Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the last two years we only invited 2-3 friends, one year for a sleepover and one year to go to a sporting event

Are you also doing playdates on a regular basis? You don't seem to be doing much of the social work of hosting yet you expect others to host your son.

+1. We dump people who don't reciprocate and would double dump someone who thinks they are entitled to come to our large party when they don't host large parties.
*except special cases. There are some kids who we take care to invite and we know their circumstances

Do you really think this way? Dump people? Double dump? For people who don't host large parties?

I tend to host large parties because my kids and I enjoy them and tend to be more social butterflies with the whole class rather than just having a couple close friends (something that worries me slightly, actually, as close friends become more important later on), but it would not occur to me to bean count how many playdates or parties kids have hosted to see if they make our list or get dumped. I really hope you don't teach your kids that way. You can still teach them that is nice to reciprocate while not stirring up animosity toward folks who can't host. Geez.

OP quit obsessing over your son's number of birthday invites. He gets some and isn't concerned so you're stressed, WHY?

My God the things you people will work yourselves up over. What metric of his worthiness do you think would be improved with more invites? What specific number- 5 more a year? 10?

Here's the thing - if you're only inviting select people to his parties, you can't get upset that he's not getting invited to everyone's parties.

We used to have family-friend parties; I'd invite mostly people I liked to hang out with, whose kids my daughter knows through that. We got invited to a school party once in awhile, but not often.

This year, we invited my daughter's 10 favorite friends from school; shortly after that, the invites started rolling in for those girls' parties.

If you want to get invited to more parties, you probably need to throw bigger parties. (this is true for adult friends too!)

But you say you only invited a few kids for his birthday and he was invited to at least two parties for those kids and the third is still making his invite list?

Unless the other kids whose parties he hasn't been invited to are having whole class parties, I don't understand why you think your son would be invited when he didn't include those children in his celebration. They obviously aren't his closest friends even if they are in soccer together. Now, if those kids are in his class and in soccer together and are inviting 11 of 12 kids from soccer and 23 of 24 kids from the class, the one exclusion being your son, that's a different story. But if they are inviting 3, 6, or even 10 kids, there's a limit and your kids simply aren't as close as you think particularly since your son didn't include them in his list! You did the excluding first, even.

Even laser tag and jump parties have a size limit. The parties are just smaller now. I hope he gets invites soon.

Anonymous wrote:It's wrong, OP, and anti-social. Don't let these DCUM posters who only invite "A" list kids to their kids' parties tell you any differently. It's sad when grown people seek to justify their exclusionary behavior and pass these values on to their kids. I would ask the parents who excluded my kid if there's something about him or her that the other kids don't like. That, or I'd take a good hard look at who my kid thinks is his or her best friend.

I can't stand this sort of exclusionary behavior. It starts here and continues into adulthood. People are always seeking ways to make themselves seem better than others.

WTF are you talking about? OP is inviting 2-3 kids to her child's birthday parties. I'm not sure why you or OP think that OP gets to cull her guests list and others don't. I guess it's fine as long as OP's kid is invited.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the last two years we only invited 2-3 friends, one year for a sleepover and one year to go to a sporting event

Are you also doing playdates on a regular basis? You don't seem to be doing much of the social work of hosting yet you expect others to host your son.

+1. We dump people who don't reciprocate and would double dump someone who thinks they are entitled to come to our large party when they don't host large parties.
*except special cases. There are some kids who we take care to invite and we know their circumstances

lol double dump. I really hope you dont talk openly with your child about "dumping" friends.

It's not exclusion! Stop calling it that! This does happen to some kids, especially those with special needs, but it's not happening to yours. I know a child who was the ONLY kid out of 26 not invited to a party. That's exclusion and a lot of parents noticed this happened and really think those parents are awful. (Before you ask, yes, the excluded child has special needs and behaviors but this is not a thread about that.)

I don't think most parents talk about A lists and B lists for parties in the same way you might talk about A list and B list celebrities. It's more about the ranking of the closeness of friends and I don't take offense.

My child has sometimes been on the B list for invites. I know because the invite comes at the last minute and everyone else has been talking about the party for a while. Sometimes my child is on the A list for close friends. Either way my child doesn't know, and happy to attend when we can. I know parents want to limit parties to a certain size and sometimes it's a venue issue and sometimes it's just the amount of kids they can handle.

I also know the social relationships of 2nd grade are ever changing, especially for boys, and that at this age parents have a big influence over the invite list. It is what it is. There are some parents I'm not a close with so my child may not get the invite even though my child is closer friends with the birthday child than some of the other invitees. It works both ways. Sometimes my child gets invited over other children because I am better friend with the parents. It is what it is and not worth getting upset about.

Anonymous wrote:WTH? You've answered your own question. I am sure you have told your son to pick X number of people to have at his sleepover or go to the game. Other families are doing the same thing and now you want to know why he is excluded. Think about what you just wrote.

Forget the "b-list" nonsense. 2nd grade boys don't think that way. At what point do you think it is ok for OTHER people to invite who they want to birthday parties, though?

Second grade boys don't think that way but some parents DEFINITELY do and make birthday lists accordingly.

I have 3 kids in NW DC, the youngest is now in 3rd. I've seen just about every version of birthday party and playdate "inviting".
-I've seen parents definitely make or tweek or influence the invite lists for their kids all the way through elementary.
-Others will only host play dates with the kids of the "A" list parents.
In this area, parents use their kids to advance their own social ambitions all the time.

Thankfully around 4th grade the kids start to run their own friendships and everything (in my experience with typical and social kids) gets easier. Less parental involvement = much better.

It's wrong, OP, and anti-social. Don't let these DCUM posters who only invite "A" list kids to their kids' parties tell you any differently. It's sad when grown people seek to justify their exclusionary behavior and pass these values on to their kids

I think the "A List" "B List" reference is horrible. But I don't think it is exclusionary to only invite kids to a party that your child is friends with. I don't want to spend $500 a year on my son's birthday parties any more. It's ridiculous. This year we took 4 of his closer friends to play laser tag, and then had cake at our house. It was great. The kids we invited were more shy, quiet boys like DS. But they are the kids that he is actually close with.

OP, do you know the families, socialize with the parents, volunteer at the school, host playdates?

If you really want your son to be included, you need to invite friends over frequently to play (since you do very small birthday parties).

We have 3 kids. If we aren't inviting the whole class, I draw up a list of all the kids who have invited the birthday dc to their parties or frequently for playdates, add in their closest friends if not included, add in a few kids with special circumstances and that is usually it. There are almost always kids the birthday child is friendly with and would like to invite if there was infinite space on the guest list.

OP, I have a second grader too and even the bigger parties like mini golf are smaller now. If you're not inviting a big group I'm not sure how you're feeling excluded.

Anonymous wrote:I'd try an experiment and invite these 10-12 kids you want inviting him to your sons party this year - I'm sure the mom's are prob making in invite lists out of reciprocal party invites.

This. I think it is funny that you host a couple of kids a year and expect your son to be invited every where. Try this or many play dates , I bet he will be included in more parties.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the last two years we only invited 2-3 friends, one year for a sleepover and one year to go to a sporting event

Are you also doing playdates on a regular basis? You don't seem to be doing much of the social work of hosting yet you expect others to host your son.

+1. We dump people who don't reciprocate and would double dump someone who thinks they are entitled to come to our large party when they don't host large parties.
*except special cases. There are some kids who we take care to invite and we know their circumstances

I'd try an experiment and invite these 10-12 kids you want inviting him to your sons party this year - I'm sure the mom's are prob making in invite lists out of reciprocal party invites.