridal Barbie, but that's unbridled optimism and nostalgia talking. What's more likely are tears or tantrums.

I've seen weddings with children work out just fine, but I've also been to plenty of weddings where the parents have forced the rest of the guests to endure their childs cries and commotion because they wanted to stay. To that, I say no thanks.

Don't get me wrong. I love children, but there are certain times when all would be best served by staying home. If they happen to have parents that can't leave their side, then so be it. You can stay home, too. It's a shame a few indulgent parents have had to ruin it for the rest, but ultimately it's the bride and groom's day and their choice. That's my argument and I'm sticking to it.

There was an interesting article in the New York Times earlier this week that debated the question of children at weddings. You can read it here. Responses run the spectrum from those that couldn't imagine a wedding without children and accuse the bride and groom of being selfish if they don't invite them to those that believe weddings should be an adults-only occassion.

Read it and share your thoughts. Should children always be invited to weddings? If not, what criteria should be used?