To be peed off at parents who drop their children's off at birthday parties...

[AnnaLiza]

....instead of offering to help out!
It's not only about the child being able to cope without the parent. I do expect 11 year olds to be ok without the parents but how can it not occur to mums and dads that I may struggle to feed and look after a bunch of 15 kids when they sit down for food and cake?
I find it very rude that the parents just shoot off without even asking if I might need help. AIBU?

Omg.

Yes. Yes, you hire help. You hire Nanny McPhee.

I would say don't have a party you can't organise properly.

DD is off to an 11th birthday party tomorrow. We shall drop her off at the restaurant and then Dh and myself are going for lunch not far away, for 2 hours hild free, lovely meal together :)

You ask family or friends for help. If no one can help you then you adjust the party plans to something you can cope with before inviting. I would be very pissed off if you asked me to stop and help because you hadn't organised youself beforehand. Especially for a group of 11 year olds.

WTF?! What 11 year old would want their parent staying at a party anyway?

Round here, the unwritten rule is that you always stay at the party for nursery age or below, but from reception up you can sod off (unless you want to stay)

Teachers manage 30 for about 6 hours.

I would have thought 15 11 year olds were easy.

Organise the food; get two 11 year olds to help
Bring your partner
Pay for help

Questions so far

When was the party? If it is in the past did everyone get out ok?
If it is now, you need to go and tend to the children.
Are they male or female?
What was the entertainment?
Is the birthday girl/ boy having a good time. because that's sort of the important bit.

crikey

yes you need to enlist assistance before the day - you say no family available, so ask friends

if you have no friends then I'm afraid you should ask only the number of children that you can safely manage, bearing in mind the age range(s) of your own child(ren)

YABU. Unless the birthday child's mum was a very good friend of mine it would not occur to me to hang around offering to help. I would just assume I was in the way and her close friends or sisters would be helping out.

or just ask the children to help hand out food and drinks.

YABVU!!

At 11, the kids don't want their parents there anyway!

Either don't invite so many, or ensure family/friends are on hand to help out. I have a 10 year old, for his birthday we went to a pool with slides etc. We invited 2 other children, and there was me and DP. So we could make sure they were safe.

I suspect you have bitten off more than you can chew.

I would find it strange if the parents stayed once they were over about 6 to be honest, unless the child was nervous, or had other reasons for needing a parent there.

I guess it would have been nice if they had asked if you needed a hand - but to be honest, most people assume you have organised your own help in advance.

Why would you invite fifteen 11 year olds to your house?

"Can someone explain how I would go about organising the help? Do you mean pay people to help? Surely that's not straightforward! If I had family living nearby I would ask them"

Well you know those people you are expecting to offer to help? Why don't you start by asking them?

What would you have said if all parents of the 15 stayed?

I am not understanding all this. There must be more information to come.....

Yabu get a grip they're 11

I've just recovered from had a party for 19 6 year old boys in my house - I had dh to help admittedly and a friend helped for the last half hour but it was fine, and actually if I hadn't been trying to get them all fed with a 2 year old on my hip I wouldn't have probably needed my friends help.

Yabu

Very much so.

Bet the op would be the first to complain if I stayed to help with the child's three younger siblings too

Simples don't invite more kids then you can handle or open your gob and ask for some volunteers amongst the parents.

I love when the parents don't hang about here. Nothing worse then having to entertain parents when I'm organising the cake and games.

Even when I've stayed at parties when the DCs were younger I didn't help out. None of the parents did. We sat and chatted. And perhaps dealt with the occasional tears or tantrums from our own kids that high levels of excitement invariably brings.

I wouldn't be expecting tears or tantrums from 11 year olds at a party. Maybe I'm wrong about that though?

No matter the age of the child, help for their party has always been sorted by the host prior to arrival.

YABU

Yes YABU.

Why would a parent stay with an 11yo???

My drop and run age limit is 5 tbh.

As others say, if you can't cope with 15 11yos sitting down to eat then don't stage a party (or be a MDS!)

Where would you get help from? ask a friend in advance if she would stay with her child?

I have to say we've never had 15 11yos, but DD had about that many people t her 10th party and they were fine. 11yos are not that bad!

well exactly - if i go to party, you would have me to help....and DS2 (who is very cute, but none too helpful) strapped to me.....DD2 (on a lead) ....very helpful she is! ...

send out invites with 'let me know if you can help please' on it, that way you may get offers of help. you kow, like school do when they send out letters for trips.

Are you kidding? It would never occur to me!! I actually write 'drop off' and 'pick up' times in dds birthday invite. We invited the full class of 30 about 2/3 came. We had part games with an entertAiner. Then it was just me and dh. Oh and they were in reception.

YABU. You organised the party, not the other parents. It's up to you to think about if you'll need help or not and organize it beforehand.

If at the time of the party you suddenly discover that you need help, ASK FOR IT! But don't expect the other parents to mind read.

Gosh I prefer people to bugger off!!! But then I am used to about 40 kids at some of our bigger parties and we have big ones from age 4 upwards.