All 4 of us to attend bday party?

Wait, I think it’s totally fine! At nursery age they’re likely inviting because they want to make friends too. I’ve had 4 nursery parties this year and each one has had both parents attend with their child - at people’s houses (including my very small house!) I’m a single parent so not me but almost everyone else unless someone was working at the weekend. They were welcome - part of the point was the adult socialising - at nursery age at least. Ask if you can to make sure.

This - what if everyone decided to do the same??

Just ask the parents if it’s the sort of party where both parents are attending or if they’d prefer if just one of you. Some parents don’t mind at all if they’ve got the space.

That seems like a stretch. We're planning a garden party for our daughter soon and I wouldnt think twice if both parents came. Obviously I'm in the minority as shown in the uproar on this thread. But it wouldn't bother me in the slightest.

Should you, DH, baby and toddler invite yourselves to someones house you dont know because of a party invite? No.

I think host should reasonably expect a parent to stay as the children are so young and while baby probs wouldnt count, id leave baby with the parent not going. Unless theres a backstory where host has a massive property and grounds theres unlikely room for multiple families do all do this so assume no one else is and follow suit unless the host says otherwise

It just isn't that clear cut. The child isn't going to be left so at least one parent is also invited by default. Now it might be most common for it to only be one parent but it doesn't follow that two parents is utterly unreasonable.

It's not like an older child being invited and no adults expected to stay.

But you don’t invite yourself to people’s homes to do it; surely you can see how rude that is?

Unless they have a mansion then absolutely not when at home. If you’re not a single parent then it’s ridiculous. If baby is breastfed then surely taking the big kids to parties are what dads are for?

This is a weirdly bitter thing to say? If you want to be weird about it I said 'at least 1'. We just both enjoy watching our daughter play with friends, no one's ever acted weird about it and I've seen others do it. We don't use kids parties as our social life. Not everything needs to be a big drama.

Doesn’t the fact only one other child has this make you realise you can’t pretend you’re invited and use it as your social life?

I’ve never seen this and my child was private educated qirh some families having huge houses, never have I seen the whole family front up.

Good grief you can’t do this, your child is invited not, you. You take your child and one of you waits, you don’t pretend you’ve all been invited. How utterly rude.

I think it's fine to ask. I get that with a new baby, you ideally want to be together, and as it won't cost more, I would have been happy to say yes.
Now if you wanted to bring your 5 older children to the swimming party at the local Y, where it was going to cost me a fortune, plus be a safety worry, then that would be different!

If the party is held in someone's home it is likely that there just isn't enough room for entire families.

I don't find that surprising at all.

So surprised at these responses! Majority of our nursery birthdays both parents come and it’s great. A bit different if they were older maybe but I don’t find this unusual at all

At 2 it’s fine.

A word of warning on the siblings.....in a few years you will have the party invitees and younger siblings who the parents expect to be fed, given a party bag and join in the games, without asking and without consideration for space/money etc.

Thats why its now very common for invites to say "Please note that only the child named is invited as we do not have room for siblings to attend". Better to nip it in the bud early ime! It gets easier when its dump and go.

In your defence OP, I recently held a party for my 4yo and her nursery friends of which I didn’t know barely any of the parents. I was perfectly happy for them to both turn up and bring siblings and in fact a few did that without me saying. So it’s really not that outrageous!

Imagine they've invited 10 children... and they all being 2 adults...
Send one parent and try and stay out of the way or help out if needed....

Why so much rudeness and anger? No one is born knowing this stuff! Mumsnet is supposed to be for exactly this sort of question!

@wanderingwillows tbh I would go alone because of the baby. If you had two parents who could actively help that might be different but one of you will need to keep an eye on the baby so will take up room but be no help. When you have been to a few parties you will be arguing about who gets to stay at home, you wont be clamouring to go, together or seperately!

I'm so surprised at the response here! My daughter is only 3.5 so haven't been to loads of parties but have been to a fair few, most of the time we both go, and most of the time at least 1 other child has had both parents there too. I never really thought much of it.

Most families I know have relatively small gardens and 100% won’t have enough chairs if everyone had two parents there

A party full of small kids isn’t a nice family thing. One of you should not go and do something actually nice while the other one endures the party.

I stand corrected! I confess i read and leapt. In my own personal experience our first drop and go was to leave our 4 year old at someone's party. It was hard! But yes, 2 years old you do need one parent to stay with each child (definitely not 2 parents though)

who?? who's idea of a fun weekend activity is a room full of hyped up 4 year olds? who is that bloody crazy or bored?????