Young kids parties without tea

[onetrickrockingpony]

Hi

My DD has her 4th birthday party next weekend. We attended one of her friends’ parties one yesterday. We’ve been to a lot of them recently…. Sometimes two in one weekend.

A party that runs 2-4pm will start often have a spread of cheese / ham sandwiches, some fruit, crisps, biscuits and then there’s cake at the end. It’s buffet style, provided in a pretty bag, or uncovered at the end, and without fail my daughter will skip the real stuff and go for the snack foods and fill up on fruit juice.

Every single time we go to one family dinner is ruined because she’s stuffed with nonsense food. She’d barely had lunch before the party started!

Would I be an utter Scrooge to just serve the cake at the end? Maybe I could balance it out with some nice fruit, crackers and cheese slices. So it’s not full on tea. And then everyone can go home.

Yesterday I overheard so many parents trying to negotiate with their child over saving something for later or not having more crisps because we were waiting for cake to come out. It is SO stressful. They don’t need it!

We had this problem so I did big rainbow fruit platters then did a decorate your own biscuits activity plus birthday cake at the end. I did tell ppl there would be a full on tea.

Haven't rtft so maybe this has already been suggested, but could you eat dinner at lunch time. Party food is then effectively DC's tea?

@Mipil really rude. And frankly, not true.

We have very different definitions then. I don’t just throw terms around, it’s quite extreme. I wouldn’t say the term ‘poor child’ about children that are not actually in dire conditions, for example ones who may just miss out on a party! First world problems.

Anyway so the majority think I am indeed Scrooge and that it’s also fine for a not-yet-4 year old to eat 6 party rings plus cake every Saturday afternoon. I disagree, it’s not necessary and it’s not healthy.

However, there are glimmers of people kind of seeing where I’m coming from.

I’ll serve the sandwich tea. But no party rings and no chocolate fingers. I might do some home made biscuits. And I’ll give them some nice fruit.

Thank you to the PPs who disagree that my taking an interest in what my child eats whilst I take her to a birthday party almost every Saturday afternoon is a sign of her being a “poor child”.

OP I say this kindly - you can be as health conscious as you like, but the more you limit and forbid at this age the harder they will push back when they are old enough to come by food themselves. Every child nutritionist will tell you it's all about balance - and 6 party rings and a slice of cake a WEEK in a party setting is not going to have any impact on your child's health. Your attitude and language around food can have a big impact especially in these formative years.

@Edenmum2 i appreciate that you’re trying to be kind here, but she’s not even 4 years old. She this isn’t even reception age to have all these parties and cakes. And Halloween was only 10 days ago. She had the cake fine, plus the chocolate, washed down with apple juice. This morning we had a pain au chocolat together with a Babycino. She genuinely does have a balanced diet. We try to eat dinner all together in the evenings at weekend because that’s the only time all of us are home, and it’s when we get to try new things. She helps in the kitchen. Blah blah etc etc. But I still find it annoying when she’s had free access to biscuits all afternoon, then has cake, and then chomps on chocolate on the train journey home. Every. Saturday. Afternoon.

Are homemade biscuits really going to be much healthier? Party rings are at least very small biscuits, far from the worst out there.

Goodness. DD had fireworks on Friday night – candy floss then a biscuit bribe for the walk home – and two parties yesterday, which covered lunch and tea. And she’s still got Halloween sweeties knocking around. She didn’t have a proper lunch or dinner yesterday, then ate a balanced diet with us today, plus one of the pieces of cake she didn’t manage yesterday. It’s fine! She brushes her teeth, eats sensibly every other day of the week, only gets water at home; a party a week isn’t going to kill her.

Sandwiches and fruit and homemade biscuits is uptight and joyless, I’m afraid. You want the Proustian rush of pink panther biscuits, hula hoops on fingers, juice boxes that squirt all over party dresses when they’re picked up – you can always get the spendy half-water Cawston ones – and a wodge of cake with the icing stuck to the napkin it’s wrapped in.

This - we were at one this afternoon 2:30-4:30pm and each child got a cardboard lunch box (themed) with a sandwich, crisps, biscuits, yoghurt, cake and raisins/fruit in

Don't want you to feel too alone OP so I'm just posting to say that I feel similar. If a party is 10-12 or 2-4 there is just no need for a party tea or whatever as it's not at a meal time. Maybe a few sweets as prizes for games and a piece of cake and you'd think that would be fine.

It was different back in the day when a party was more likely to be after school when kids would actually be hungry. I do have fond memories of those parties and the party tea but that's because it was 5 or 6pm and a more natural meal time. It would be sandwiches, crisps, carrot sticks etc. followed by jelly & ice cream.

This. It's a party.

My kids say “no party food would destroy the party.”

Why do you give her chocolate on the train home if she’s had biscuits and cake just before at the party?

I think having the food is part of the experience though. Sitting with friends and eating together and enjoying learning to do that - I think we forget to see these things from our children's perspective. It's important to them.
Like parents who try to ban gifts and just want a fiver. It's part of the experience for children.

Anyway I agree you can do healthy food, but I also wouldn't get too stressed if they don't eat their tea after. It's not a big deal and they definitely won't be at a party every weekend forever.

Just say no to some invitations.

Yabu to expect your dd to not eat much when it’s presented but you have control on how many events she attends. Presumably you know her closest friends so which parties to prioritise.

Your updates make no sense - you're worried about an unhealthy meal at a party yet you give her pain au chocolat in the morning and chocolate on the train home?

Why the jeff did you feed her a pain au chocolat and a babycino the morning before a party, when you presumably knew that it’d be heavy on party food later, ten days after Halloween and all the rest of it? I presume you’re giving this as an example of how balanced you are wrt treats, but it comes across oddly.

Party from 2-4? That normally means food aroun 3pm. That's not tea or dinner, that's a snack to give energy for the remaining 1/2 hour of mayhem.

We always had family dinner, around 6-7pm. As long as DD ate something so she wouldn't wake up hungry in the middle of the night I didn't care if she had crisps, biscuits, cake or a carrot stick at the party.

Child is now 17 and somehow survived the party stage where we had parties 2-3x a month.
I did 3 larger parties, DD was 4-6. I was glad the time of non-eaten sandwiches was over and I just served cake plus crisps, chocolate and fruit or at later years - Dominos pizza at 6pm.

You are going to refuse party invites because she eats too many crisps😂😂😂😂😂

I assume she’s your first?!

😂😂😂

I think you need to unclench, and I agree it’s strange to give her a pain au choc on the morning of a party (especially when you appear so untight about sugar). On a party day , there are no treats prior and eggs on toast for breakfast, soup and whole meal for lunch with fruit. Then a chicken sandwich fir dinner, that sort of thing.
when I do parties, I don’t do buffet. I do savoury first (hummus/carrots, olives, crisps, , mini sausages), then fruit (grapes, satsuma segments), then cakes and I serve it to them (with help). I’m 3 kids down and I’ve down the whole lot…individual boxes, pizza, etc etc….my new method is the winner.

I often think some parents find it difficult to see things from the perspective of their child..

In this case not being allowed to go to parties would be huge. Not being able to eat party tea with friends would be huge.

As a parent you can balance the rest of the day fine and think to yourself over the case of a year even if it's every single person in the class it's 30 meals out of 1035 in a year. And possibly not even that if some parties aren't over meal time.

I also do wonder if you've got any issues around food yourself and if it's triggering you with the food/lack of control?

It really is fine.

Serving food is just what you do. If you don't you'll be talked about. Ask them to bring a packed lunch if you don't want to provide food. Honestly, some folk.