To not do food at a 6 yr old birthday party?

[yellowgecko]

I’m organising a village hall party on a Saturday, 2pm-4pm. The plan is to do a kids disco, and put out bowls of sweets and crisps, do the cake towards the end and give everyone a party bag on leaving.
I think we’ll end up with around 25 kids. I’m just fed up of going to parties and seeing all the food waste!

AIBU - yes you need to do a buffet / proper food
YANBU - snacks are fine, no one will starve

The key is good communication. If my kids had to attend a party at that time, I might assume that they were being given lunch there so I wouldn’t give them a proper lunch beforehand.

I can’t hold an event without offering food and drink to guests, so I would have to sort food as a host.

What a leap.

I wouldn’t expect my child to be fed a proper meal between 2-4. I’d give them lunch, go to the party (where they’d have snacks and cake) and have dinner when we got home.

I’ve read some silly things on MN over the years but ‘food at parties is ridiculous’ must be up there with the best (or worst?).

What do you mean by a proper meal?

Hahaha. Yep, sure is .

2 hours of running around / disco for 25 6 year olds without a break is a lot.

There will be arguments, some will get very hot / tired / overwrought etc.

A bit of a sit down, make sure everyone has a drink - a bit of rest and cool down with ‘party tea’ .

Yes this is similar to what has been popular in our area for years, an individual bag. Stops kids grabbing handfuls from sharing plates and wasting it, or making everything grubby. Also more likely to be eaten as it’s manageable for them, rather than being faced with a table of food and too many choices (particularly for aged 5 and under. Older ones always seem ravenous from running around).

I would add a few sandwiches along with crackers & cheese. And fruit shoots. Playing about makes kids very hungry & thirsty.

must be cultural but nobody would expect a meal over here if it's a 2-4PM party. Everybody will have eaten lunch before. Light snacks, drinks for sure, cake.

Entertaining 25 5/6 year olds for 2 hours solid is no mean feat.

I'd put out some food as a "breather" from the disco / something to occupy them for a little while. Doesn't have to be expensive or a full on meal but I'd do a selection of sausage rolls, cut up pizza's, crisps and biscuits - that kind of stuff.

They wont want to dance for 2 hours straight, food breaks up the party nicely.

Exactly. People on here think carrots and cucumbers, ‘crusty bread’ and a soup is a full meal when hosting so what do you expect 😅

Haha perfect! 👌

Food isn’t needed, it’s fine op

I’d say sandwiches and sausage rolls at least as I’d say people will have a light lunch assuming there’ll be something there at least

Order 5 margaritas pizzas to be delivered on top of what you’ve already planned. Job done.

But why does providing food have to mean there’ll be excessive waste? It’s not that hard to guesstimate what might be needed and to provide food that doesnt have to be binned if left over

What happened to proper party food, isn't it meant to be a treat? Honestly all this talk of giving out a sarnie and bag of crisps individually packaged to each child makes it sound like no more fun than school lunch!

Everyone will expect food. Just make a few sandwiches and cut them in 4 and put out some babybels or cheese strings.

if you have left over sandwiches make toasties the next day.

I don't think you need to do food. But I would want to because it will fill half an hour and a 2 hour party wth 5 and 6 year olds will seem like a very long time without it.

I would have some plates of fairy cakes and biscuits, sliced up swiss roll sort of thing, rather than sandwiches or pizza. No sweets though, as pp have said.

You need to make it clear before to the parents. Then that's fine

If you decide to do this make it clear in advance. We went to a party like this and after an hour of continuous running around the children were asking for food. All they were offered were a few slices of cucumber and lots of cake, biscuits and sweets. All the cucumber was gone very quickly and the children were still hungry and didn’t really want cake. It was the only time the DC left a party hungry.

100% you need to have food at a kids party. Sandwiches, jelly, ice cream. You can do it yourself cheap as chips.

Definitely need snacks. Cupcakes,crisps,a fruit platter, sticks of carrot and cucumber,bread sticks and biscuits.

We had a party 2-5pm and I did lots of packets of things that we eat anyway (Bear snacks, crisps, Babybels, breadsticks, etc.) so there would be minimal waste. I also cut up cucumber and strawberries so I could feel a bit better about all the junk :) It was demolished! Kids do go a bit crazy at parties. I would put it out at a mid-point and do a snack time instead of having it out from the beginning. Less mess and better to have eating as a mini event.