Birthday party woes, really need some advice!

[Itshouldntbethisway]

Hi, would really like some advice, my DC is having a joint birthday party with a school friend, and is upset that a few children that haven't been that nice to him have been invited by his friend. He would never have invited them otherwise. To make matters worse a child in their class who has been invited had a party and didn't invite him, and having just found out, he wants to uninvite them. DC understandably feels totally unenthusiastic about the party and is not looking forward to it. I feel sad for him really. I'm now having second thoughts as I think DC should have the party that he wants with the friends he likes (a couple of friends haven't been invited because of numbers). Should I cancel and do a separate party for DC or leave it as it is, with invites having gone out already? Any advice would be gratefully received!

You can't do a lot if invites have already gone out can you? This is the risk of a joint party. Think you will have to suck this up and put it down to a life lesson.

You are being unreasonable. You can't have it both ways, you can't decide you want a joint party and then dictate who the other child invites! If you cancel now, is it going to cause financial difficulties for the other parent?

Also, you need to suck up the fact that your DC won't always be invited to every party. You absolutely cannot uninvite!

What was the rationale behind the joint party? Are the DC close? Are you and the other parent?

YABU. You are going to look bonkers if you back out of a joint party but then book another party just so you don't have to invite certain dc.

Did you make it clear to him that uninviting people to parties is not something that can be done?

I see that you haven't invited 'some friends' because of numbers. But your son is upset because he hasn't been invited to every party.

I'm assuming you had a joint party for financial reasons so surely pulling out of it, paying your half of the joint party and then paying for a new more exclusive party is going to be really expensive.

How old is he?

If it's a joint party you have to explain to your son that the other child can invite who they want.

Some children will invite you to their party and some will not- for various reasons and you cannot take it personally.

The other question is did your son want the joint party? Did you explain that means that he doesn't get full control of who comes, what happens etc?

Thank you all for your replies.

@NerrSnerr he is 7 years old and understands he can't be invited to every party and won't get full control with a joint party. The kids that didn't invite him have been saying to him that he wasn't invited to theirs but are coming to his, which I think is a bit mean. This is what he is mainly upset about.

The original plan was that we would invite only the boys in the class to avoid complications but the other mum later added a couple of boys in the other classes, same year group. So I was caught out a bit, if I had known that would happen I may have decided to go it alone.

@Rogue1001MNer the kids are best friends and the other mum and I are good friends.

@ItsSnowJokes yes, looks like I'll have to suck it up, lesson learned for next time, no further joint parties.

I'd leave it how it is now but do things differently next year

Did he want the joint party or did you?

either way, lesson learned. Single party next time.

This is why you don't do joint parties.
There's nothing you can do.