AIBU - siblings at parties!

How incredibly rude of your guests! I’m not surprised you didn’t want to host again. I always think what a lovely gesture it is if anyone invites me or my children to their home and prepares food for us, there is no need for anyone to be that ungrateful 🥲

That’s awful - and thankfully more extreme than I’ve ever had the misfortune to experience.

You do find the CF parents noticeably pushing their CF children towards the party food etc though

We used to do traditional parties at home, with party games and home made food, and sometimes had a magician. The last party we had, all 10 invited guests turned up, and we acquired 6 siblings too. There was plenty of food, but we had to bring in the garden table and chairs so that everyone could sit down for tea. Some of the mothers stayed, didn’t help at all, and were really critical of the food - told me chocolate ganache made with chocolate and cream was far too rich for children, moaned about the sausages being halal, children don’t want to eat cucumber and raw pepper at a party, her child only drank sparkling water, etc etc. We didn’t have another party after that.

If it’s a public space like a soft play it’s fair enough to pay for your younger child to go into that public space, supervised by their parent, but not to join the party table or take a party bag. That’s cheeky! Their parents should buy food for them.

Obviously no siblings if it’s in the party child’s house or a private space.

The parents who say “they come as a package” are the worst re this.

Well, no, the present and it's value in inverse proportion to the parent's entitled behaviour.
Guaranteed they'll be the ones with the most thoughtless cheapest present if any at all.

Most people are completley understanding of the fact names are on invites and in each class there is usually only 1 or 2 like this and they get known for that and the invites will dry up. As you can see their cases of cheeky fuckery are so severe they just cannot get their head around why it's wrong.

Those same people will be extremely polite and will not dream of bringing uninvited siblings to the parties of kids whose mums they are friends with or where they see social climbing opportunities for themselves.

So it's not always innocent and naive. Far from it. They are typically bullies in others ways and push their way in otherwise too but like all bullies they'll be perfectly pleasant and kind to some people.

They are usually social climbing scum.

I think its fine as long as they check in advance and offer an option 'please can I either bring sibling or drop and go' and at least a few days in advance.
For my youngests 5th, I had 2 parents message me at 10 pm day before and 1am day of the party. And 1 of these was a total cf - their older children ate at least 8 of the themed party cupcakes between them before food was even served, so them some of DD's friends didn't get one and the mum just watched and laughed 'well they are growing boys' and went crazy on bouncy castle and hurt younger children. They never got invited again!

Tell me about it. I hosted a garden party for a small number, a couple did drop off but loads stayed. They all live a few mins walk away, had my number, but not good enough 😂 My Mum was like ‘why are the parents staying?!’ 😂

DH and I led all our own entertainment. I ended up leading a dance routine to Superman! By Blacklace (slightly obsessed with their tracks for parties!) in front of these parents 😂 to be fair, they were supportive and 1 said both my DH & I were in the wrong job and would be fab pro party entertainers, which was kind 😂

Out its not just at home, if you host 5 kids at home, the parents still stay and some still expect to bring uninvited siblings. I made a comment above why do you need to stay and drag the siblings along when it's a garden party for a few kids and kids in something like year 2 so been through three years of school.
The culture of thinking of others is gone and it's all me me me.

@OutandAboutMum1821 if I could afford a family sized home at 90s prices rather than a tiny flat, I’d be hosting at home too!

Hopefully 2 presents were given to the birthday boy/girl as 2 guests attended.

Wow this one has run and run today!

Parties have changed over time:

’90s weekday party- Child from age 5 who’s party it was got collected with school with 5 friends. They were taken to their home by their Mum, possibly with Nana/Auntie/another Mum helping, They played party games, ate tea, sang happy birthday. They all got collected at 6pm. Absolutely no parents stayed and absolutely no siblings attended, ever.

Nowadays-

Host’s perspective- I don’t want to host at home because children are poorly behaved/I can’t fit all the parents and uninvited siblings in. I don’t live near my extended family and have nobody to help manage this. I’m forced to pay an already extortionate cost for a soft play package. I’m then forced to deal with all the awkwardness around uninvited siblings and feel caught out that I don’t have enough party bags for siblings I had no idea were even attending as they didn’t even ask me.

Guest’s perspective- I’d love to drop off, but I’m expected to stay, either because the host expects that or I don’t trust how my own and/or other people’s children will behave. My other half is at work/I’m a single parent/we got used to doing everything as a nuclear family during Covid. I have nobody else to leave my other child/ren with. It’s quite nice to chat to other parents as I don’t know anybody locally. We’re all here because it’s the weekend, and we are all driving together elsewhere for the rest of the day.

Gosh I wish I was parenting in the ‘90s! 😂Sooooooo much simpler all round!

I think this is also rude. You’re putting the hosting parent in a shitty position; if both children were invited then they’d both get an invite. Statistically you’re not going to be the only single parent at the party, so how many extra children end up being hosted?!

If I have to take younger sibling too, and it’s a soft play style party, I just pay on the door and older one goes into party room with her friends whilst I’ll play/eat with younger sibling in main area. I would feel very awkward about asking for siblings to be catered for!

It's a public place. Your rage about this is dripping off your comment. Unclench, it's a kids party 🤷🏼‍♀️

That is very rude. I would stop inviting your child

My DS is in year 1 and has known most of his friends from preschool. I have a younger child at preschool where many of the other younger siblings now go too - so pretty much everyone knows each other and siblings are friends. We haven’t hit the stage where you just drop them off at a party.

It’s the norm round here to bring younger kids! I have always just accounted for child invited plus sibling/s. I would say the only exception was something like going to clip and climb where there is only a small number of children invited/it wouldn’t be appropriate. Never thought about it as being weird.

I don't see how it's making anyone selfish and entitled. As far as they know they're just being taken to a soft play and told that their sibling is at a party but they can have a sandwich in the cafe.

Anytime extra children have been at parties I've been at it's rarely anything to do with the child's particular desire and almost all about convenience. It's not worth making a specific childcare arrangement for the other child of the other parent happens not to be free. And crucially, in all my children's classes, nobody would be expected to.

The entire conversation I have had last time I had a softplay party for my was something like:
Friend: Thanks for the invitation. Fred is definitely free. I'll need to bring Jo as well if that's OK, I'll pay for her obviously
Me: Of course, no worries. I'm pretty sure Jane will be bringing both her two as well so they'll be able to play together.

Job done. No boundaries crossed, no offence, nobody thinking they are getting one-up on anyone, nobody being entitled. A complete non-event.

And missing out and getting upset need to be learnt and practiced for situations they'll have to encounter in 10 or 15 years time.

It's about the importance of teaching children not to be entitled and selfish and that other people's needs and boundaries are worthy of respect. And where it could lead if you raise entitled lazy all about themselves kids looking at e amples set by some.
And that it's okay to miss out and be upset.

To be fair one time when I brought DC2 to the same softplay as a siblings party some of the boys in their class did encourage him to go absolutely feral. Maybe enough parties will lead to a life of crime.

Lol hilarious!!

Why has this gone from going to a soft play party to becoming a sex offender? Truly odd turn of events.

Wow. That's a really impressive, gigantic leap of nonsense.

I've never asked anyone this on here before but, and I mean this genuinely, are you ok? That's a really strange post based on pure imagination