Leaving 2 out of party invites from friendship group, AIBU to insist?

[PartyInviteFriendshipGroup]

DD is 10, almost 11.

Having a birthday party for her 11th Birthday at the end of July.

She’s allowed to invite 15 peopl.

4 of those are cousins, so that leaves 11 invites.

She invited 3 from her activity group (one of those is at her school). So I assumed the other 8 would be from her friendship group of 9 including her from school. But she’s insisting on inviting 6 of them but not 2 of them because she doesn’t feel as if they’re her friends as much as the others.

These 2 are in the same class at school which is not hers, there is 3 in the freindship group from her class, and then 2 in the other class (with the child from her activity and one of her cousins) – it’s a 3-form entry school.

I really think it’s unfair to leave 2 out, given I have to pay for 16 places (including her) whether we have 16 children or not I don’t see what harm it does to invite them. They’re not horrible to her she just doesn’t consider them her friends.

The friendship is a mix of boys and girls (more girls than boys) and it’s a girl and a boy being left out. So it will be obvious iyswim.

I’ve told her she can drop the boys from her friendship group invites if she wants to but one of her cousins is friends with 2 of the boys so she wanted him to have someone to talk to.

AIBU to insist she invites the last 2 from her friendship group? Or is DD right to want to decide?

That's quite tough to figure out. You're right to be concerned for the couple of left out kids' feelings but she's equally allowed to have who she wants at her party. Can she explain why, and have you spoken to her about how it can feel to be suddenly excluded?

Does she want her cousins there or are you insisting?

I don’t think you should be factoring in who her cousins might want to talk to.

Did the two kids she doesn’t want invite her to their birthdays? If yes, she should reciprocate.

If they didn’t invite her then it’s fair enough for her not to invite them either.

Do all the kids tend to invite the whole friendship group?

Children need to learn resiliance and that life is not fair and people have other views that differ from theirs

They have to learn to fail, not be chosen and understand it is based on choices outside their control.

You would be unreasonable to leave two kids out, it's unkind x

I'd check to make sure that you are fully aware of the group dynamics. There could well be fractures happening as the children get older.

yeah I was wondering if she was "allowed" to not invite her cousins if she wanted

It seems mean of her to not invite just these 2 kids to make a point. If she had 8 spaces and wanted to invite 2 more friends from one of her activities or something instead that would at least be understandable (although still feel mean to those 2 kids) but to literally prefer to have 2 empty spaces (that you still have to pay for) rather than invite them, just because she's 'not as close' to them as her other friends is very odd if she still does count them as friends.

I suppose the easiest thing would be to ask her what if someone invited everyone else from the group of 9 friends to something but not her, because they didn't feel as close to her, would she understand, or would she feel left out, when they were talking at school about how much fun they had etc?

The cousin she goes to school with yes she considers him her friend, and I wouldn't let her invite him without inviting his sibling (which she knows anyway and always invites). Thats my two DNs.

The other cousins are from ExHs family - they're ExHs cousins DC, and I insist she invites them so ExH can't accuse me of alienating his family - she does like these cousins and sees them maybe once a month when she goes to her grandparents with ExH so is fine with them being there.

She just says they're not her friends like the others are

The ones who have parties invite the whole group yes, out of the 8 others 5 have had parties this year and 3 haven't.

She's not really bothered about parties that aren't her own, if she goes she goes but if she's not invited she's not that bothered.

This makes it tough as to whether YABU/YANBU.

You’ve exerted your influence quite a bit already. If that wasn’t the case, I’d try to get DD to invite the other two given there’s space.

I would encourage her to invite them, but don't force it. It seems silly not to have the full 16 kids at the party if you're paying for it.

(God, I'm glad to be past this stage 🙂)

So she should invite them if they invited AND she went to their parties. That's the rule I have for my DS unless force majeure (think major fall out). Tell her it's the polite thing to do. And to not attend a friend's bdayparty if she's planning to exclude her from her's.

I’d be more concerned that I hadn’t taught my DD to think of other people than anything else. Not a good look and guaranteed to set off other issues.

@PartyInviteFriendshipGroup it’s her party and she's 11 not 5. Friendship groups are fairly well formed at 11. And there's nothing worse than a parent enforcing ‘acquaintances’ on a preteen. Friendship groups at this age also change over time. So what doesn't work this year, might next. But if it’s her party let her chose the guest list.

I think you've already insisted on some things so I wouldn't insist on this too. Let her invite who she likes.

Are the 2 who aren’t invited going to the same secondary school ? End of July is the summer holidays which makes it less awkward if you decide not to invite them.

Just to be clear, this is not leaving 2 children out of the whole class out? It’s just two children out of what you perceive as the friendship group?

friendship groups change. Especially as children get older, it is important to let them choose their friends. Not to be actively unkind or cruel, but to choose who they spend their time with.

I’ve noticed this very distinctly with my own daughter. She has two circles of friends. There is the close knit group that she adores. There is a wider circle that may have better ties to individual members of her closer circle. She however has very good reasons for not being particularly good friends with the people on the wider circle. She will hang out with them when it comes up via other friends, but she isn’t keen to create situations where it happens.

You have already insisted on a number of family invites so it is unreasonable to insist on more. Your DD knows her friendship group better than you do ( i.e. who are her friends v the more acquaintance type of relationship) at this age friendships do change and I think it’s up to your DD who she invites.

Are you sure that the friendship group still has te dynamics it once had? My daughter is in year 6 jd the friendships have grown significantly as they seem to have grown up a lot.

Yes they're all going to the same secondary school, but all in different form classes.

I'm not really sure of the exact dynamics as I don't tend to hang around with DD when she's with her friends, they meet up at the park or walk to and from school together.

We do talk about friends and the names from all the group come up but some more than others.

So it's clear to her that you decide who comes to her birthday party then? She doesn't actually get a say?

Of course she gets a say. If she hadn't wanted to invite my DN she didn't have to, it was totally up to her, but I wasn't going to let her invite my DN and not his sibling, she invited both or neither. She is fine with this.

ExHs cousins DC is slightly different, I admit I have insisted she invites them, but she understands why. And they do invite her to their parties, I just don't get to take her as it's ExHs family.