Okay, here’s a (not-too-serious) suggestion. On the BACK of the inner envelope, have printed something like:
NOTE: BE SURE TO BRING THIS ENVELOPE WITH YOU TO THE WEDDING!
(Due to the heightened need for security in this age of terrorism, we will have armed guards at all entrances. They are under strict instructions to shoot to kill anyone who attempts to enter without an envelope displaying his/her name as an invitee. NO exceptions will be made, even due to age/size/infirmity. I’m sure you understand – terrorists are using even children as suicide bombers these day.)
I think the discussion of the Wedding-Invitation Rule (WIR) boils down to this:
If you’re planning a wedding, you must realize that there are two sorts of people that require special consideration, else they may violate the WIR, especially for their children.
1.) People who willfully ignore the WIR rule. (I am not in this camp - I wasn’t even aware of the rule until this thread … so, )
2.) People who are ignorant of the WIR rule.
You can choose to deal with this risk-factor in a number of ways.
1.) Accept the Risk.
2.) Mediate the risk with clarifying instructions.
3.) Mediate the risk by going on a worldwide crusade to educate folks about manners.
4.) Mediate the risk by only befriending graduates of Manners U.
5.) Eliminate the risk by not restricting the attendance of children.
1a - spread the word through friends and family that it is a ‘no kids’ affair.
1b - use a response card with “# attending” format so you can tell if any additional unexpected people are RSVPing, call any guests that have assumed children are invited.
1c - call up any RSVPing guests at ‘risk’ of bringing uninvited kids and casually bring up the ‘no kids’ rule, or their babysitting plans.
Peggy Post, the manner maven from Wedding Channel.com, suggests 1a and 1b in her article. I think these ideas are better than your #2 because they involve direct communication rather than a potentially misunderstood additional instruction.
What about me? I happen to be going with #5. With 6 neices and nephews under 13 years old we may as well go whole hog on the kiddie event. We’re actually setting aside a space for the kids to hang out, so they’re not always underfoot.
If the names of the invitees are clearly listed on the invitation, there is nothing to interpret.
Standard invitation etiquette covers all of those situations quite well. If your name is on the invitation, you are invited. If it is not on the invitation, you are not invited.
What on earth could possibly be done that is simpler for everyone than ‘If your name is on the invitation, you are invited. If your name is not on the invitation, you are not invited.’?
All of your ‘solutions’ to make things better, and more clear, are serving to add mud to the water and to create a lot of unwanted stress and additional cost to the hosts who already made it perfectly clear who they wanted to invite by sending them an invitation by name.
Do you not believe in the existence of people who don’t know about these rules? Is that your problem here? Do you believe no one has ever showed up at a wedding with unwanted children in tow because they didn’t know the WIR?
If you honestly believe that, you’re beyond help.
If you don’t, then it sounds like you choose #1 Accept the Risk. If that works for you, have a ball.
There are so many people in this country that can’t program their VCRs that they had to come up with the VCRplus number-code system to make it simpler.
Really, if you can read and tell time, it’s not difficult at all. And yet… some don’t read the manual. Which, in this case, actually comes with the VCR.
Sure, you could make that analogy. But expecting every American to know that rule of etiquette is like handing that bar of soap to a child raised by wolves. If he gets the use of it right on the first try, it’s just dumb luck.
I would also like to know what’s unfair about this.
We certainly don’t hate kids or anything. We plan to have several children, and in fact my fiance teaches grade one and he loves the kids in his class very much. We also have between us about 25 young cousins, nieces, nephews, and children of friends who we spend a lot of time with, love dearly, and genuinely want to share our wedding day with.
Some of the friends and coworkers we’ll be inviting have between them at least 32 children we have never met. If I were to invite them (out of “fairness”?) at $40 a head, that’s over $1200 I would be spending so that complete strangers, who likely don’t even want to be there, can come.
I guess that the thing for me is that I do not look at my wedding list as adults/children I have invited, but rather people I have invited, regardless of age. For example, I don’t think of my 9 year old cousin Carly, who I see several times a month and love just as much as any other relative, as an extension of her parents. I think of her as Carly, human being whose presence would be appreciated at my wedding. I think this is why I don’t understand what is unfair about inviting some people who happen to be young and not others. Are you suggesting that in order to be “fair” to some 30-odd complete strangers, I should not invite a person I love very much, just because she happens to be younger than some of the other people I love very much? Is it also unfair that I am inviting some coworkers but not all?
Also, when you suggest printing up two different sets of invites, could you clarify for me what each would say? As I mentioned, “no kids” wouldn’t be appropriate to put on the set of invites that would be going to the only-parents-invited group of people, so what exactly do you mean by that?
Honestly, the family/non-family kid breakdown didn’t occur to me. So that’s part of the issue … as for inviting the children of some friends and not others, that still puzzles me. If Jane and John Doe are your friends, isn’t inviting their daughter or son along to the wedding a good thing to do because A.) they won’t have to find a sitter and B.) since she is the daughter of your friends, wouldn’t you like to meet her? To turn this around, if you knew John really well, but had never met his wife, would you consider inviting him and not his spouse?
See above for part of the answer… inviting some co-workers but not others is perfectly fair and good … they’re not a family unit.
I don’t think I ever suggested two sets. That was someone else. I suggested three sets at one point, though. With the # of seats to be reserved specified for the 1 or 2 person invites, and # of seats unspecified for the “and family” invites.
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