That's weird. I'd let my kid go but warn her ahead of time that we're not buying anything, that it's just to enjoy in the moment.

I'm 21:44 -- forgot to say I would send my daughter because that poor birthday girl (unless you feel your daughter is too young for makeup, which is a totally valid position at 11 -- not sure how I'll feel when mine is that age). But prep your daughter in advance NOT to give out your email or phone number ("My mom does not allow me to give out her information") and that she won't be buying anything or getting a goodie bag from the party. Hopefully there will be cake, at least.

I had a sister in law that sold Mary K. She was pretty much a creep. It's a huge pyramid scheme where you have to keep bringing people in under you to make money. So I'm surprised if it's a drop-off party ... you're the real target.
Although actually, I didn't find their stuff that bad -- I liked the lipstick and some of the cleaners and hand creams. I ended up buying a ton of the stuff because the SIL roped my sister in. On the upside, I got it all 50% off because my sister was just trying to make her stupid sales commitment, so gave it to me all at cost.

Anonymous wrote:I'm saying don't follow-up something that is tacky with something much tackier - rudeness. You can just simply decline and maybe say cosmetics are too mature for your daughter right now.

I agree with you in general, but these sales really get to me, and I am angry on behalf of the birthday girl, whose party the aunt co-opted.
So I would be saying something quite blunt.

Ugh. People.


But, if she's really excited to go, I'd probably let her. But then again, there's going to be a lot of unhealthy messaging going on because its a party trying to sell makeup to young girls...

I'm saying don't follow-up something that is tacky with something much tackier - rudeness. You can just simply decline and maybe say cosmetics are too mature for your daughter right now.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Email from you to birthday girl's parents (or whoever sent the fist invitation):

"Dear X,
Thank you so much for the invitation, and for the follow-up phone call. We regret that DD will not be able to join in the festivities, as we are not in the habit of going to sales parties, particularly ones disguised as children's birthday parties.
DD will give your daughter her birthday gift as soon as possible. We wish her all the best on her birthday!
Your name."

I would give a gift directly to the birthday girl, because it's not her fault she has such a shockingly low-class family.

No need to be rude or impolite.

Actually, sometimes people need to hear the truth. What if they're fundamentally decent people who are just socially clueless? It would be nice to give them a heads up. If they're socially clueless they won't take an indirect hint.

Anonymous wrote:
Email from you to birthday girl's parents (or whoever sent the fist invitation):

"Dear X,
Thank you so much for the invitation, and for the follow-up phone call. We regret that DD will not be able to join in the festivities, as we are not in the habit of going to sales parties, particularly ones disguised as children's birthday parties.
DD will give your daughter her birthday gift as soon as possible. We wish her all the best on her birthday!
Your name."

I would give a gift directly to the birthday girl, because it's not her fault she has such a shockingly low-class family.

No need to be rude or impolite.

Email from you to birthday girl's parents (or whoever sent the fist invitation):

"Dear X,
Thank you so much for the invitation, and for the follow-up phone call. We regret that DD will not be able to join in the festivities, as we are not in the habit of going to sales parties, particularly ones disguised as children's birthday parties.
DD will give your daughter her birthday gift as soon as possible. We wish her all the best on her birthday!
Your name."

I would give a gift directly to the birthday girl, because it's not her fault she has such a shockingly low-class family.

read the latest about Mary Kay's ingredients ...
http://action.ewg.org/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=2152&tag=201506Cosmetics

OMG this is terrible and I would be planning something more fun to do that day than that party. Crazy!!

So tacky.

What bad taste.

If you think your dd would enjoy the makeovers, I don't think there's any harm in her going, as long as you tell her ahead of time that Larla's aunt will be trying to sell her things, that you won't be giving her any money, and that buying something isn't at all necessary.

Learning to say no in the face of a hard sell is a good skill to learn.

Yikes.

My DD got an invite for a bday party for a friend she doesn't really play with anymore. Both she and I were kind of surprised but she was excited when she saw it was a make over glamour party and thought it would be fun. She discovered that almost all the girls in her grade were invited. I even doubled checked the invite twice because with that number of girls I thought I misunderstood and that it was more of an end of the year type party not a bday party.

Today I get a phone call from some very chippy sounding woman who is telling me how she can't wait for my DD to come to Larla's party and how much fun they are going to have and then she says something about did I get the email and to reminding me that the "goody bags" can be purchased at the party or after the party even. I was really only half listening up until that point but when I heard the "purchase" part. I asked her to repeat that and then told her I was confused because I thought this was a birthday party and what would she have to purchase. That's when she told me she was a Mary Kay lady and that she was doing make overs for the girls at the party. I was just stunned so I didn't really know what to say. I had read the email so this is the first I was hearing about this. She blathered on for a while and eventually it came out that she is Larla's aunt. Is this some kind of new standard in birthday parties for kids? Having a direct sales person host the a kids birthday party ?