Op, your options are: have your son attend the party on his own
Or
The whole family declines the invitation.

If you were to go, you would have to spend money on an expensive gift, to also pay for a sitter is too much asked.

Just find an excuse to not go.

You cannot deny that you are offended. Going as a threesome is not going to change that and you will not enjoy yourself

I am so sorry that your DD will be disappointed, OP. But she is not invited and you "fixing" it for her so she can go is a bad message. I also agree it would have been more polite to invite the whole family, but it is clear this was not an oversight- DD was not included. You should respect this and move on. If it were me, I would get a sitter or arrange a sleepover for DD, and go with the rest of the family.

I am a firm believer in letting our kids experience disappointments, failures and setbacks in life, hard as it is- because this is where they will build resilience, and learn that they can face and conquer adversity. This is a minor disappointment but you should let your daughter experience it. You can commiserate with her because it trult sucks that she was not invited. But she wasn't. And she will be sad, but she will get over it.

Anonymous wrote:Please try to understand and put this in perspective. Very often, in terms of friends, only the children are invited (the same age, 13 year old children) to Bar Mitzvahs. They are incredibly special events. Otherwise, they are mainly family and very close adult friend events. And they are usually extremely expensive. Often they are as expensive as wedding receptions. To compare the invitation to a Bar Mitzvah to the invitation to a birthday party is a complete mos characterization of its importance. If you, as an adult friend, received an invitation, you should feel completely honored that you made the list. Be assured that many, many did not. To ask that your 9 year old daughter be added to the list would be completely inappropriate. This is not an event for her. Feel honored. Don't feel slighted in the least. And find your daughter a sitter for the night.

+1

I am not Jewish, but feel that if the names were specified, it was 100% not an oversight. Perhaps, as a rule, the honored boy does not want 9-year old girls there? Since it is "his" party, I think we should honor that. Tell dd it is not a party for kids under 10. Get a sitter or playdate. End of story.

OP - You are out of line. If you were actually related to Bar Mitzvah family and DD was not invited, then you can be annoyed. You're not related and it's customary to invite only friends or only friends and their parents. Every Mitzvah we've attended has only invited our kid, our kid and me, or our kid and both parents. Siblings are usually not included. PS, I'm not Jewish.l

Why is NO ONE listening to the Jewish people on this thread?

PP you aren't Jewish, are you?

OP, I agree with your husband that this rude, and inevitably it will hurt your 9 year old's feelings. I would send your son if he wants to go, and you and husband do something with daughter. Personally, I would NEVER invite both parents plus one child only. Its just rude. I would not make a point of telling the people why you are staying home, but if they ask tell them the truth. Your daughter's feelings are way more important than some party. And I am culturally American FWIW.
I am flabbergasted that so many people are OK with excluding only one member of a family when that one member is a nine year old. You either have kids only, adults only, or families plus all kids. To me its the equivalent of inviting a wife but not a husband to a wedding. Tacky and rude.

Please try to understand and put this in perspective. Very often, in terms of friends, only the children are invited (the same age, 13 year old children) to Bar Mitzvahs. They are incredibly special events. Otherwise, they are mainly family and very close adult friend events. And they are usually extremely expensive. Often they are as expensive as wedding receptions. To compare the invitation to a Bar Mitzvah to the invitation to a birthday party is a complete mos characterization of its importance. If you, as an adult friend, received an invitation, you should feel completely honored that you made the list. Be assured that many, many did not. To ask that your 9 year old daughter be added to the list would be completely inappropriate. This is not an event for her. Feel honored. Don't feel slighted in the least. And find your daughter a sitter for the night.

OP, here is a thought. You said your son was invited to their older chid's party 7 years ago.

Seven years is a long time. Circumstances change.

Many, many people are not in the same place financially as they were 7 years ago. Perhaps they are throwing a smaller party.

Another possibility is that in 7 years, their extended family could have expanded greatly. New cousins, nieces, nephews, BILs and SILs, etc. Where they might have had space last time to invite extra children such as your son, they might not have that luxury this time around due to their extended family growing in size.

A final possibility (and I think this is the most likely) is that your son was invited last time as a "guest" of their youngest son, to help entertain him. Your son might actually have been a guest of the little brother, and not the older brother. This time around, since the boys are friends, your son is a true guest, and not the playmate for little brother. In both parties, you and your husband were actual guests. Your daughter does not fit the role of friend of the guest of honor, nor is she a playmate for anyone in the family, which is why she is not invited.

It seems like it isn't unusual not to invite the entire family from other people's experiences. It is their prerogative to invite how ever many people they can accommodate. However, I do understand OP's feelings about her dd being left out.

I'd be sure not to blow the situation out of proportion in front of dd because it will make it worse for her and something she likely won't ever forget.

Instead, I'd just explain to dd that they can only invite so many people and leave it at that. Probably the less said in front of her the better.

So if a couple only has one child the child has to invited to every event or else you are leaving out one member of the family? And in this case you say it is totally wrong to not invite the DD because she is the only family member not invited but then you wouldn't invite the other neighbor who has twin 9 yr old daughters because its okay because there are two family members left out?

You have got to know that this is a different situation. With one child, not invited, it's the case separating grown-ups from children. I did not say in this case it's wrong not to invite an only child. But I will say with twin 9 year old daughters, it would be wrong to invite the parents and one twin and leave the other twin home.

How do you know they invited all the neighbor's kids? Their son wants his good friend there. The parents want the neighbor's there who they feel are good friends and want them to share in the joy of their son's bar mitzvah. The daughter is not friends with the kid. it is not cold nor is it poor form. If the OP feels too hurt by all this, then don't go. But don't expect you will have the same relationship with your neighbor.

I was responding to the pp who said that is what she did for her son's BM...you know, the pp I quoted?

Anonymous wrote:pp here again. If it's the norm, why did the neighbors go out of their way to explain why DD wasn't invited as a 2 year old? was the DS invited for the older kid?

also

We did this for my son's BM. We invited many neighbors and not their kids. If we invited every neighbor's kid, it would have been an extra 30 kids. At $100 a pop, I wasn't going to spend an extra $3,000 on kids that my son wasn't friends with and had no interest in having there.

this is completely different. If you invited the neighbors and excluded all their kids - that's different than inviting all the kids but one.

How do you know they invited all the neighbor's kids? Their son wants his good friend there. The parents want the neighbor's there who they feel are good friends and want them to share in the joy of their son's bar mitzvah. The daughter is not friends with the kid. it is not cold nor is it poor form. If the OP feels too hurt by all this, then don't go. But don't expect you will have the same relationship with your neighbor.

Anonymous wrote:Ok I am one for not inviting kids to weddings and all but this is fucked up.

You do NOT invite an entire family and leave one child out. OP your neighbor is cheap and being an asshole. How would they feel if they all got invited to something and one of their children was left out.

The proper thing to do would have been to invite your DS only. What assholes.

So if a couple only has one child the child has to invited to every event or else you are leaving out one member of the family? And in this case you say it is totally wrong to not invite the DD because she is the only family member not invited but then you wouldn't invite the other neighbor who has twin 9 yr old daughters because its okay because there are two family members left out?

Ridiculous. Invite who you want - if people get all offended like this PP because of how many kids they have and how they feel that dictates who gets invited where...tough. Those people are going to be super sensitive and offended no matter what you do.

In the OPs case. I say one parent go with the son and one parent stay home with the daughter.

Anonymous wrote:pp here again. If it's the norm, why did the neighbors go out of their way to explain why DD wasn't invited as a 2 year old? was the DS invited for the older kid?

also

We did this for my son's BM. We invited many neighbors and not their kids. If we invited every neighbor's kid, it would have been an extra 30 kids. At $100 a pop, I wasn't going to spend an extra $3,000 on kids that my son wasn't friends with and had no interest in having there.

this is completely different. If you invited the neighbors and excluded all their kids - that's different than inviting all the kids but one.

OP here, yes DS was invited and did attend the older child's Bar Mitzvah