How will you feel next year when your kids are in high school and athletes wear their jersey (or similar) on game days? How will you feel in five years when your kid goes to college and fraternity/sorority members wear their letters?

Your kids will inevitably not be chosen for something at some point in their life, and they will have to deal with it.

Anonymous wrote:My kids are young, but do kids really wear some other kid's bar mitzvah shirt to school? How often?

I teach in a W feeder MS. All the guests wear them on Mon morning. You can tell who the popular kids are. They all have one. The unpopular kids are wearing regular shirts. Also, actual hoodies were popular the last two years so those are actually worn quite often throughout the winter months. Outside of DC, LA, and NYC, who can afford a $55 sweatshirt for each guest, plus catered food, a DJ, a dance coach and backup dancers, private Hebrew tutor, and all of these other trappings? If you have a DD, how do you save up for a wedding to top that 15 years later?

I actually agree with OP. I am a school counselor. I wish schools could enforce a policy where you can't where the shirts, at least the next day. No need to invite everyone, but also teach kids some sensitivity surrounding this area. Kids do need to learn resiliency and to deal with disappointment, but believe me, they know they weren't invited. It just seems unnecessary to face thirty five kids wearing the shirt the next day. Parents can choose whatever favor they want, but it's also an opportunity to have a discussion about kindness and sensitivity.

Anonymous wrote:My DC never got invited to a single bar or bat mitzvah in middle school. Can parents please consider only providing these shirts as party favours on the condition that all kids from the child's grade level are invited? Try to imagine how kids feel to see these shirts week after week.

I don't particularly like the t shirts as favors but you want a person to invite the entire 6 or 7th grade to an event that can easily top $50-$75/head? If your child is not really friends with the bar/bat mitzvah child, why should they be invited? Inviting the entire grade to a party is over by 2 or 3rd grade.

I'm throwing a bar mitzvah and I made sure the party favor was not a tshirt.

Yes it is traditional to wear them to school the next day. It is very cliquey and I think it is terrible att a vulnerable age.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids are young, but do kids really wear some other kid's bar mitzvah shirt to school? How often?

Yeah, I'm a bit stunned that this tacky party favor is still around... Was done more on Long Island than in New Jersey back in the day....

My kid got one from a bday party recently. It is her favorite shirt because it is so incredibly soft.

Anonymous wrote:By age 12 or 13 kids should be able to deal with knowing not everyone gets invited to everything. My kid had well over 100 kids in their grades. No way in hell would we invite all of them.

I agree on both fronts. Your kid needs to be able to handle it and it is not reasonable to invite the whole grade given numbers and cost . He'll forget cost, most venues couldn't fit that many people (bc these events also have lots of family and family friends and is not purely a kids party) even if cost was a non issue.

Anonymous wrote:My kids are young, but do kids really wear some other kid's bar mitzvah shirt to school? How often?

Yeah, I'm a bit stunned that this tacky party favor is still around... Was done more on Long Island than in New Jersey back in the day....

OP. I'm sorry your son doesn't have as many friends as you would like him to have. That is your issue here, and not the t-shirts. Not every kid is in the in-crowd, and that is ok.

Thirteen is just too old to ask kids to do what you are asking.

By age 12 or 13 kids should be able to deal with knowing not everyone gets invited to everything. My kid had well over 100 kids in their grades. No way in hell would we invite all of them.

OP, you're ridiculous. Nobody should change what they're doing because your special snowflake can't accept that not everyone gets invited to everything. You need to teach him how to deal with this as it won't be the only time he's not included in something. But asking other parents to not make the shirts is absolutely insane on your part.

My kids are young, but do kids really wear some other kid's bar mitzvah shirt to school? How often?

My kids wouldn't like it either, but such is life, isn't it? My kids aren't having a bat/bar mitzvah and they haven't received shirts from friends, so I'm not saying this as a parent who has done this, but by 13ish, your child should generally get that life isn't always fair, no?

My DC never got invited to a single bar or bat mitzvah in middle school. Can parents please consider only providing these shirts as party favours on the condition that all kids from the child's grade level are invited? Try to imagine how kids feel to see these shirts week after week.