To ask that my nephews don’t come

[Littlebitofthis1]

My niece is going through the usual hardships that many teenagers go through at high school. So for her birthday I decided to organise a girls only afternoon tea, and I invited my mum, sister, and niece to come along with my own two daughters and my son (because I’m on mat leave with him).

However, it’s caused a major argument with my sister (whose daughter I planned the event to celebrate). She is annoyed that I didn’t include my two nephews in the invite. I said for my niece, I thought it would be nice to make it girls only and not have her brothers there now she’s older. Now my sister is saying that she’s not going to come and therefore won’t bring my niece either, unless I include my nephews. She also used as an argument that my 6 month old will be there and he’s a boy. Not sure this is of relevance but I’m paying for the event.

should I include my nephews or stand my groundy daughters are still young but I always intentionally do some special things for just them and me and plan to continue that so I didn’t think I would offend anyone by planning this.

Cancel the whole thing. She’s an ungrateful cow.

EDIT: actually the niece isn’t an issue so invite the adult niece, offer to pick her up and just uninvite your sister.

I think it's a lovely idea from an aunty... your sister needs to calm down it's the daughters birthday so she spits her dummy out and her daughter misses out .. what a parent .

Her son is a six month old BF baby.

That was the sister's ridiculous argument too...

So OP has to either cancel the whole thing

or bring and pay for two teenage boys too... because its not fair if the six month old baby gets to go because he's a boy.

If someone wanted to plan a lovely birthday treat for my DD.... I'd let them. and say thankyou

OP just wondering is your sister like this at family weddings or other big occasions?

It sounds to me like she wished she'd thought of a fun afternoon tea for neice, but you said she doesn't think about or organise such things and I think she might be a bit jealous..

Not a great parent if she'd rather cancel and have her DD bored at home, than let her go to your outing if the nephews aren't invited.

Does she want a medal?

I don’t really understand the no boys thing and I hate the comments implying normal boys would hate it, my son would love it and so would one of my brothers (the other definitely would not). I was always brought up with invites extended to all but not everyone was expected to come if they did not say to. Didn’t really ever have boys or girls only things but I guess some people clearly do.
inviting them from the beginning would have been nice, sis forcing them to go when the by don’t want to is very odd

🙄

It’s for your sister to treat all her children equally- you are not bound to doing the same. That said it sounds like you treat your nephews to vouchers and stuff on their respective birthdays, so no problem there. I get vibes your sister either doesn’t like her daughter or jealous you are closer in age to her daughter perhaps? You doing afternoon tea, you’re not taking her to Disneyland. The boys will cope and so will she.

Stand your ground and tell you sister it’s not fair to make a nice thing for your niece all about what your sister wants, she needs to grow up and stop competing with her daughter.

I don’t know I’m a bit conflicted….I do think it came from a good place you arranging this for your Niece, but knowing her and her mum have an already strained relationship and how she ‘favours the boys’ to then explicitly not invite her brothers yet tag your own kids along for convenience does seem a bit off to be honest.

She's 18. Cancel the whole thing and arrange separate meet up with her and your kids. No need to involve your sister.

I have two nephews and I have different relationship with them. It is totally fine. I see them separately and together. Same with extended family, there is a mix and match of people based on interests and events. Even in nuclear family it is fine to divide occasionally.

I hate it to. I think to deliberately leave a sibling out of a family lunch because of the sex they are is vile and such an outdated concept.

Dhs family do it all the time to. They have "girls" trips and never invite the sons or grandsons. Dh finds it incredibly hurtful and MIL wonders why the boys are not as close to her.

If families chose to exclude kids because of the sex they are its little wonder relationships fracture. I think the op has massively over stepped generally here. I would never dream of arranging a girly only birthday lunch for my niece without her mum's permission whilst leaving out her brothers. I would ask my sister first and include my nephews to.

I suspect in a few years when the ops son is older and is being left out because he js a boy she will realise how unkind this situation is.

Yes

And posters bemoan their adult sons not being as close to them - but the truth is that a lot of families just cherish their daughters more than their sons and boys receive the message that they aren't as important

Hrft but it was a nice thing to try to do for your niece and she might even enjoy looking after your newborn with you.

I hope it works out.

This is so weird
I never ask my sister's permission to invite her adult children lol

Why can't the men take the boys out for similar interests?
I'm not playing video games or going hiking or playing football
Things that the boys in my life enjoy
I enjoy going for long walks, painting etc
Things they absolutely hate
Its ok to be different

Teenage boys tho
Not little boys

That the point though, assuming boys as a group like certain things and girls different things, when it’s more that some poor like some thing and some other things.

I don’t understand any of the heat you are getting. You’ve planned a lovely thing. I come from a big family and any time someone can be made to feel special in their own right is cherished. Also the boys are clearly not bothered about coming so it’s yoor sisters strange rules about having all of her children with her that seems to be the problem. If she has weird anxieties then ideally she could put them aside for her daughter. If her 18yo
daughter wants to come and she doesn’t tell her not to bother coming then! She’s spoiling it for her child which is really odd.

Exactly.

I think it's incredibly weird to think that an 18 year old woman has more in common with two under 5s because they are girls than with her close in age brothers.

That's the OP deciding to create a gendered culture in her family.

You're not going hiking but enjoy long walks?

Are those not exactly the same?

Video games, hiking and football aren’t exactly “boys things”.

Nor is walking and painting “girls things”.

Weird.

Also, I’d happily play a video game with my son to show an interest in him and what he enjoys. Kick a ball around with him for 10 minutes in the garden. Isn’t this just the bare minimum of parenting? Engaging with your children and what they enjoy regardless of their sex?

“The men”, “the boys” - agree with a pp. So outdated.

I think your niece made a mistake asking for her mum to be included when favouring the boys is a sore point and she knew she she would want to bring them.

I think you made a mistake not just inviting your niece out for coffee and avoiding all the drama.

Can an aunt not invite her 18 year old niece to afternoon tea, on a day which is not the actual birthday ? Where’s the cutoff - does she have to consult her sister/invite both nephews for the rest of their lives if she wants to see her niece ?

I agree. And when I was 18 I didn't need my mum's permission to go somewhere - not did I need "bringing" by my mum!

@Vivi0 you’re overtaking this thread with your own agenda here- don’t you have better things to do?

Supporting people ultimately means responding to the individual in front of you — not policing language or activities so heavily that even acknowledging some tendencies that could fall into “gender stereotyping” becomes controversial.

The OP didn’t say she chose an afternoon tea because of gender. she chose it because she knew her niece enjoys that!!

From where I’m sat, the nephews wouldn’t have been invited regardless of the activity that was chosen. so it’s besides the point. OP updated that they didn’t even want to come. And that’s okay!

So what, in life you want to force people to do things just to prove a point that we no longer conform to historical gender stereotypes. Would you be so passionate about this if the activity was something else? We could argue you’re gender stereotyping in the first place by assuming that the activity was chosen because it was “girly”.