Anonymous wrote:I notice a theme of being invited to a party that starts at a certain time and when you arrive at the appointed time, the hosts are not ready. Do people now just routinely schedule the start time on the assumption that everyone will be late?

(I have to admit that, in order to get my inlaws to arrive on time, I sometimes tell them an earlier start time than I actually want. Because they WILL be late and if the event includes dinner & children, we'll have a nightmare on our hands...)

This confuses me too. As someone who is punctual, I am always showing up to parties that aren't "ready" even when arriving at the correct start time.

Anonymous wrote:I went to a kids birthday party that was held in the workout room of the parents' apartment building. There were several activities like a bean bag toss, but unfortunately it only took about three minutes to do all of the activities, so the kids were almost immediately bored and wound up running around & yelling in this small room with mostly nothing to do.

But the oddest part was that there were bunches of balloons, and of course the workout room didn't have a real ceiling but did have a bunch of sprinklers with sharp edges. So about every two or three minutes a kid would let go of a balloon and it would pop when it hit a sprinkler or a sharp/rusty edge on the exposed pipes. The workout room had a wood floor and almost nothing else to absorb the sound, so every balloon burst was like a gunshot going off and several kids would cry or be scared.

OMG! This one made me laugh so hard I cried. This is hilarious.

Anonymous wrote:My husbands relatives assign potluck dishes for their annual holiday party. With a recipe to follow. NO substitutions!!

Oh, good lord. And I thought it was irritating when my MIL just tells me what to bring rather than asking what I'd like to provide!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, except that the PP had mentioned that she was Indian as well, and very familiar with how such events usually happen. The hosts just sounded rude.

The Indian-ness of that PP baffles me. She should know that serving food late is customary. If I was posting about a party with rude Indian hosts, I would have said, "I know that at Indian parties food is usually served later, but...." That story just sounds made up to me.

I'm the poster of that story - not made up but think what you want. I'm Indian with a fully Indian family and things are never THAT late so maybe we're just weird. I realize that dinner at an Indian party isn't at 6 pm but my family doesn't keep guests strarving until 10 pm so that they give up on dinner and hit the fast food places. It's all about hospitality - if you have enough heavy, hot snack food from 6 pm onwards, it's understandable if dinner is at 9-10 pm bc you know no one is starving. A mini samosa and dry snack mix isn't going to tide people over for 4 hrs regardless of how much they're attuned to culture. I find that while lots of Indians may prefer a very late meal, at parties they start serving earlier to accommodate kids, older people etc. Maybe I hang out with weird people and these other Indians are normal but it strikes me as inconsiderate to starve your guests and then blame the whole culture.

Anonymous wrote:Ladies, please stop picking fights with each other. This thread is hilarious and you are about to kill the mood.

+1 This thread is hilarious. I laughed out loud (for real) at the party in the workout room where the balloons kept popping and scaring the kids. I don't know why that is so funny, but it is. To me, at least.

My husbands relatives assign potluck dishes for their annual holiday party. With a recipe to follow. NO substitutions!!

Ladies, please stop picking fights with each other. This thread is hilarious and you are about to kill the mood.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Re Midwestern garage parties:

I'm from Ohio, and it is basically using the garage in place of a tent if it's nice enough to be outside. This is what our family and many friends did for graduation parties, etc. You have a shady place to put the food and sit. A garage open to the driveway provides a bigger overall space than a room inside most houses, and kids can run around outside with adults around. Friends and family can wander in and out of the house. I don't see what's so strange about it.

Yep. Ohioan here, too, and it is so common, I can't even think why someone might think it weird. But, now that you mention it, I don't think I've been to an outdoor party in the DC metro area that was in a garage. Maybe just because many people here don't have garages?

And for the original "garage party" poster who asked what to call a party held in a garage, it's called "a party".

No, we have garages out here. We just do not hold parties in them. Garages are grotty places to store your cars, kids' bikes, outdoor equipment like snow shovels, and the like. Parties are of course held outside, but, if so, then on a deck, lawn, patio, etc. People can mill around or go inside, whatever they like. But never is the garage a part of it. The garage is (unless you are one of those people who have paid to have your garage super tarted up like Jay Leno's garage or something like that) really not for anyone outside of the family to see. It would be like, hmm, I don't know, having a party in . . ..hmmm. . .I cannot think of a less appealing part of a house than a garage, actually! I guess: maybe like having a party in your unfinished downstairs storage room, amongst the furnace,ac, w/d, and exposed pipes? Most people would not do this unless they are about 18-22 or a few years removed from college.

Who is the we? Your use of "grotty," "tarted up," and "amongst" are dead giveaways that you're not American. And who says that Brits aren't snobs?

Anonymous wrote:Well, except that the PP had mentioned that she was Indian as well, and very familiar with how such events usually happen. The hosts just sounded rude.

The Indian-ness of that PP baffles me. She should know that serving food late is customary. If I was posting about a party with rude Indian hosts, I would have said, "I know that at Indian parties food is usually served later, but...." That story just sounds made up to me.

Wow these are crazy! Our only odd one was when my aunt sent an evite for her dd bday party, in the evite it asked each of us to sign up to bring a main dish, app, or dessert.
This wasn't just a big family potluck, this was a 4 year olds bday party, like on of us was supposed to sign up to bring hot dogs and hamburgers and cake or something...

I notice a theme of being invited to a party that starts at a certain time and when you arrive at the appointed time, the hosts are not ready. Do people now just routinely schedule the start time on the assumption that everyone will be late?

(I have to admit that, in order to get my inlaws to arrive on time, I sometimes tell them an earlier start time than I actually want. Because they WILL be late and if the event includes dinner & children, we'll have a nightmare on our hands...)

I took my dd to a surprise b-day party for one of her kindy classmates. It was on a Friday night, in the winter. The family didn't tell anyone that there was no visitor parking near their townhouse. We had to park a couple of blocks away and walk back in cold and dark. We arrived 5 minutes early, and were the first ones there. The parents were just starting to get ready! The house was filthy. I asked if I could help. They set me to cleaning veggies for the veggie tray. Don't get me wrong, my offer to help was sincere, but I didn't expect to be peeling carrots and chopping celery for someone I barely knew! The next mom who showed up was asked to blow up balloons! There was nothing ready to occupy the child guests, either.

After the guests had finished working, we were expected to sit in the small, dirty, livingroom and wait for the birthday girl. The birthday girl had been taken out by relatives, and wasn't brought back until an hour into the "party." Then, she threw a hissy because her surprise party wasn't the kind of party she wanted (she yelled about how she had asked for a party at a certain place, and that some of the guests were not to her liking!). Instead of taking the b-day girl aside, the dad yelled at her and smacked her butt in clear view of the guests. Awkward! She still backtalked and sulked through the whole party.

Finaallly, there was food-- but not enough for everyone to get more than a few bites. Despite the b-day girl's mood, the parents had her open the gifts in front of everyone. She was less openly rude than before, but showed little interest or gratitude. Then, they had a "clown," who was obviously a family friend, with a lame act that verged on offensive at points. I would've taken my kid home, but we were literally packed in, with the clown blocking the only exit from the livingroom!

To finish off the night, we had to wait in line to leave, because they brought coats down from the upstairs in bunches, instead of letting us get them, or trying to find our coats in the pile. Of course, we were the first there, so dd's and my coats were on the very bottom-- aaah! We hightailed it out of there, before they asked us to clean everything up!

My DH took my child to a horse riding birthday party at a horse riding place really far out in the country. The party was from 11-1 and no food was served. Our kid was starving and it took forever afterwards to get food because the place was so far out. Would have been ok if the invites had warned of this so they could have eaten beforehand.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can cite many examples of ginormous Cleveland Park homes (usually paid for or owned by grandparents since the couple with the kid usually worked for politically perfect ngo's or had cutsie "cool jobs" as documentary producers or some such sh*t) where there were "stations" for the 3-4 yo to shuttle through, an elaborate spongy or felt "craft"and a hay maze in the backyard. In 90º weather, they eccentrically had no air conditioning in the house and I had to beg the hostess for a dusty glass of tepid tap water. Then there was there was the party in the Palisades at a 4 story, Martha Stewart perfect mansion complete with 4 flights of tightly winding stairs (which was awesome to navigate with 3 yo) Of course, there were "station activities" on each floor. The crowning moment was when the hostess stood in front of the group bewildered parents that had been sequestered to the back porch. She forced us to all smoosh in together and say: "cheese" for a photo-op with her GIGANTIC Canon 7D that was so unwieldy that as she went to focus the lens she lost her footing and fell face first down into the porch in front us and actually smashed the camera to the floor. I don't generally laugh at such things but, many snickers were stifled while feigning attempts were made to help her get off the ground. She was physically unhurt but her pride and her 3k+ Canon were totaled. If the hostess is reading this now, just know you will NEVER be forgotten.

Wow, why so full of contempt? Your post is pretty vile. You're the one that sounds full of yourself.

Wow. The thread asks for odd bday party stories. This one was frickin' odd. I have contempt for these types of parties--maybe in your life people are nice and invite kids to these things because they like people. In my world that is rarely the case. These parties are orchestrated freak shows and represent the worst aspects of over the top parenting styles. The kids don't have fun, because the parents don't really feel welcome, too many activities overwhelm everyone and it is all so bizarre.

I'm really enjoying this thread and haven't been to anything this bad... Well, we were invited for a big (by evite) first birthday at noon. I called a few days before and let them know we'd be leaving early due to DH having to go into office (we only have one car and bday and office were far apart). We arrived promptly at noon and there us no birthday child. Only the mom setting up and not dressed yet (she said - hi, I haven't changed yet) No lunch. No food out. Our toddler looked around blsnky. I furtively checked my iPhone to confirm timing, and yes, I was right on time. So I offered to help out, 2 guests arrived by 1, still no food. Birthday boy arrived at 1. We left at 1:30 and had to stop at mcdonalds bc none of us ate.