Why a Small Wedding Works So Well With Children

Children do not mind where the wedding is. They mind being cold, hungry, tired or bored, and a small wedding in Lapland lets you control all four. With 10 to 20 people there is no long receiving line, no formal seating plan and no hour of waiting between the ceremony and dinner. Everyone fits at one table, and the children can sit next to you.

Smaller numbers also open up places that a big wedding cannot use. Our Intimate Wedding in Lapland page describes weddings from the two of you up to around 30 guests, in glass igloos, an ice chapel, aurora cabins and wilderness lodges. A glass igloo or a cabin is a room your children will remember on its own, which matters when the wedding is also their holiday.

One honest note: Rovaniemi Weddings is our own company, so we are not a neutral reviewer. What follows is what we would tell a friend who asked how to do this with kids, and some of it is simply common sense that applies wherever you book.

Giving Children a Real Part in the Ceremony

The children who enjoy a wedding most are the ones with a job. Keep it to one small, clear task each, and one they can do with mittens on:

• Carrying something. Rings in a small box, a short bouquet, a lantern. Younger children can walk with an adult instead of alone.
• Walking in with you. Many families have the children come down the aisle with one parent, or stand with you for the vows. Nothing says the children must stay in the front row.
• Saying a few words. A single sentence, said into a parent’s ear if shy, is more touching than a rehearsed speech. In Finland, heartfelt toasts from family and friends are a familiar part of a wedding meal, so a child raising a glass of juice fits right in.
• Placing the candles or flowers. A task before the ceremony, in the warm, with nobody watching.

When you tell us about your day, tell us how old the children are, and we shape the order of events around them. Our styling for a small wedding can include furs on the ceremony chairs, pillar candles and, in winter, dried flowers and evergreens, so a seat for a child is both warm and part of the scene.

Keeping Children Warm Without Spoiling the Photos

Cold is the one real risk of a wedding in the Arctic with children. It is manageable, and it is a matter of planning, not luck. In winter, from November to March, temperatures can drop to −30 °C, and the weather will not wait for your ceremony. We have found these rules work:

• Keep the outdoor part short. For winter ceremonies we suggest 15 to 20 minutes outside, with a warm space right next to it. Fire pits, blankets and hot drinks are part of how we set up a winter wedding.
• Dress children in the same layers you would for a day outdoors: wool base layer, warm mid layer, insulated outer layer, mittens, hat and insulated boots. The wedding clothes go over the top, not instead of the warm ones. Our hour-by-hour guide to what to bring for a full day outdoors is written for exactly this.
• Plan the pictures first. Do the family photographs at the start, when everybody is fresh, then go inside and finish with the couple portraits.
• Choose an indoor ceremony if your children are very young. The Ice Chapel at the Arctic SnowHotel & Glass Igloos is indoors but stays at around 0 to −5 °C, so it is short and warm clothing is normal. A cabin or a glass igloo is a heated alternative.

In summer the problem reverses: long evenings, bright light and mosquito season. Light linen and a quiet corner for a rest suit the day better than anything dramatic.

Daylight, Naps and the Best Hour for the Ceremony

Daylight is the thing most families do not think about until it is too late. Around midwinter, Rovaniemi has only a few hours of soft twilight rather than full sun, and in the Christmas season the polar night is part of the atmosphere. In June and July the opposite is true: the midnight sun gives soft light until well past midnight, and children will not go to sleep at their usual time unless the room is dark.

That makes the time of the ceremony a family decision, not only an aesthetic one:

• Nap after lunch, ceremony after the nap. A two-o’clock or three-o’clock ceremony in winter lands in the blue-hour light, with children rested and fed.
• Have a full meal first. A small child waiting through a ceremony on an empty stomach is the most common reason a short ceremony turns long.
• Plan a quiet room for later. A glass igloo or a cabin means a tired child can sleep a few steps from the party. Guests can stay at the same place; accommodation packages can be arranged.
• In summer, start earlier than you think. The midnight sun means you do not have to wait until night for the light, so a late-afternoon ceremony and a dinner that ends by bedtime works well.

A reindeer sleigh ride is a lovely arrival for children, typically 15 to 30 minutes and available for one or both partners. Treat it as an extra, not the plan, and always have a car as the fallback for a child who has had enough.

A Small Guest List and Who Really Needs to Be There

The most common intimate weddings we describe have 10 to 20 guests. For a family travelling with children, we would suggest thinking in three circles:

• The inner circle: you, your children and anyone whose absence you would feel on the day.
• The helpers: a grandparent or a close friend who can take a tired child for an hour, so you can do the portraits in peace.
• The celebration at home: many couples hold a symbolic ceremony in Lapland and celebrate with a larger party after they return. Our Elopement in Lapland page explains how an elopement for two works here.

Cost scales with numbers. The published cost guide runs from around €5,000 for an intimate elopement to €30,000 or more for a larger celebration, and from €10,000 to €20,000 for a styled event for 20 to 50 guests. A smaller list moves you down that scale, and our Lapland Wedding Cost page breaks it down by venue, styling, photography and catering. Please read it as a guide, not a quote; a quote follows a consultation.

Which Season and Which Setting Suit a Family

Our wedding pages give a simple picture of the year. Winter, November to March, is the most popular. Spring is April to May, summer is June to August with the midnight sun, and autumn is September to October, with the autumn colours and the aurora returning.

If your heart is set on snow, March is often called the sweet spot: snow without the extreme cold. If you have children under school age, we would honestly lean to September or early spring, or to a heated indoor ceremony in winter. Our Winter Wedding in Lapland page has the winter detail, and our Lapland Wedding Venues page lists the places we know best.

The Paperwork, Briefly, and the Trip Around the Wedding

Finland allows foreign nationals to marry, with no residency requirement. You apply for an examination of impediments through the Digital and Population Data Services Agency, which typically takes about seven working days and costs around €60. You need valid passports and a certificate of no impediment from your home country, with certified translations into Finnish, Swedish or English, and sometimes an apostille. A civil ceremony is performed by a district court judge at almost any location, and it can be held in English. Start three to four months ahead. Our Getting Married in Finland page has the full list.

Then the trip itself, which is where children get most of their memories:

• Day 1: arrive, rest, a short walk. Children are tired after travel.
• Day 2: the free day. Santa Claus Village on the Arctic Circle is about 8 km north of the centre, and a good place to burn energy. Our surprise reindeer sleigh ride and Santa visit write-up shows how we plan a secret for kids.
• Day 3: the wedding day, with a slow morning and nothing booked before the ceremony.
• Day 4 or 5: a rest day, then home. Wedding fatigue is real for a six-year-old as well as for an adult.

The airport is about ten minutes from the centre and there are direct flights from Helsinki all year, so the journey itself is rarely the hard part. Our Honeymoon in Lapland page has ideas for the days afterwards.

How to Plan It With Us, Step by Step

Rovaniemi Weddings works as one team from the first idea to the final set-up, and you can book the full service or only the part you need. For a family wedding the steps look like this:

1. Tell us about your day. Date, guest count, the ages of your children and what you would like them to do. Write through the Contact Rovaniemi Weddings page; we reply within one business day.
2. Consultation and estimate. A meeting in person or online, and a price estimate during or shortly after the call.
3. Agreement and deposit. A simple agreement and a deposit that secures the date.
4. Planning together. We source and book the suppliers, present options, and you choose. We handle each booking and email.
5. The wedding day. Our team installs every detail, runs the timeline and quietly solves the small things, such as a missing mitten.

For winter we suggest booking 8 to 12 months ahead, and 12 to 18 months for a full wedding. See Lapland Wedding Planner for what planning covers.

FAQ

Our Honest Final Word

We run Rovaniemi Weddings, so of course we would like to plan your day. But we also live in a town where children are part of every winter, and the weddings that work best with them are not the grandest. They are the ones where the ceremony is short, the room is warm, the nap has happened and every child has a small job.

If you are not sure where to start, read our Intimate Wedding in Lapland page, choose a season, and then tell us about your day with your children’s ages. For the setting, many families begin with the Arctic SnowHotel & Glass Igloos in winter or a lakeside venue in summer. We reply within one business day.

Rovaniemi Weddings · by Joona & Alla

Weddings and venues we plan in Lapland

Every option is planned, set up and quietly packed down by our own team, and nearly every proposal includes a photographer. Tell us your story and we reply within one business day.

WeddingsIntimate Wedding in LaplandRovaniemi WeddingsSee more →VenueArctic SnowHotel & Glass IgloosSinettä, Rovaniemi — on the shore of Lake Lehtojärvi, around 30 minutes from RovaniemiSee more →WeddingsElopement in LaplandRovaniemi WeddingsSee more →WeddingsLapland Wedding CostRovaniemi WeddingsSee more →

Rovaniemi Weddings is our own wedding planning and proposal design company — Joona & Alla, based in Rovaniemi. We plan, style and coordinate proposals and weddings across Lapland, Finland, Sweden and Norway.