Name tags at a party

[Rainandclouds]

So I helped my friend this morning with her 5 year olds party. They have just started school so don’t know the children very well. She made name tags for the kids (just stickers) with sally or John B on and also had tags for the drinks. She could then address the children by name when serving and give then the right meals (the invite asked what sandwich they wanted). I thought this was a excellent idea. It was in a hall that was sole hire but apparently some of the parents were horrified by this (they didn’t all stay) and some refused to let their child be “branded”! So was this a big no no or an excellent idea?

The other parents sound unhinged. If they didn’t want their children branded they really shouldn’t have given them names in the first place.

I actually thought about name tags the other day and how it’s amazing that teachers know the name of every single child in a whole new class every September

I think it was very sensible and I have sometimes wished adult parties would do the same so you can remember who the hell you're talking to and people won't keep topping up your drink if you're driving! Still, inadvertently, your friend has found out who the high maintenance parents are and can step away...

Paddington. We don't. We have advanced faking strategies.

Sheesh. I organised a reunion for my school year, 40 years after we left. I made name badges for everyone to avoid any embarrassment of not recognising folk.

Its a great idea, its very difficult if you're a parent that doesn't do pick ups or drop offs and don't know the children .
Wish I'd done it at past parties it would have made things a lot easier

WTF?! Sounds fine to me.

How many horrified ones left? On the plus side they probably felt less smug by the time they got the DC to the car, the kids probably had a meltdown at being pulled out of the party.

We always had name stickers at parties (when there were lots of people, not six friends to the cinema-type things!). I thought it was normal.

It's helpful for the children too if you have a mix from school/family/Brownies/dancing etc.

Thanks for the replies. I am glad normal people think it’s a reasonable idea. Sorry the ones that left just dropped the kids at the door and then came back to collect at end. They didn’t remove screaming kids from the party because of the name tags. That would be seriously odd! I will suggest she try’s to avoid the crazy ones!

Well it's clearly a good way to weed out the painful parents you want to avoid forever

it’s amazing that teachers know the name of every single child in a whole new class every September we are with them 6 hours a day, and lots of us resort to name stickers for the first day or two.

Paddington Seating plans. It's the real reason for seating plans. But now I've told you, I'm going to have to kill you!

Name stickers are brilliant Rain. The complaining parents are weird.

It sounds like a great idea. Even when you're familiar with the children, it can be easy to forget some of the names in situations like this.

It probably wouldn't have been much use at one party my DC had though. Of the six guests, three had the same first name and the first two letters of their surname were all the same (I ended up calling them John*1, John 2, John 3 based on their arrival order). Of the remaining three, two also had the same first name, and the sixth one had the same name as my other DC. Very interesting sleepover time!

*John was not the real name.

Sounds like a good idea! Some people just love to moan