5th birthday question

[SconNotScone]

Off the back of a thread running in AIBU at the moment, about why some kids/parents don't invite the whole class to a party, I have a question about my daughter's upcoming party, would appreciate some thoughts.

It will be her 5th birthday middle of October. We agreed she can have a birthday party this year, and she told me a little while ago who she would like to invite - about 12 or so kids, made up of a mixture of friends from nursery, pre-school and NCT group friends. (By chance, all of these happen to be girls)

She has only just started school, and all the pre-school friends she wants at the party have started with her. So automatically, two girls from her class, and two from the other reception class are going to be invited.

She has become friendly with two or three other girls in her class, and I think she would probably like to invite them as well. So that makes five girls in her class, plus two in the other. Does this mean I now have to invite all the little girls in her class?! I actually hadn't planned to, except now I have seen the other thread where most people are saying that reception parties are usually a whole class affair!

I don't want to be an arsehole parent, but also don't want to invite people just for the sake of inviting! Any thoughts please?

I think if you only invite 5 girls in the class it would be fine as its a minority.

I tend to invite more and give less notice (2 weeks instead of 1 month as is standard here). I then get my required number of attendees after some people decline due to other commitments.

DD1 is 5 soon, and we are doing similar. She has a couple of pre school friends who started school with her, plus one or two new friends who she’d like to invite so maybe 8 in total from across the two reception classes. She also has friends from ballet/gymnastics/swimming, a couple of friends who went to a different school and some children of my friends she wants to invite, so we just can’t do the whole class. Added to which I have no idea of all the children’s names and they don’t issue a full class list.

Personally I’d invite all the girls in her class this year, by next year she’ll have formed little group of friends. It’s nice to invite them all for the 1st big party.

No, stick to your guns and just invite the children that you and your DD want to invite. Don't feel pressurised to invite all the girls.

In that situation I would stick to what you're doing. Yesterday I sent out invites to the whole class for my dc who will be 5 in October too. He's new to the school though so doesn't have any particular friends yet. Last year in his old school I know parents who did similar to what you're doing. As long as you're not leaving out one or two I don't think it's as bad.

Assuming there are not only 8 or so girls in the class (not unknown), then what you are planning is fine as you are not leaving a small number of children uninvited.

Thanks for all the feedback! A bit of a mixed back, but leaning more towards sticking with original plan. I think there must be at least 10 or 12 girls in the class (not got the class list to hand), so it’s not like only one or two would be excluded!