Another wedding party selection issue

[crd5555]

Hello. I am planning my wedding for July '05 and am having some trouble with the selection for all of the wedding party. My aunt (who is only 6 years older than myself) is going to be my matron of honor and I have two friends who will possibly be my bridesmaids. My fiance has a ton of friends who he could chose from to be his groomsmen and he has already asked his best man as well. My problem is that he has 3 older sisters. They are between the ages of 31 and 34 and we are only 23. I would not mind at all to include them as bridesmaids but I feel like they would be out of place because of their ages. I thought about hostessing but I would only need 2 hostess and then I would still have one sister to include and I cannot make one sister and bridesmaid and the other two not. Plus one of the sister's husbands is going to be an usher probably and I feel like I can't have him in the wedding and not her.

Not only is the placement of the sisters a problem but they have 4 boys and 1 girl of age to be in the wedding and Ihave 1 girl and 1 (possibly 2) boys in my family that I want in it. Their ages range from 4-10. The ten year old girl will probably be my junior bridesmaid and the only other girl will be the flower girl. So I have 5 possibly 6 boys to include somehow.

If anyone has any ideas for solutions to my problems please let me know. Thanks a bunch.

[purpleaa]

Being in my 30s myself, I wouldn't feel uncomfortable because people in the wedding party are 10 yrs younger than me. I think if your concern is their feelings, you can ask them and they will have the option of saying no if they feel uncomfortable.

Good luck with including 8 children in the wedding! That will take some creativity. Could they be greeters at the door of the ceremony location?

[RadioLyss]

Well, I think including all three of his sisters as bridesmaids is fine. As for the kids that can always be a dilema!

Here is what my FI and I are doing. Maybe it will help give you an idea.

We have 5 attendants each (including MOH and BM) that are friends and siblings.

Then we are having 2 Junior Bridesmaids and 2 Junior Groomsmen.

We are having 1 ring bearer and 3 flower girls. He has 2 little cousins that are girls that we are not including (even though FMIL would like us to).. simply because neither of us have ever met them since they live in Ohio. I have cousins in AZ with kids also, but we don't see them often. We chose the 8 children that mean the most to us.

Perhaps you could include some of the boys as ring bearers... Having 2 is not bad since there are 2 rings! HAHA! Then 1 or 2 as Junior Ushers. Then have some of the others as hosts... they can pass out directions to the reception site, or rice or bubbles or petals or whatever you are going to have! =)

Good Luck!

[BrideDesign]

I remember reading about formal or royal weddings having pages, children used to attend to and carry the brides train. It may seem like a little much, but if you have a dress with a train it might be a way to sneak those extra children in there...there is a short article about it on the web:

http://www.ourmarriage.com/html/pages.html

Good luck!