No party bag for DS

[girlmummy25]

My SIL done a small party for my 10 year old niece which my DD age 7 and DS age 3.5 (nearly 4) went to. There was 11 kids there.
When everybody was leaving her DD handed out the party bags and there was not enough for my DD and DS.
When I asked her if my kids were meant to have one she said ‘oh your DD should of had one but I think another kid has took it’ but nothing about my DS as she didnt get him one!!
My DS was really crying and my DD was on the verge of tears as all the other kids were opening their party bags infront of them.
I was so angry I left (I was meant to be staying for a bit longer as it was at my MIL & FILs house), as I was leaving her partner was rummaging around and managed to chuck a few sweets in 2 bags and gave them to my kids.
ok so maybe my DD not having one was an honest mistake from someone else taking it but to not even get my DS one, I was fuming.
also why on earth was she 2 party bags short in the first place when she knew exactly who was coming - there was no unexpected guests.
some may say oh its because DS is a boy and younger but in my eyes that shouldnt matter.
AIBU by being so angry about this?

Exactly, the children are literally being ushered out the door.

Mine would have been upset but it’s your job as a parent to try and smooth that over so they feel better. Not have a tantrum and storm off yourself

Party bag tat pisses me off no end, it's all just plastic rubbish, why we cant just cut the cake up and put it in a bag to take home like it's the 1980s (😆) I will never know. I have to bin the contents of party bags weekly (3 primary aged children averaging 2 partys a weekend throughout the year, we have had 5 this weekend!!!).

If your 3 year old is at a 10 year olds they'd end up having to buy stuff suitable to go in a 3 year old's party bag, I usually order those bulk buy things off amazon according to the age/sex of the kids invited, so if there was just 1 x 3 year old you'd need to order stuff just for them. I'm not sure why a 10 year old would have a 3 year old nephew at their party anyway (I have a 10 year old and a 3 year old nephew, he definitely isn't invited to their partys, we didn't even have my 5 year old at my 8 year old's party last week, he wasn't old enough to join the activity).

Party bags are full of cheap tat. I'd be glad they didn't get one, all the tat ends up in the bin. She's given him cake so that's fine.

I agree with others that your son was only there because she felt she had to invite you all. Same with your daughter really.
I partly wonder if you were meant to decline going to the party but then visit after but she didn't make this clear and you missed any signals that this would be appropriate. I don't really get why having your children at a 10 years party would be their choice.

Plus if all the kids are sat opening and playing with their party bags it would be easy to see who took 2

The kids who see their parents get het up and storm off as opposed to hearing ‘sorry everyone, but there just weren’t enough, we’ll make it up by doing or getting this or this’ are the kids who will expect everything to always go right in life and won’t be able to handle anything not going perfect.

Your sil couldn’t not give school invitees a bag, the kids would all be talking about it in school!

This kids are sponges they follow their parents lead

Ps I disagree with people acting like it’s a big deal your kids were there, relatives coming to a party of kids a different age is normal, they just fade into the background but get to take part where it’s possible!

With that age gap I really wouldn’t expect a party bag - your son wasn’t a full guest invited to participate along with the others. He was a family member tag-along. Which is lovely. But the party bags were for 10 year
olds - it’s mad to think he should have got one. What a lucky boy getting to enjoy the slide etc should have been your tone, and if absolutely necessary some kind of fun treat on the way home. Being really angry about this is OTT. Let it go….

This is insane to me.

It is your job to teach children how to manage disappointment. You made a difficult situation worse for them by storming out instead of helping them frame it.

"Aunty X made a mistake with party bag numbers, we're going to get something later. I know you're disappointed but we've had a lovely time and we get to play for longer than everyone else if you want to, you just need to wait a little while."

Job done. If they're not able to get past it then I would take them home but not as a victim of a crime but because they're not handling the situation.

Your children are crying over party bags?

Whoever started this whole party bag lark has a long to answer for! They’re such a waste of time and money, not to mention bad for the planet: only benefit is handing them out the door helps to persuade kids to leave :)
Can understand why the kids might have been a bit upset because for some reason, kids love party bags no matter how underwhelming …but no doubt the kids were over it half an hour later.
But you’re an adult. You know party bags are total nonsense. Your job is to model resilience and compassion. If you had just said “ooops, that’s a pity, oh well let’s go for icecream/ another bounce on the castle/go see Nana who always has X treat just for grandkids”, they would have been over it in 3 mins rather than 30 mins.

Its a party bag I am sorry a 3 year old is devastated and you cant cope with this but no i dont think this will stay with him his entire life and no a 3yo did not need to be there

That’s pretty standard for children to start rummaging around in them while parents are getting coats on and saying goodbye.

OP, I think you’ve had a hard time on here. There will always be posters who feel that anything more than a slice of cake is completely unnecessary and any child who gives out anything more than a second hand book and some seeds is doing the work of the devil. Ignore them. It wouldn’t have taken her any effort to buy some sweets for your DS, and for such a small amount of children, to have kept a closer eye on which children were taking more than one party bag. These things matter massively to children and I would have been annoyed with her as well.

Imagine storming out of a family member’s party because your toddler didn’t get a 10yr old’s party bag. So embarrassing

Parents have enough on their plates hosting parties without family members having tantrums over trivial things.

Maybe use it as an opportunity to teach your children that life doesn’t always go exactly as they want and that they can’t just cry about every little thing. The fact that you were “fuming” tells me that won’t, though. Grow up 🙄

Your anger and abrupt departure will have not have helped.

Sorry DS & DD it looks like there was an issue with the party bags. That's sad but it happens - here is an extra piece of cake and part favour.

Jobs a goodun.

What you did reinforced their upset and made it worse.

I’d be a bit put out but your anger seems disproportionate unless there is a history of this sort of behaviour? Storming out seems a bit OTT and probably didn’t help with your kids crying about it.

Kids being kids.

Sadly, worse things will happen to your children. It's mildly annoying at most - your rage is disproportionate to the event.

She was fooming I tell you, fooming

Massive overreaction.

Also why is a three year old in the midst of a ten year old cousin’s party? Weird.

At least you’ve given the rest of the family something to gossip about for the next couple of weeks:-)

Whether you're unreasonable or not really depends on the context of your relationship with SIL. If this is just another in a long list of slights and now she's taken it out on the children then it's understandable that you'd be upset and leave.
If there's no backstory and it was just an accidental not having one party bag and not including the 3 year old in the bags then it seems like an overreaction.