Surprised at the birthday party invites we are getting

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our school doesn’t allow invites at school, so there’s no way to police who gets invited. We’re also a title 1 school, so it’s ridiculous to mandate the whole class be invited. It’s too expensive

We ask dd who she wants to invite and I try not to leave kids out. But if we haven’t been invited on play dates or met up out of school, we normally don’t invite.

No school mandates that everyone gets invited. They mandate that if you give invites at school, you need to invite everyone.

[Anonymous]

My 1st grade daughter has been invited to 4 all class parties and 2 small parties where only a few girls were invited. Her birthday is coming up and I’m undecided if we will have an all class party at a big venue like a trampoline park or just invite girls and a few boys from class.

Last year, DD was only invited to one whole class party the entire year and maybe 2 smaller parties.

[Anonymous]

My 2nd grader has been to 1 all class party this year and 1 smaller group party. He was invited to another all class party but we had a conflict and couldn’t make it. I do find that he gets most of the invites in the fall and before winter break, then nothing over the winter and then it picks up again in the spring.

[Anonymous]

Of course it’s normal to have birthday parties that include just your friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m obsessed with inviting everyone

Me too. Why exclude? We are in NYC and I don't care what we have to cut back on because of the expense, we invite the whole class. Period.

We are in FCPS and the lower grades had classes of 28-32. We can’t fit those sizes in our house and a party with that many would have too much money at a venue. Much summer parties already ran $600-800 and this was years ago. That many kids can be over stimulating and then they aren’t fun. We never invited full classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DD has been invited to several parties this year and it appears that the rule of inviting the entire class is no longer in play. There are several first grade classes at our school and it appears that the norm is now to just invite the kids you are friends with. Did I miss something?

You missed being normal, apparently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DD has been invited to several parties this year and it appears that the rule of inviting the entire class is no longer in play. There are several first grade classes at our school and it appears that the norm is now to just invite the kids you are friends with. Did I miss something?

The whole class invite was pre-school only. Parties became limited as soon as we hit ES. There is only 1 child in my sons class who has continued with whole class parties, everyone else does their own thing. Some kids don’t have parties, some kids have small parties, some kids have slightly larger parties. DS has been invited to 5 or 6 this year. I know of ones he has not been invited to because he is not a friend of the birthday kid. That is fine.

[Anonymous]

The one time I invited the whole class the party was terrible. Only 10 people out of 24 RSVPed. Then only 6 showed up. Maybe people don’t see it, maybe something else, but after that I said never again.

This year (in 1st) we just had 4 friends and did a fun outing. It was a blast and perfect.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The one time I invited the whole class the party was terrible. Only 10 people out of 24 RSVPed. Then only 6 showed up. Maybe people don’t see it, maybe something else, but after that I said never again.

This year (in 1st) we just had 4 friends and did a fun outing. It was a blast and perfect.

Did you send reminders? I know people probably rolled their eyes, but I sent two reminders to RSVP including through the email addresses I got from the class parents. I didn't want 12 people not bothering to respond to the invite, but them have the kid show up at the party.

[Anonymous]

The best bday party we've had yet was when we limited the invite list to 5 close friends. We could go over the top on activities, favors, etc. because the budget stretched so far, and I feel like DD really spent quality time with each of her closest friends. Every gift she got was thoughtful and really specific to her personality. It was such a fun day where I know DD felt really loved.

Massive parties can be overwhelming and IME kids end up just playing with their best friends anyway. I don't mind going to them but I always feel like I'm just checking a box, if it's not actually a good friend of my kids.

Not to mention, I have no interest in going to 40 bday parties a year! (2 kids x 20 classmates each).

[Anonymous]

It’s really hard in big public schools that have multiole classes per grade level. The 1st grade class might have 26 kids. But all her actual friends might be in a different class, but are her friends from K, Girl Scouts, soccer, whatever. Are you going to end up inviting 35 kids? It gets ridiculous.
I made up a particular rule for myself that if was inviting more than 50% of any one group (girls in her class, kids from soccer team, kids from scout troop, etc.), I would invite that whole group. But if it’s two kids from class, two kids from different classes, 2 kids from soccer, I wasn’t going to worry about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DD has been invited to several parties this year and it appears that the rule of inviting the entire class is no longer in play. There are several first grade classes at our school and it appears that the norm is now to just invite the kids you are friends with. Did I miss something?

Because the kids have friends and cousins and family outside of the class. My kids K class is 25 people. And people dont RSVP anymore so if we include friends from soccer, our neighborhood, preK friends we still have playdates with, etc it would be 40 kids. Now, not all 40 would attend but since people dont RSVP you have to keep it open and pay for all of those potential kids. Try finding a location that even allows 40 kids. And people expect pizza and juice and cupcakes and food for adults- to be available but lord knows only 30% of the moms that come to the parties will actually eat a slice of pizza and cake in front of others.

Furthermore, we will send something in to celebrate his birthday in class like donuts.

This - our K class is 25 kids. That's the limit for a lot of venues and we want to invite friends from activities, prior preschool, neighborhood too. And some ppl bring siblings etc. if the class were a little smaller I would have loved to include everyone.

In preschool we did all-class parties bc our kid didn't really have other separate friends yet.

[Anonymous]

I am so much fun without Hennessy

[Anonymous]

My rule for my kids is invite everyone (either whole class or same gender) or less than half (of class or gender). It's fine to prefer a small party of just your friends, it's not fine to invite everyone except the one kid you think is weird.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thank you all (mostly) for your kind replies. DD is our first child, and I wasn't aware that entire class parties usually stop at K.