My child is 4 and we get invited to a lot of parties. I decline every party at a bounce house, which is 90% of them. Though we always go to the party if it's a good friend of mine or his. But if it's a classmate that he's never mentioned much or isn't friends with we decline.

I find birthday parties annoying and my child has never shown much interest in them. My child has plenty of opportunities to socialize with friends through preschool, sports, and playdates. I don't think birthday parties are very important.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Or Option C, I suck it up and let my kids go, because THEY love birthday parties and celebrating their friends.

I’m talking about the parents who choose not to attend for family time or other reasons.

People do this? Gross

Depends on the age, but DS feels so sad when he's not invited to a party but his friends are, so if he's invited, I suck it up and take him.

We do tell him but luckily he forgets when and whose party. There were so many in January and February and exactly when some viruses were going around. We stopped getting him excited in case he can't make it.
In pk4 they seem to invite the whole class, so not like nobody is going to show up or that he doesn't have a chance to go next year.
He puked one weekend and had a pink eye the next weekend.
He likes all the kids- every day there is a new "best friend".