No replies to party invitations

[Dandymum45]

I have a dd who is going to be eleven soon. She is quite shy , but does have some friends at school. She attends a SEN school as she has some difficulties with holding a pen , using a knife and fork etc , she has hypermobility and is undergoing tests for dyspraxia . She is above average intelligence ( according to school reports ) we live abroad and have zero family support . She is doing very

well with the local language . English is her native language . ( To give some background ) Anyway it’s her birthday soon and she wanted to have it at a play center which is about ten minutes drive from her school. (I should add that all the children at the school have another language as the first language , and come from all over , most are transported by a bus that picks them up . Therefore you do not meet any parents except at parties etc . There are ten kids in her class, 9 including her. So we invited all of them . And two whom she is friends with from another class . It’s a play Center where you can go on trampolines , bouncy castles etc . So are free to do your own thing , but you have a table with food etc on . So we wrote the invites three weeks ago and sent a follow up asking if parents could let us know either way by this Friday . Party is next Saturday 31 st . Out of all the invites only the two friends from another class have replied . I know there’s still tomorrow and Friday, but I will be very sad for her if none of them reply . Fortunately my friend is bringing her kids and there are a few others . ( not from school ) But we still don’t know what size cake etc to order and also we have to pay in advance for the playcenter. . Yabu theres still time , or Yanbu this is normal.

If you have all their numbers I would do a nice and pleasant "I'll assume those who haven't replied can't make it so will order cake and food accordingly and hope to see you next time "

Obviously better worded like "looking forward to seeing those who confirmed. If there are any extras do please let me know today/ tomorrow/ whenever as I'll be ordering cake and will order only for those who've replied "

We only have the number of one who’s party we recently went to ( she’s one of the ones who has replied ) as our kids are taken and dropped off by several buses depending which area you live so you never see other parents . Surely it’s just manners though right ?

This is why I absolutely hate throwing birthday parties for my DC, people are awful when it comes to replying and yes MN will give you a million reasons why but it’s just rude. We had one person reply twenty minutes before to say their child was coming and two show up without telling us that they were coming at all, thankfully we had sorted extra parts bags just in case.

Send a reminder text but if you don’t have parents numbers I can’t see what else you could do. Could it be because some of the kids are from a bit further away so it difficult for them to get to?

Can you get the teacher to send an email reminder to people and include your email/number in it?

Less and less people do seem to rsvp these days which is just very very rude.

also unsure if it’s just our school or a thing.

But it has been seen to be that certain religious / nationalities are much less likely to come / rsvp at all and don’t tend to invite those outside of their shared either so you could have a bit of lazy and a bit of culture not mixing.

It’s irritating but it’s similar to what we’ve found with school parties. Dad’s birthday last month we invited the rest of her class (30 children) plus the siblings of some of them who are in my older DCs class. Out of 30 invites only 14 replied by the date we asked, 3 text me after the date to ask if they could still attend, 1 who had said yes then didn’t turn up to the party and 1 parent who didn’t respond turned up anyway. And these are people who I see on the school run every day so some people just told me verbally.

I say it’s best to just be prepared with a bigger cake etc just in case others show, although it’s annoying. Will the play place let you pay for a minimum number of children and then pay for any extras that show up on the day?

That’s awful .. well the play center is about ten minutes from the school , I’d say the furthest it could be is about 25 mins drive , for some kids , but I do know that some of the kids live nearer to the playcenter than we do . Oh I should add my husband obv put his number on the invites and reminders and said if you could send a whattsapp … I won’t be doing it again in a hurry . She was so excited .. I feel sad .. thank goodness I’ve got friends whose kids can come or I would have had to cancel x

So you gave them until this Friday or last Friday?

Either way. If not response by Friday, presume that is there response - no

Thanks for that , il go for a bigger cake just in case … that’s a bit Hardfaced just turning up .. we have paid upfront for 15 and so far with friends and the two from other class we have 8 . I’m sure the cake can be taken home /parents can eat it etc .

When you’ve been invited to parties before, how did you RSVP? Surely you must have everyone’s contact details. I think it can be normal to have to chase a few people who haven’t responded. This seems like a lot, but I think kinda still normal up to a week before.

Are you sure they got the invites?
Could the class teacher not have handed them out?

You have the number of 1 person? And your daughter has been at the school presumably for years if turning 11?

There’s no class WhatsApp group?
you have never had friends over?
your daughter never gone to a friend’s house?
this was the only party invite you’ve ever received?

how long has she been at the school?!

Sen schools are different as parents mainly don't drop off and pick up themselves.

A play centre is a little young for 11 year olds?

So I don’t understand why the op goes inc to such detail about her daughter’s Sen given every other child there will have Sen

She’s only been invited to one , and they have confirmed . As I say it’s a small class 5 boys 5 girls , one child just brought a cake in for their birthday and one girl had a party that she wasn’t invited to .

Have literally none of the school parents replied?

I'd be assuming the invitations had gone astray if absolutely no one replied.

It has a younger area and then a larger area for up to 16 year olds

I was wondering the same thing .. maybe not been given to parents etc

Maybe she would be happier with just her two friends at her party? Maybe the other parents don’t want to commit as their SEN kids may change their mind on the day.

Some kids are there purely because they can’t attend mainstream as they don’t have a good grasp of the language ( parents may not be native speakers etc .

I was wondering the same thing .. maybe not been given to parents etc

People are generally shit at replying, but given both of the invitations to the other class have been replied to I'd seriously be wondering if they are languishing in trays somewhere