Friend annoyed with me over NYE plans

Have we been ghosted OP? You haven’t returned 🤔

YANBU to want to socialise with new mates. YWBVVU in the way you handled it. I’m not surprised your friends were upset!

wow YABU. We have friends we do this with. I had to travel abroad to help an aging parent and even then I apologised for messing up the usual NYE plans! You've got to acknowledge what you're doing or you do absolutely come off as dumping them for new friends (which you have done).

Making other plans AND just not mentioning it is horrible, sorry. You clearly do not value these friends and if you like these people at all, you should grow a backbone and apologise properly.

Like pretty much everyone else on this thread, I think you handled this horribly. You should have told them clearly months ago that you had other plans. This is not how adults with any shred of empathy behave with their friends. I hope they have found better friends to spend their time with now.

'Felt awkward'? Because you presumably had already made/contemplated making other arrangements?
And you decided not to be up-front about this because...?

I would think it's a bit shady yes.
Is there a reason you couldn't/didn't make it a group thing? When did you inform your friend of your NYE plans, since you had made it a tradition?

Of course, you shouldn't be 'forced' to do anything. But the very fact you say you would 'feel' forced, says a lot about how you now view this friendship.

🤣🤣

Didn't even let us know. Typical

Found some shiny new MNetters to hang out with

Yanbu to want to hang out with other people too but they aren't unreasonable for feeling left out and hurt by the choice you've made and from experience it probably isn't this isolated incident that's made them feel this way either, there's probably been a few times you've excluded them.

If you value the friendship, make time for them too, include them in some things you do with this new group too (not all the time just do things sometimes with your old friends on their own, your new friends on their own and occasionally things all together)

Looks like OP's ditched us now...

Totally agree, op really isn’t covering themselves in glory at all.

Yabu because its a long standing arrangement so not unreasonable to expect the status quo. You should have told them in plenty of time for them to make new plans. Its fine to make new friends and make new plans but yabu to have not said anything

Haha! You might show her up by ordering tea at coffee club or something.

Do you have form for such social faux pas? Hmmm...!

@StrawberryJangle I wouldn't care but both my friend and I are in our 70s! She goes to a local weekly coffee club of golden oldies and never once has said come along. I don't bother asking because I don't actually need more friends but the OP seems to be dog in the manger too!

Appalling behaviour. Wow.

I spend every new year with my BIl and SIL in a similar set up as you. My group of fairly new friends did a New Years thing but we still celebrated with BIL and SIL as I enjoy it, it means a lot to us and I can see my friends whenever.

If I had chosen not to spend it in the usual way, I would have had a proper discussion with them so they weren't hanging on for us and could be sure they could make other plans.

You’ve handled it badly ignoring their messages and just going with the other group. You should’ve said that you unfortunately couldn’t make it this year, but hopefully next year. Would’ve given them a chance to make alternative arrangements.

We used to have a similar arrangement w a couple (started when DC were born and we’d stay over or they’d stay at ours). However, due to some changes of circumstance we now go to another more local friends (and have got to know their friends over the past few years do always good to catch up). We always sort this out weeks in advance and our original friends make other plans.

There’s no hard feelings and I’d love to see our original friends again on NYE but it’s just not practical atm.

This.

Also, I think its weird you didn't invite them and let them judge if they wanted to come or not.

We spend every NYE with another couple for the past 5 years. This year they chose to go elsewhere, to another party they had been invited to. Didn't bother us as they told us when they got the invite and weren't hosting so wasn't their place to invite us. Had they hosted and it was friends, not family, I'd have been a little hurt

I was just reading through and had this exact same thought.

They're MY friends, you can't have them as your friends.

Either that or OP is embarrassed of her long standing friends and thinks they are not good enough for new friends.

It all smacks of playground politics and I don't mean the parents.

You say your old friends 'mentioned it' (NYE plans) and you and DH avoided responding. That was cowardly and mean. Your old friends would have assumed NYE would be the same arrangement as normal. You should have been honest then so your old friends could make other plans.

And if you broke the news to your friend a few months back, when you got the invite, they could have gotten used to the idea and made other plans. But you gave them NO choice, you just left them high and dry! They could have made other plans, if they'd known. You've treated them like shit, you really should apologise. I hope your 'new friends' are worth it....

What sort of a friend are you? Not one I'd want for sure.

Why wouldn’t it have worked?

did you think your new friends were too cool…? That your old friends wouldn’t necessarily fit in?

in other words - you absolutely could have invited them - you chose not too - they are acutely aware of that and yeah tbh I think they are rightly pissed off. You should have extended the invite

Wow can you really not see how hurtful you’ve been towards your friends they have been good enough to spend every other new year with just not this new year because like a couple of teenagers you ditched them for newer better friends that’s really shitty of you op.