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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to do a joint birthday present for twins

114 replies

PogoBob · 06/10/2015 17:52

DD has been invited to the birthday party of twin boys from her class. The boys aren't part of her immediate circle of friends (so I don't really know them mum) but she likes them so wants to attend the party.

Money is tight at the moment plus we've 5 parties we need to buy for across the DCs this month. Would it be unreasonable to buy a joint present? I could ensure it was something large enough to be shared between them without either being short changed, but wonder if this would be unfair. Buying two smaller presents would actually work out more expensive.

As you can probably tell I have no experience of twins so don't know what is fair!!

OP posts:

WhispersOfWickedness · 06/10/2015 21:27

My two DC are both invited to a party for twins this weekend, we will be taking 4 presents with us

Dani240 · 06/10/2015 21:39

I am a twin and a mother of twins, and have to say that as a kid you have to share everything, including your birthday, when everyone else at least gets to be the centre of attention on that day! We used to hate "share presents", they always used to create arguments. Get them two cheap presents. Treat them as two separate people - because they are!

LillianGish · 06/10/2015 22:06

At a joint party for non-twins I wouldn't expect everyone to bring two or even three presents - just arrange it so everyone buys for someone (I have organised this before now). Am I the only person who thinks it's not necessary for kids to get a huge pile of stuff? You just end up re-gifting it and so it goes on.

MissMarpleCat · 06/10/2015 22:11

As a mum of twins I say no. They are still individual people and need to be treated as such.

mandy214 · 06/10/2015 22:24

On the point about different parties, my twins (boy/girl) are 10 now and haven't had a joint party for 4 years so it's really a non - issue now.

But in the early days (aged 3, 4, 5 etc) they had:
1 the same birthday
2 the same friends
3 the same family
4 the same idea for what they wanted for a party (soft play centre / village hall etc)

So, for instance when they were 5, we could have hired the village hall all day. Invited all their class, grandparents etc and had party for Twin A. Then send everyone home, only to invite exactly the same people back later that afternoon to do the same thing all over again for Twin B. I don't think so.

That doesn't mean I don't want to treat them as individuals. How ridiculous.

MissMarpleCat · 06/10/2015 22:37

I'm referring to buying the twins sepetate presents and cards.

mammmamia · 06/10/2015 22:41

I am by some of the posts on here. Some precious, some mercenary. The world's gone mad.
I have twins aged 5. They had joint parties until age 4. Last year separate. People are very generous and many brought them a gift each. We had enough toys to open a toy shop. They don't need separate gifts. Something to be shared even a bag of sweets is fine. They will get tons of gifts from their party.

We went to a party for twins last week. I considered getting 2 gifts for each twin, one each from each of mine. Then I saw sense and got them a big box of Lego between them, from my two. They loved it.

Cadenza1818 · 06/10/2015 23:00

Mum of twins and from a family of six sets. It's separate cards n presents from us here too! Might seem precious but if it was a joint party of 2 school friends, would you ask the question?

SirRodneyEffing · 06/10/2015 23:28

As a mum of twins I really wouldn't be offended if you brought a joint present, or even no present at all. My twins are now (thankfully) old enough to be past the age of all class parties. There was a couple of years when a party of 30 kids would result my living room being awash with close to 60 presents. It all seemed too much.

If you really can't bear the thought of turning up empty handed, a packet of malteasers each would probably be well received, by both the kids and their parents after they've gone to bed

Norest · 06/10/2015 23:37

Separate presents. Something small. Twins always get treated as if they are one entity. Causes a lot of grief.

Norest · 06/10/2015 23:38

Oh and by the way if you are a parent of twins and think you know all about how they love to be treated like one singularity? You're very likely wrong. That is all.

Original poster

PogoBob · 06/10/2015 23:43

Got side tracked and couldn't get back to the thread until now, wasn't expecting to cause such debate.

It's looking like my initial unease about a joint present - hence starting the thread - was right so I will look for something seperate for them. Now I just need to text their mum to find out what they are into at the moment (5yo DD is proving rather uninformative about what either of them enjoy!)

OP posts:

PrincessTooty · 07/10/2015 00:08

Doesn't the fact that they have to share a birthday party mean that the parents aren't that fussed about them being treated as individuals.

If I knew the kids well then I'd buy seperate presents but if I didn't then I might get a joint present. I'd get seperate card though.

mammmamia · 07/10/2015 00:15

princesstooty - erm yes because as a parent of twins i have plenty of spare cash and time to throw them each a separate birthday party on the same day

Ponyboycurtis · 07/10/2015 00:34

Another mum of twins here - FWIW, when they are invited to parties they go with a card and gift each.
They are 6 & have, so far, had joint parties, they very nearly had separate ones this year but changed their minds and chose to have another joint one, they have a cake each and I do party bags from each of them.
When it comes to gifts - sometimes they have a joint one, they love it as much as they love every gift, what they don't like is having one card between them - I think they enjoy reading and then making a display of their cards and putting their favourite ones in a 'special things box'.
So I would say YANBU to go with a joint gift but a card each (in our house anyway), would be a big thumbs up.

SmallLegsOrSmallEggs · 07/10/2015 00:52

Oh lord this thread has made me realise in a few years separate cakes won't be enough and it will have to be separate parties too. Which I suppose makes sense as they don't automatically get invited to the same parties. But it's twice the fun stress.

mammmamia · 07/10/2015 08:03

Separate parties are inevitable but what I was trying to say upthread was that just because you have joint parties for as long as you can from a practical perspective doesn't mean I'm not bothered about treating my children as individuals!

HaydeeofMonteCristo · 07/10/2015 08:45

Funnily enough I would possibly get a joint present for siblings, but not for twins. My feeling is that twins need help understanding/ asserting their individuality and a joint present doesn't help.

I get this idea from my cousins being (different sex) twins and dd having two sets of twins as best friends (one set identical, the other same sex fraternals).

That said as a mum I am grateful/ relaxed about whatever presents people buy my dcs, and very much of the "it's the thought that counts" camp.

HaydeeofMonteCristo · 07/10/2015 08:48

Just generally though I think it's worth remembering that having twins is no picnic and very expensive. I would never expect twins to have two parties or buy DD a present each (although I have noticed that one particular twin mum always buys extra nice presents!).

mandy214 · 07/10/2015 10:00

Smalllegs this year we had DD's party in the morning - 10 giddy, screeching girls doing a disco party, DD decided that she wanted microphone shaped cake pops instead of a cake - being a nutter I said of course I can do that took me 2 days. Cleared up and dashed to local sports centre for DS's party in the afternoon - a football party, complete with homemade football cake. It was hell great fun .

SmallLegsOrSmallEggs · 08/10/2015 01:21

Arrrrgh. They may have to have parties year about

toomuchtooold · 08/10/2015 11:03

Smalllegs mine are only 3 but this year they had their hearts set on separate cakes. We ended up with about 2 kilos of cake left over. The best thing was, although they were adamant they wanted separate cakes, they both wanted the same cake. Just one each!

Also on the whole sharing thing: twins have to share their whole life, from day 1, and it can be stressful depending on their personality. Yesterday mine were on a forest walk with their kindergarten and one of them pushed the other one into a puddle because she was trying to steal her stick. In a forest. A place which, you can be fairly sure, has plenty of sticks to choose from. Another example: the stick-stealing one took a shine to a hand-knitted doll that my aunt made for me. So I said to her, would you like her to be yours, like really yours the way your bedtime bear is? And she didn't say anything, she just hugged the doll tight and grinned from ear to ear. Sharing is fine but sharing everything causes stress. They need to know they have some stuff of their own that nobody can take.

MrsTedMosby · 08/10/2015 13:12

Ah I'm such a bad mum of twins. I don't care much if they get joint presents or cards, and they don't care either, as long as their names are written in them - one
Person once wrote "To The Twins" The twins were not impressed, they have a name each.
I've also bought a joint present when They've been invited to a friends party - but I did double the amount of money spent so he got a nice big pressie.

If you're really stuck for cheap separate presents go for chocolate, mine would love anyone forever who bought them chocs!

MERLYPUSSEDOFF · 08/10/2015 14:23

If you are short of cash get them a cheap DVD (asda had some for £3) and a packet of popcorn / sweets each so they can have a sofa day (all assuming they are primary age) if you want to do a shared present.

Craft and sticker books are relatively cheap.

I have soon to be 8 yr olds. We are doing joint party next year. T1 will get presents form his friends, T2 will get presents form his. Some parents will buy both a gift - like the beavers who know them both.

I would go for separate presents.

Want2bSupermum · 08/10/2015 14:28

When accepting an invite that doesn't explictly say 'no gifts' or 'donations in lieu of gifts' I ask the parents what their child likes. It avoids potentially awkward situations like this.

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