to expect replies back for dd's birthday party?

[canofworms]

Dd1 was 7 last friday and had a party yesterday which I said she could invite 15 friends to. I sent out invites 2 weeks in advance, 3 sent "word of mouth" replies back via dd1 which wasn't terribly reliable, 1 didn't reply until 3 hours before the party started and 2 told me they'd come (got it in writing) and then never turned up!

Luckily dd isn't too bothered about it all as I made up they must have been poorly to not turn up and she even took their party bags into school for them.

I'm was cross to start with that she wanted one of the girls who didn't turn up to come to our house for tea on her actual birthday. She wrote her a lovely letter inviting her with our phone number on and every night she came home crying because she hadn't replied (and never came).

(Rant over)

I had this problem last year with dd's 3rd bday- sent abotu 20 out and only a handful replied, I didn't know if the others weren't coming or just hadn't replied so had to cater for them all. In the end only 1 who hadn't replied did turn up so I had sooo much food and party bags left over. This year I sent about 25 out expecting the same to happen again and everybody bar one has replied- not only that but they can all make it [gulp]. I was expecting similar numbers to last year so over-invited.
Personally I would always reply

Oh dear ! Some of these tales are really sad, especially the little boy who thought he'd been naughty as no friends turned up.

ds3 is going to have his party soon; we sent out 15 invitations - to his nursery class - he is SO excited. it will be his first party (age 4). I just hope we get a reasonable turn out.

I do understand people are busy; I have 4 children and weekends especially it can be hard to fit everything in. But i do try. Everything party-related is exciting for my 4yo even though I've been there/done that so many times before. he loves the idea of having friends of his own, and loves to go to parties. Let's hope his goes well...

YANBU.

Lord, reading these posts makes me feel so sad and also makes me realise that I must live in a very polite town as the rate of responses and attendance is very good here.

I was, however, very at the cheek of a mum at school recently. She hasn't acknowledged a single one of the THREE invites her DD had for our parties over the years. However, when lots of people failed to reply to invites for her DD's party she was livid and even got the class teacher to have a word with parents and tell them off!

I had responded to the invite BTW as I didn't think that the 'party crimes' of the mother should be visited on her DD.

Thank you. This was just the grumpy rant I needed at the end of a crap day.

Patsy

This makes me so sad. DS is nearly one and we're not doing anything really for his birthday because he won't know. We're going to see people gradually over a few weekends which I think will be better for him. Saying that, I've got such a thing about inviting people to parties and them not coming that I don't know whether I'll ever dare do a party. It's bad enough when I'm disappointed, never mind little ones! So no, YANBU