To be shocked at kids party prices

We charge £20 an hour to rent the hall. If you made the food and baked the cake yourself, decorate cookies as an activity, brought music from home and did party games you could do it comfortably for £150 for an hour and a half party (with 30 mins either side to set up clear up) even with nice food cider is the go to adult drink around these parts.

Probably totally politically incorrect - but when mine were little - I used to cut the numbers to an achievable amount in the early years parties of infant school - to have a ‘girls’ party for my Dd and a ‘boys’ party for my DS.

both were in primary school classes where boy / girl split was pretty 50/50 so I didn’t feel bad only inviting the girls of the class to the princess party etc for my DD and the boys to a ‘space’ party or ‘football’ party

before everyone piles on that boys can like princesses and girls can like football etc - yes of course they can and I totally agree that everyone can like anything and that princesses and dinosaurs and football are not gendered and I don’t think pink is only for girls.

But I couldn’t afford a whole class party and doing a ‘boys party for the boys’ and ‘girls party for my girl’ was a simple way of deciding which half of the the class to invite that seemed easiest when they were little and friendships were very fluid. I wasn’y the only mum to do this - it was pretty common then - though maybe not now?

as they got older and really had firm friends we never did ‘big’ parties any more and then we invited a couple of their closest friends (of either sex ) to spend their day together and do something fun like an outing or sleepover etc.

I know this is totally down to forward planning and luck but we bought a whole load of space hoppers in the end of summer sale at Aldi- I think they ended up being £1 each- and let the kids go wild in the village hall. The kids went crazy for it. Forward planning is everything. If you see it cheap, buy it up and store it, if you have the space. Same goes for post-Halloween sweets, post Christmas chocolate coins, end of season at B&M…

@unicornpower

@butterdish93 where roughly in the country are you? I’m genuinely interested where you can get a bouncy castle for £50! They are £100 minimum by us, and that’s excluding delivery and set up. It came to £145 for a bog standard one! I gave up!

I did 45 kids in a village hall with an entertainer and with everything included. Food, party bags, decorations, entertainer, hall etc it was just under 500, were in the home counties. I think what you have said is spot on

I’m a fan of a village hall party without the bouncy castle. We went to one where they’d made various pirate themed activities, mostly out of cardboard (throw the beanbag in the shark’s mouth, walk the plank, pin the eye patch on the pirate) that was fab.

For my 4yo’s last party we hired the local village hall, turned all the lights off, put some disco lights on and just let them dance! We did a couple of rounds of musical statues/musical chairs, provided a few sandwiches/crisps/fruit/cake and a friend of ours did a couple of magic tricks. Can’t have cost us more than £100.

Totally agree with this. We have just been to one for four of them and it was great. They hired someone where nice, and chipped in for one big cake. We all got assigned one person to get a present for so it cut down on the masses of gifts.

We’ve hired a big soft play for up to 40 and that comes in at about £550 with food.

This is for DS’s 5th birthday. We have invited all his class as it’s their fist year at school and quite a few have done similar which has been really good as a lot of us didn’t know anyone else there when our DC started school as hardly any live within catchment.

DS has no young family members such as cousins so the rest of the invites are to friends he met in nursery etc.

I imagine from yr1 onwards the parties will become a bit more targeted towards smaller groups as friendship groups develop between the children but I’ve found this years parties really good for getting everyone together and am glad they’ve taken place like this.

The parties where too many kids I.e whole class were carnage at nursery/ primary school. Parents where I were used these to show off to each other hiring fire engines or having entertainers etc. Their birthday kid was often overwhelmed You might think you are doing a nice thing not leaving anyone out but the sheer noise in a room plus adults can be overwhelming. I found smaller group parties 10-15 or smaller seemed perfectly lovely and didn’t come with all the expense.

@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER

just sometimes things like that mean the world, and that’s why I want to invite everyone for as long as I can

I want my children to include rather than exclude as much as possible

be the change you want to see and all

Until the eldest was about 10, dd always invited the whole class, so it did come expensive, though a nearby church hall was extremely reasonable to hire, and there were masses of toys for younger ones to play with.

I also used to invite the whole class when dds were younger - dd1 in particular wouldn’t leave anyone out. And although dd is well into her 40s now, I still remember the little boy who said, ‘Thank you for inviting me to your party. Nobody else does.’ 😰
I still think about him - they were around 8 at the time.

We’ve just done a smaller party of 10 cinema on sat morning cheap at £3.50 per head followed by kids meal at Nando’s
but with snacks and table games/ crafts still cost £250 plus

only way to keep cost and workload low is cheap supermarket cake and simple goody bags

when we did party in a hall we had bouncy castle (get one with a slide as it reduced accidents as it increased a flow system iykwim)

and had crafting activity which doubled up as goody bag

cheapest party ( girls ) was at our house
( drop off no parent catering or pressure of their eyes on you !) decorating their own bag that we put bits in for going home
pass the parcel And frozen pizza

I wouldn't skip on the party bags tbh. I think my kids (6&8) have only ever been to one party ever without a party bag or some equivalent, and so I think it's pretty much expected now, even if they don't have much in then at all.

Wacky Warehouse…£10 per child including food and you don’t have to do anything 🙌🏻

400 for 30 kids sounds good

Please reconsider the party bags. I know it sounds grabby and they are usually full of tat but kids love a party bag. Sweets/lolly/chocolate bag and cake are always a winner and an extra ‘something’, for this age you can pick up pencils/rubbers/stickers/bag of plastic fidget toy toys/bouncy balls etc for cheap. Also giving out party bags is one of the things that my kids loved doing at their parties too, and signifies party is over!

I would agree not to invite cousins etc once the kids get older. They tend to get a bit sidelined as the school friends don’t know them.

and yes I would suggest to invite the children who have invited your child to their party, it’s quite rude (imo) not to.

it will be easier when they have started to make more secure friends at school as you can just do something with a select group. However probs best to note now that if you book climbing/trampolining/soft play parties there is usually a 10 children minimum clause.

That sounds about right. We've never done parties like that as we can't afford them and in my experience there will be a couple of whole class parties in reception/year 1 and then nothing.

When our dc have birthdays they choose a film to watch and dinner of their choice.

Please don’t take this the wrong way but they’re 3/4 and it’s just been Christmas. There’s nothing you can hand out after a party that will be useful or treasured forever. The books we’ve been given at this age are usually pulp worthy. Give them some cake and bubbles to take home. At least that’s a bit of fun and the plastic packaging goes into recycling.

Personally after trying loads of things including books we just went with edible in the end for most parties - sweetie cones or similar. Probably better for 5+ though.

id do colouring books and crayons or something like that. Bag of party rings or haribo , job done.

That's a lot of money, but the norm these days I'm afraid 😬

Some tips:

At risk of sounding old-fashioned, do try to but any thoughts of 'competing' or 'keeping up' with other parents out of your mind. Do it all yourself!

As PP has said, invite no more than 6-10 children. Self-cater with the usual healthy dips, sandwiches, crisps, plus supermarket birthday cake etc.

Activities - cheap and cheerful. For a sea/ocean theme, you might want to try something like https://www.scouts.org.uk/activities/flapping-fish/

Children can make their own fishes/whales/starfish as part of the activity, play the game, and then take their creations home with them.

Then the usual, pass the parcel, musical chairs, etc. Four year olds will neither know nor care that it's a £2.50 per head tea and not a £400 event.

Party bag - cake, a hand-written 'thank you' card for the guest and, if the budget allows, a small book - these are great and under £10 for 24 - three each!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/TWIDDLERS-Pack-Colouring-Activity-Books/dp/B0BS9VYB48/

If you do want to spend a bit more on a paid-for event then just limit this to cousins and you can explain that it's 'family only'.

Whole class party are always a bit shit ime. We went for smaller house parties, or the park if the weather was alright or a small group activity, then back to hours for pizza and games.

A full class party with an entertainer in a hall with an entertainer, food and party bags cost between £400 and £500 around here!

Activity type ones (after reception) always seem to be set for 10 kids and are slightly more reasonable at around £350-£400 (both party bags usually included at least!)

Some are even more expensive! A pamper party comes in at around £500 for 6 kids with additional extras that can be added on to that!

I think that sounds good value; about £10 to £12 per child.