Party invites 3 months ahead?!!!

[Shadowboy]

I don’t know if it’s just the pre-school my daughter attends but the party invites are ridiculously far ahead.... so today she received a party invite for the 8th June! That’s three months away!! I have no idea what commitments we will have in June so there is no chance of me RSVPing for a while! This is not the first time- we also have invites for May, June the 1st etc.

Am I being unreasonable in finding these early invites being given out far too early? Plus the kids get excited about going.... only to forget about the party 3 months later!

Disorganised I get the distinct impression from the "giving plenty of notice is fine contingent" that they would be equally offended if I replied No than if I just didn't reply at all.

DD3's bday is on the first day back after the Summer holidays. Her class friend has a bday slightly later the same week. Before we broke up last Summer friend's mother asked me in May if we would be free for friend's party on my DD's bday weekend. I reminded her it was also my DD's bday and suggested a joint party. She refused as she wanted it to be her DD's "special day". Not sure when she thought my DD's "special day" was supposed to happen?

Three months is a bit much! But when my DD was in preschool I used to do invites 7/8 weeks in advance because most of the kids seemed to have been born within a two week window so you had to be a bit spiky elbowed about the whole thing. Thinking about it, it would have been much better if we had actually spoken to each other and co ordinated but there you go 😝

I just organised my DS's party and gave just under 2 weeks notice which seems short to me. Almost all the children could make it. There are some times of year that are busier though so I guess more notice may be needed. My DD's birthday is about a month after DS's so I'll book something for her once his is over. I'll probably try to give 3-4 weeks for that which seems better than 2.

Mind you I am the sort of person who always books last minute holidays so perhaps it's my character...

I get the distinct impression from the "giving plenty of notice is fine contingent" that they would be equally offended if I replied No than if I just didn't reply at all.

You are missing the point: people are not offended when you don't reply, it's just rude and you are messing them around. How are they supposed to organise anything if people don't reply? Most parents would just invite another friend or a cousin if your child can't make it.

She refused as she wanted it to be her DD's "special day"
I can understand that, joint parties are not for everybody. With 4 half-days in a weekend, you can easily organise your own special day for your DD at another time.

Some people don't care about birthdays, but some of us do. I understand that for any child it's his own special day of the year, it's his turn. So whilst we adults don't really care, it's important for them. A bit of kindness would be nice. It's only a couple of hours for us, but it's a big deal for them.

I would probably decline if something like this came up, because I might get a better offer. (previously I would leave my RSVP for a while, but I've become better behaved!).

Husband would probably accept, because he's just like that! Then he'd regret it when it came around...

MIL caught us on the hop the other wekend, and had us sat down with our calendar in the kitchen and could see we didn't have things written in. I managed to get out of one engagement she foisted on us, leaving him to go alone.

(I don't mind that I'm going to hell for the above - I can't stand having my weekends filled endlessly with engagements.)

I can see we will never see eye to eye on this disorganised. However just for further illustration we had 5 close family and friends with birthdays this weekend. Within the next month we have DD1's 18th, my Mum's 75th, 2 SiLs and a niece with bdays and our Wedding Anniversary (now you've got me worrying I've missed someone ).

If anyone wants my DD3 to prioritise a class party then January is fairly quiet for us.

I did kind of save the date -text to some of DD's best friends as early as I booked the party pr checked what dates are available. She is a mid-July child so we had clashes often other end-of-term things, especially if her friends do drama/dance as Summer = big shows.

But invites never went out before May half-term.

I was less bothered with a big class party but a party of 10 where I pay for each place I try to get my replies as early as possible.

Its a way of stopping other parties being booked for the same day and time, which makes sense. Especially towards the end of the school year when all of the summer born parties all try to squeeze in June/July.

At small schools (and ones which helpfully have the children's birthdays up on some chart somewhere!) you can just chat to the parents of other children to make sure it doesn't clash. I've done that a few times.

My diary is booked up fully until the middle of June, so if anyone came up to me with an invitation for a month from now, they would be too late.