Summer is the wedding season in many countries. This means it is when many people debate about such things as wedding themes, the perfect spots to have a reception or wedding take place, and, of course, whether it’s okay to exclude children from weddings or not. Opinions differ on what the acceptable etiquette for this is. Some people have no problem leaving the kids at home, especially since most weddings include alcohol and go long into the night. Others see it as an unbelievably rude thing to ask, as children are also part of the family and want to participate in the celebrations. A third, often mentioned opinion is that young children, who wouldn’t understand much about the celebration and most often have early and set bedtimes anyway, should be excluded, but older children such as teenagers should be welcome.

One woman took to an internet forum, NetMums.com, in 2018 to tell of her experience with a friend’s wedding and ask other forum members whether she was being unreasonable in her reaction and expectations. The woman, only identified by her online nickname of Sunny D, explained that she had received an invitation to a location wedding set to take place in Australia almost a year prior. She had booked the required flights for her and her family well in advance and even conferred back with the happy couple about the arrangements regarding children. Imagine her surprise when she was told a mere three weeks before the wedding that her newborn child would not be welcome.

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Sunny D explained in her post that she had tried her best to make arrangements early and only after talking to the bride and groom. The original wedding invitation had gone out via e-mail a year prior, she stated, and she had spent time chasing after the exact details of the event. Finally, only weeks away from the actual date, the physical invitation arrived:

“I chased for the actual invitation about 100 times and eventually it arrived 3 weeks before we flew. The invite said no children.”

Understandably, Sunny D was not amused. She had been pregnant at the time the e-mail invitation arrived and had a 5-month old newborn she was breastfeeding. Therefore, a babysitter was not an option for her, and finding one on such short notice would have been problematic anyway. In any case, the flights had already been booked and paid for.

Despite this, Sunny D still wanted to honor the couple’s wedding day wishes, so she looked for options once she was in Australia:

“When we got to Australia my family mentioned maybe I could hire a babysitter, I researched online but couldn’t find anyone (they live in the suburbs) Everyone I knew in Australia, was attending the wedding.”

Faced with all of this, she was incredibly upset and asked her fellow forum users whether she was being unreasonable for asking for an exception to the “no children” rule in her case.

The commentators were on Sunny D’s side without question. One put it into words, stating:

“If couples don’t want children at their wedding that’s absolutely their prerogative but they need to make it clear in plenty of time for guests to make arrangements for childcare or decide not to go. Failing to mention this “minor detail” until you were committed to going is extremely thoughtless.”

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What do you think about this wedding invitation? Have you ever received a wedding invitation via e-mail? Tell us your stories and pass this along to friends and family!