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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To expect friends to show up for dinner on time

51 replies

Sprite21 · 30/03/2013 18:38

DP invited friends for dinner tonight and told them 6pm, then earlier today asked if they could make it any earlier.

They texted at quarter to and said they would arrive for 6:40, with no other explanation. We timed everything for 6 so now it's all sitting there getting cold.
I know 6 is early for dinner but we have to eat then so we can eat with DD, 18 mo and then get her into bed.
So AIBU?

OP posts:
zlist · 30/03/2013 20:29

They are being rude but it also sounds a bit odd to invite adult friends round for dinner to fit in with an 18mo on a Saturday night. I always invited people round after I put DC to bed when they were little.
Could they have genuinely not realised that you actually meant to start eating at 6? That is very early for a meal at a friends house. I would be very surprised to recieve an invitation like that unless I was bring my DC along too.
I wouldn't be late though.

AnyoneforTurps · 30/03/2013 20:33

Agree with *chandellina" - it doesn't sound like much fun for them.

Rude of them to announce they were going to be 40 minutes late without apology but I have to say that, if I'm invited to arrive at 6pm, I don't expect to eat at 6 pm on the dot. TBH, you sound like you begrudge them coming at all.

Pendipidy · 30/03/2013 20:37

Why are you eating so early with dd ? Don't you want adult time? If you invite someone for dinner and children are not specifically mentioned i would assume they would be in bed.

So, what time did they turn up? Did you feed dd before they arrived? That would have been perfect surely, then she could be in bed when they arrive to eat .

DoJo · 30/03/2013 20:37

If I was invited round to someone's house for dinner at 6pm it wouldn't occur to me that we would actually be eating at that time. I would assume that we would be having pre-dinner drinks (and maybe something to nibble on) until at least 8. When we have people over, we tell them that they are welcome to come earlier if they want to see our son, but I wouldn't expect them to want to eat with him. YABU to expect them to eat dinner at 6pm, and they are only BU if you didn't make it clear what the plan was.

magimedi · 30/03/2013 20:38

Very, very rude.

YANBU

Punctuality is the politeness of princes.

PO face..................

Viviennemary · 30/03/2013 20:45

I don't think I'd expect to be eating at 6 if I was invited for dinner. A meal at five or six would be tea.

Chandon · 30/03/2013 20:46

They were late, but tey ket you know.

In your guests shoes, i would never have expected to actually have dinner at the dot of arrival time.

Most of my friends would give the kids their tea at 5, and do a grown up dinner later. So maybe ths is the root of the problem? They assumed wrong and thought they were invited to dinner, rarher than the toddler's tea Grin

Or did they also bring a tot, then maybe it would make sense.

I agree with the poster who said they prob just wrote DINNER WITH SPRITE in the diary, then when they got yor text they went " shoot! It is at 6, get dressed! Where are the keys?, what time is it now. Shoot!" driving down the motorway with her still putting n her clothes and make up and him going fuckfuckfuck a la Hugh Grant in 4 weddings!

gordyslovesheep · 30/03/2013 20:55

I wouldn;t invite adults to eat WITH my children

also if I get invited for 6 I wouldn;t expect to EAT at 6pm on the dot - I'd probably be expecting chat and a glass of wine with dinner between 6:30-7pm

maybe they didn't realise you would be dishing up bang on 6pm

dietcokeandwine · 30/03/2013 20:55

YANBU at all if your invitation was explicit (i.e. DH saying we'll be eating on the dot of six and we need to eat that early because we eat with DD). If that's the situation, they were very rude.

YAB slightly U if your invitation was a little more vague (I, too, would assume an invitation for a certain time would mean dinner being served at least 30-60 minutes later to allow for drinks and chat time). If this was the case, a little inconsiderate, but not rude as such.

As others have said, your house, your rules, but to be honest I think it sounds slightly bonkers to expect adult friends to want to eat that early and with your 18m DD, unless they're her godparents or something and specifically want to see her. I can think of nothing worse than being invited to a Saturday night dinner with friends to then be expected to eat with their toddler. (Lunch is different, an invite to 'tea', would be different, but I suspect most people would assume a dinner invite to be for adults and adults alone). And what on earth do you then do afterwards whilst she's bathed/read to/put to bed? Leave your guests watching telly?

Next time, why not feed DD at her usual 6pm time, bath her, put her to bed and then invite friends to come after that so you can all relax without an overtired toddler around? Just a thought.

carabos · 30/03/2013 21:05

In principle they are rude and YANBU. However, in their shoes I would have turned down an invitation to eat at 6 with a toddler then leave because said toddler was being put to bed an hour or so later Hmm. I wouldn't want to sit around during the putting-to-bed process either unless I was family interested in the child.

karatekimmi · 30/03/2013 21:07

Very rude. Eat at 6 and tell ten their dinner has been binned as they can't get there when invited. I can't believe how many people think its okay to turn up 40 mins late for a dinner party.

It's your choice if it includes your children, an while some may choose not to, that is up to them. That is not the issue, the lateness is the issue

PlasticLentilWeaver · 30/03/2013 21:15

Do they have kids? Maybe they were giving them tea at 5pm, waiting for a babysitter etc?

If not, take the hint that being childless, they didn't fancy nursery tea at 6pm!

SauvignonBlanche · 30/03/2013 21:17

At 6pm it's not a dinner party though is it? It's a tea party.

CamillaMacaulay1 · 30/03/2013 21:19

YANBU - they could easily have said they wouldn't be able to make 6pm when you first invited them. 40 minutes late is very rude when someone has cooked you dinner.

eslteacher · 30/03/2013 21:21

Huh, OP's specific situation aside, I think the whole point of a dinner party is to relax, be leisurely and enjoy friends and good food. To me, part of that is not stressing about arriving on the dot - its not an interview or business appointment. I'd almost go as far as saying it's more polite/normal to arrive 15 mins after the stated time, than early or on the dot. So 40m generally wouldn't bother me excessively, as long as I had been forewarned. But I guess its different etiquette among different groups of people.

Blowin · 30/03/2013 22:53

OP are you coming back to respond at all?

MTSgroupie · 30/03/2013 23:05

You timed dinner so that it would be ready to eat when your guest walked through the door at 6pm???

If your guests knew this was your intention then it's rude of them to be late. Otherwise it's a bit silly inviting guests for. dinner with the intention of whizzing through dinner so that you can feed and put DC to bed. I would just invite them around for drinks after DC is in bed or for lunch instead.

MaybeOrnot · 30/03/2013 23:12

So your DP suggested that they may arrive earlier than 6,for dinner? Realistically,they were probably trying to digest their 4pm tea and cake at 5.30.
YABRUR

TheOriginalSteamingNit · 30/03/2013 23:13

It was rude of them just to say they'd be there at 6.40, but a bit odd of you to invite them for dinner at 6, I have to say.

grovel · 30/03/2013 23:15

What a daft invitation! Earlier than 6 for dinner? Bonkers.

LaurieFairyCake · 30/03/2013 23:21

Sorry, your invitation is too odd for me to think about them being rude.

It's not dinner you've invited them to, it's something else - I'd call it tea like others on here but I don't call it tea.

Instead it sounds like to be that you've invited them to children's dinner time.

Which is just weird.

Even if you were having a barbecue I'd hear the words six and think 6-ish and turn up at 6.25. It's just too early.

GreenEggsAndNichts · 30/03/2013 23:22

hah. I've been married to a German for too long. 6pm is our normal dinner time.

I suppose it would be a bit later if we were inviting others over.

GreenEggsAndNichts · 30/03/2013 23:24

I have to agree, though. Unless the guests had children of the same age as mine, I wouldn't expect them to eat as early as they do. I have been to several casual dinners where dinner begins quite early but adult food comes out a bit later, iyswim.

Original poster
Sprite21 · 30/03/2013 23:26

Sorry for late response. Friends arrived almost as soon as I posted so I didn't get a chance to respond.
I guess we assumed they would want to see DD as they are always asking about her and tonight complained that we hadn't asked them to babysit recently.
Six is early for dinner and we probably should have been more explicit about the timing.
We thought if we had dinner early then we'd have time for a board game once DD was in bed. This is what we normally do with these friends.
Putting DD to bed was fine. One of us does the routine while the other chats with our friends.
They don't have kids.
Thanks for the responses, they helped me gain some perspective. Funny I felt really annoyed about them being late until they turned up and all was forgotten.

OP posts:
MTSgroupie · 30/03/2013 23:28

A former work mate suggested that we meet up after work for dinner. I told her that I finish work at 5pm so how about meeting up 5:30pm. She suggested 4:30pm because she liked to be home before her DD went to bed. Fair enough. I arranged to work through lunch so that I could meet my friend at 4:30pm.

My expectation was drinks and probably early dinner at 5:30pm but my friend wanted to sit down and eat immediately. It was weird eating dinner at 4:45pm.

Anyway, the next time she suggested dinner after work I made some excuse. 'Bonkers' was apt then as it is now.