To think that parents should send a quick individual thank you after kids birthday parties?

[comoatoupeira]

Hello
Sorry if this has been done to death, but does anyone else think that the childrens' birthday party and gift giving culture is completely bizarre in the UK?
What I mean is the way that people bring sometimes very large/expensive gifts, or really very thoughtful and nice gifts, like a book that has been chosen especially for the child, and yet nobody seems to expect an acknowledgment beyond 'thanks for all the lovely presents!' on the school WhatsApp group.
I know that everyone is really busy, and I know that this would always fall to the mum not the dad and we don't need any more small admin jobs related to our children, thank you, but it still feels wrong.

What feels wrong? It feels somehow grabby, or as though the effort gone into choosing the gift is just taken for granted (and the money).

I accept it's probably just something people have decided so as not to create too much work for themselves. But it bothers me. What do you think?

This is the kind of message I think would be good to receive: 'Hi! Just to say thanks so much for the gel pens, little Timmy loves them. See you on Monday'. The purpose being simply to acknowledge that a gift has been chosen and bought, nothing more!

Lots of people don’t have any family help while hosting a party and even the 2nd parent might be responsible for younger children as well as keeping an eye on the party kids.

I'd hazard that most school party gifts are:

• Generic stationary items that go "Minecraft/Spiderman/Batman for boys, Disney Princess/unicorns/Squishmallow for girls"
• Book that is the right age
• Whatever Haribo type sweets were on offer in Asda
• Generic toy that was on offer in Home Bargains

Very little thought, wrapped up quickly in 5 minutes and considered a chore required to attend the party. Not the big, thoughtful, grand gesture some think it is.

Expecting a personal thank you comes across as needing validation and expecting effusive thanks for you being brilliant. Aka it's all about you getting an ego boost not about the politeness of the thank you

I personally send individual thank you messages to everyone (make a list of who gifts are from while DD is opening presents) but I wouldn’t be offended if I didn’t receive one.

we have a class group chat at my sons school, if my son was to have a party, I would put a message on the group chat saying thank you to all who came and for my sons gifts and how much a it’s appreciated.

i don’t think it’s fair at all to expect someone to send 30+ messages to individuals thanking for every gift. Its giving the mentality of that you give for something in return. Do something nice without expecting anything back

I agree with this. I don't consider it a chore to take my kids to parties but I often buy gifts in bulk/when they are on offer and I pick the most appropriate one when a party comes up. Even with cards I usually bulk buy them in multipacks from Amazon. These are tips I got from MN btw 😂 I might spend more time picking a gift for a close friend.

Totally agree with this.
I still make mine write thank you letters and there is NO WAY they can use my phone to do it. Pen and paper only.

YABU. DD had 3 whole class parties, in years R,1 and 2. Fot 2 of those I was a single parent and had to rope friends/family in to help me out. When we did the cake and sang happy birthday, we would also say thank you for coming and thank you for the presents.

Each child that came had entertainment, food and a party bag. They said thanks on the way out. Should they all write a letter to say thank you for the lovely party?

There is no need for 30 kids to write a thank you letter, or 1 kid to write 30 thank you letters.

I don't understand the 'I send a text', 'I send a note'.
It's a child's party, not my party. How would it be instilling good manners for me to do this on my child's behalf?
Back in the days when my children did write thank you notes for gifts from classmates, they did it themselves. It took an eternity and became stressful. I wasn't going to do it for them, I wasn't the one receiving the gift afterall.

When people started sending group WhatsApp thank you messages after parties, I followed suit. It's one less thing to worry about.

At a party my children greet their guests and thank them for their gifts. At the end they thank their guests for coming. I will then update the party WhatsApp group saying thank you for coming and for gifts and add some photos of the party. Job done in my opinion.

Presumably you hand write all thank you notes too?

This.

I do actually. I have a stack of little nite cards. Sadly I don’t get as many gifts as the kids nowadays so don’t have to do as many 🤣

Your child's gift surely, not yours. The party, the gifts and the thank you notes should all be between the children. The parents are just there to support them.

Gosh, I thought everyone handed out handwritten notes to the person who gave them a cup of tea 🙄🙄🙄. Of course, that was exactly what I meant.
Did you notice where I wrote “Slight derail, I know…”
Did you read the last sentence of my post?

Personally I always tried to thank parents individually after the party. But I know with some of the larger parties with say 30 kids this is more difficult

Not to embarrass people (size & duplication) and also so you can keep a list - for thank yous

In all fairness, if me not receiving tailored thank yous from 30 individual parents after their child’s birthday party means that I don’t have to do in return… then I’m happy with the trade off.

Because thanks means nothing if you haven't opened the present

We always did too

That's why manners are in decline

i used to try to but I gave up because invariably some tags had fallen off and I had no idea who’d given them! Not wanting to embarrass myself I joined in the general thank you club.

So if it means nothing, then is it unnecessary to say thank you when you are handed over the present? Should you remain silent and only follow up with a message after you opened it? I wonder how well it would go down on MN 😀

A general thank you is manners. If that isn't good enough for someone over a child's birthday present which is often generic and/or from the 'birthday party drawer/cupboard' anyway then oh well.

How old are your kids op?

It depends on whether you give the gift out of kindness or because you are expecting a thank you. I am not bothered when someone tells me thank you verbally. They are showing appreciation at the time and that is showing good manners. Me expecting a personal note, message or call after that just screams that I want more affirmation and praise and is really not good manners is it? Being upset you didn't get a thank you is just as presumptuous and rude as the person not thanking you. You should be doing nice things and giving gifts because it is the kind thing to do, not for praise and thanks. That defeats the purpose entirely and is very self serving.

Yep, the expectation is itself not great manners.