Children's Party - Rant!

clint_S

I find the most annoying thing is when they attend your kids party and then you find out a month later that they didn't offer an invite to your kid to their party. I've even had one mum ring on the day and ask if she could bring her niece as well.

clint_S

Lily-Rose wrote: »

Now that ^ is a bit harsh if you ask me! Calling people rude and 'self entitled' because they didn't bring their 4 year old to a party. Coz God forbid they have a life and a family, and something may have come up; family emergency, sickness, illness, or shock horror, they forgot! Bit judgemental! So you don't think it was rude not to turn up after stating you were going too?





I agree with these 2 ^. It's entirely up to the OP what she does, but IMO, ruling out EVER having a party for her child again because of this one bad experience is unreasonable. I mean,what if said child WANTS a party when they are 6 or 7 or 10 or 11. My daughter certainly wanted parties at that age. I would not have dreamed of saying no because one party didn't go my way 5 to 8 years ago! I'm sure the OP stated she would have smaller parties not no parties.

And I agree that the time of the party was late. Most 4 year olds would be in bed at 6 or 7. Some are, some aren't, but surely you'd know the bed time of your child before accepting the invite? Even if people said yes, they may have thought better of it, and not wanted their infant child to be up so late, And a text was to much? and not everyone has the social etiquette to let people know. They have busy lives, something else may have come up, and they are probably not very close to the parent in question, so it wasn't a top priority to let them know... (and I'm sorry, but I can't believe that the OP is close to all 13 of these parents; she probably barely knew some of them...) Not top priority but a quick text was all that was required not a letter explaining why. Plus most invites have the parents phone numbers so there really isn't an excuse to saying that they didn't know her.

Plus this is probably the 25th invite their collective children have had between them this year. So faffing about trying to let the OP know their child wasn't coming, would not have been very high on their list of priorities. I know *I* would have made every effort to let the parent know, but many people I have known over the years, wouldn't bother. If it was the 25th invite and they had already had enough why accept? again all it would have taken was a quick text.

If you DO ever have another party supersaver2, (and maybe try again with a smaller amount of kiddies, say 7?) then have it at 4pm, right after school So excluding children of working parents, which annoys me about stay at home mums, so everyone can come straight after and is less likely to forget, and don't have it in the school hols! (Well it wouldn't be if it's straight after school!)

No-one is saying you are depriving your child of anything supersaver2, but I think to say you will never have another party for your child EVER because of this one thing happening, is a bit much!

A quick text was all that was needed, no excuse.

Spendless

catkins wrote: »

In my area it only ever seems to be parents who park with no thought.

The council put yellow lines along part of my road as they said it was dangerous for children to have to cross between parked cars. So all the residents make sure their cars are not parked there between 8am - 9am and 3pm - 4pm and what happens? All the parents park along there as though they think those yellow lines are there for them to park close to the schools.




But it should not be commonplace. Are we supposed to just accept that rudeness and no manners are normal now?

Surely now with mobile phones, social media etc it is much easier to let someone know you can't make it to their party/event? So even less reason to accept rudeness




If parents thought the time was "iffy" why say their child was going to attend? Stop defending rude, ill mannered parents who are teaching their children to also be rude and ill mannered

What exactly do you want people to do about it? You cannot change how other people behave, you can only change yourself.

When it happened to me, at my DD;s 7th birthday, I changed the way I did parties from then on in and haven't had a no-show since.

dirty_magic

supersaver2 wrote: »

Wow, things are getting heated!

Very interesting that people assume I'm 'mum' when in fact I'm 'Dad'! My wife normally would organise parties etc but she's just finishing treatment for breast cancer so it's fallen onto unorganised, 'bad planner' Dad to sort!

I can't answer all posts individually but I still think it's the height of bad manners from many people I've seen for over 3 years near enough daily.

My daughter was upset so not sure why I'd risk a repeat. At least taking her and her 2 closest friends out for pizza and cinema is guaranteed to cause no upset, even though that is appearing to make me a bad parent in the eyes of some.

Also I'm accused of being bitter and sulky with some not pleasant traits! All I wanted was to organise a party for my daughter and friends, nobody had to bring a present, they just had to come as they said they would! Some ver harsh posters on here.

I don't think not having a big party makes you a bad parent. As she gets older she might prefer close friends anyway. Little kids play with anyone, but as they get older they stay friends with the ones they get on well with and the others become acquaintances. I was quite introverted as a child, a big class party wouldn't have been fun for me because I only socialised with a few of them anyway.

catkins

Spendless wrote: »

What exactly do you want people to do about it? You cannot change how other people behave, you can only change yourself.

When it happened to me, at my DD;s 7th birthday, I changed the way I did parties from then on in and haven't had a no-show since.

Well posters stopping making excuses for the rude parents would be a start. It is not acceptable and I can't believe some posters are making out it is

bossymoo

Aww id be devastated too.

Surely they can't all have had such an emergency that none of them could call to cancel? agree it's very bad manners.

Wishing your wife a speedy recovery.

I find with our parties it's the opposite, some people assume they can just bring siblings along without checking first! DD had a party 8 weeks ago, I invited 14, 12 accepted and 16 came!!! However, from previous experience I had extra party food boxes and managed to stretch the food around... They did have a good time tho...

freyasmum

duchy wrote: »

Because mental health issues, stress, poor self esteem ,white collar crime, infidelity and job losses never happen in nice middle class villages ?

I think you need a reality check if you really believe that.

Lily-Rose wrote: »

Coz God forbid they have a life and a family, and something may have come up; family emergency, sickness, illness, or shock horror, they forgot! Bit judgemental!!

All good points, and you might expect SOME guests to have unavoidable last minute emergencies come up.

But surely 75% of invited (and RSVP'd) guests ALL having last minute family emergencies/mental health problems/forgetting/ongoing health issues?

That all sounds a bit midsommer to me - the unluckiest little village I know of.

Surely if you have mental health problem/other health issue, you RSVP with the proviso that you may not be able to actually come depending on how you feel, this setting the host up for a potential no show?

Definitely some of them may have been caught up elsewhere but the fact is, the majority of the 9/12 (if i remember rightly) who said they would come and then didn't are just plain rude!

Loz01

Lily-Rose wrote: »

Now that ^ is a bit harsh if you ask me! Calling people rude and 'self entitled' because they didn't bring their 4 year old to a party. Coz God forbid they have a life and a family, and something may have come up; family emergency, sickness, illness, or shock horror, they forgot! Bit judgemental!

Yes we all have emergencies and sickness and illness but whats the excuse of the people who didn't bother to RSVP the OP or just didn't didn't turn up? Laziness,thats what.

ska_lover

ahh sorry OP, it is a real shame but I am sure you are more upset /hurt by it than your LO. Kids are so resilient.

I have to agree with the posters who are saying that the time of the party was a bit late IMO, it may have been far better as a mid afternoon party rather than 6-8pm.

Some might think it a big precious, but many will not stray from their routine even at birthdays, Christmas, I know someone like this

What a lovely idea, and I hope your LO has a nice birthday