Christenings
When to Send a Christening Invitation: Step by Step
Six weeks before for the date, 48 hours before for the restaurant and the map: here's the order that stops the same question arriving twice.
Send The Joy · October 1, 2026 · 3 min read
The christening is on a Saturday, and by Tuesday you've answered the same question three times: what time is the church? Your mother is booking a train. One godparent is swapping a shift at work. The restaurant address is somewhere between a photo of the baby and a joke about the cake, and you're no longer sure who actually got it.
Nothing is missing. The order is. When to send a christening invitation comes down to three moments — six weeks out, 48 hours out, 24 hours out — and after that you barely have to send anything at all. Get those three right and the rest is small edits: a new time, a different table, a map that finally loads.
When to send a christening invitation: six weeks before
Send the main link the day you lock the date. 'Luca's christening, Saturday 18 May, San Miguel, 11:00' is already enough for grandparents to write it down and for a godparent to ask for the day off. The restaurant can wait, and the invitation can say so in one line: 'Table confirmed in a few days.' Message grandparents and godparents directly, before you post in the group — they're the ones who need more notice, whether that's a flight, a hotel or a shift swap.
- Six weeks before: the link with the date, the city and the church time.
- Four weeks before: a soft reminder, with the reply form already open.
- 48 hours before: restaurant, address and map edited inside the same invitation.
- 24 hours before: the same link in the group again. Nothing sent as loose messages.
48 hours out: table, map and headcount
Two days before, open the invitation and edit it: restaurant name, address, map link. If it's already on people's phones, the same link shows the change, so nobody has to be told twice and the address doesn't disappear under forty replies. If the room still isn't confirmed, write that too — 'Waiting on the restaurant, I'll update here' — so the link stays the one place worth checking. If the restaurant asks for a rough number, read the reply list inside the invitation and count the yeses, not the maybes. Then one short message to the group: 'The map's in the invitation now, last scene.'
Three fields get edited most often, so keep them apart. Church time and meal time: 'Church 11:00, restaurant 13:30.' Move one without touching the other. Dress code in a single clear line: 'Dark suits for adults, comfortable clothes for the kids.' And if it rains, one sentence on the cover — 'The ceremony stays at the church, drinks move to the hall' — with the times and the map left alone.
One link you can edit beats ten messages you'd have to send again.
24 hours out: one link, one instruction
The day before, post the same link in the group again. One line does it: 'Everything's here — time, map, and where to confirm.' Anyone who hasn't replied can do it from their phone in seconds, without installing anything, and their name lands in the list inside the invitation. If someone isn't on WhatsApp, send the link by SMS or email; it opens in any browser on a phone, a tablet or a laptop. And if someone genuinely wants paper, print a few copies for the people who'll keep them. Then pick a design, try it free, and publish your digital christening invitation as soon as you have the date. The same link will follow you through the last change.
