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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to not want ds1 to have a party because we've NOWHERE to store the 30-odd presents he'll get?

81 replies

LovelyWalters · 04/01/2010 19:46

I'm not being a killjoy, honest!

Ds1 will be 6 in a few weeks, and dd will be 3 a few days after. Ds1 has just started school and so far has been to about 6 parties at various soft-play places etc. Everyone in the class appears to get invited - I don't think they're at the stage yet of choosing who comes, iykwim. There are about 26 children in his class.

Every time I drop him off at a party I see a mountain of presents, which I just know consists of endless amounts of plastic tat. We live in a small house with very little storage, and nowhere to put more storage. If we have a party for him I just don't know where we could put his stuff!Especially after the deluge of presents he was given at Christmas. Plus becuase it's dd's birthday too I'd feel obliged to throw a small party for her (she's at nursey and it would only be for a few dcs, probably in the house = more plastic tat).

Any suggestions? It's not that I don't want to let him have a party, it's the aftermath I can't bear! He's a great kid...oh maybe IABU, I want him to have fun! But what can I do re presents?

OP posts:

PeedOffWithNits · 04/01/2010 20:23

agreed, £200 still buys a lot of plastic toys!

Lapsedrunner · 04/01/2010 20:24

I put DS(6) presents away in a cupboard, he opened a few and the rest went to charity shop!!!! This year we broke the mould and only invited a select few (others are still going for a full class party!

zapostrophe · 04/01/2010 20:28

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

renderedspeechless · 04/01/2010 20:51

good thread op. interesting to learn that some people find the no presents rule or request for gift card rude. am having a whole class party for my dd in few weeks and want her to understand that the celebrationis more than about receiving presents. tried this last year too, she invited 8 friends, of which 4 still gave presents. felt a bit funny that my request open to misinterpretation on many levels. fully get that some parents need to bring gift, would people be offended if i stated that dd would love a named item costing £30 and that a SMALL CONTRIBUTION TOWARDS it would be generous and appreciated. opinions please?

agree that i consider dd potentially receiving £000's of pounds worth of vouchers to be quite vulgar. i really want people to understand that it is not a gift-collecting or 'money-making' opportunity for dd.

SE13Mummy · 04/01/2010 20:56

Have a small party in your small home and on the invite include something along the lines of, "X is having a small party in our small home so if you'd like to bring him a present please choose something small/use-up-able".

Just because others are doing whole-class parties it doesn't actually mean that you have to too. My DH and I are teachers and feel that supervising 30 children is something we do when we get paid, not for fun at the weekend!

MilaMae · 04/01/2010 21:00

No I only ever spend £4(all I can afford with the number of parties my 3 go to,6,6 and 5) and always try to get non crap which I put thought into eg a nice Book People book, or Tesco craft set(they've got a lovely card making one I've just stocked up on),wooden bead sets from Hawkins, tiny Lego sets,eco torches,wooden jewellery,tins with sweets in etc.

I hate Toys R Us(it only sells plastic crap),it's my money so I like to decide what I spend it on,I'd also die if I only gifted £4 and everybody else gifted far more. People would be pressurized into gifting more so they didn't look bad-horrible.

Also what kid deserves to go and choose vast amounts of toys after a party and birthday. Going round a toy shop choosing £200 worth of toys is something I never want my dc to do. They hope for 1 thing at a time and if they're lucky at Xmas or bday they may get what they hope for,giving them masses of money to choose what they want is just creating greed.

Original poster

LovelyWalters · 04/01/2010 21:01

yy zapostrophe, i always try to buy books or something non-plastic for ds1's classmates too - just feel their parents would appreciate that more!

the other thing is - ds has had a few settling in problems since starting school - we had recently moved back home from America and he was finding the cultural differences quite hard, I think. Scottish kids are ever-so-slightly rougher than their US counterparts! He seems more settled now and is doing really well with his schoolwork and we are really pleased with how he's doing. So I do feel that I'd like to treat him to a party.

Wouldn't go down the gift card route here, don't think it'd go down too well at this school. Am swaying between a few friends allowed and taking them 10 pin bowling or the like, (our house isn't big enough for even an 8-kid party) or full class at a soft play with the £1 or even £2 idea....

OP posts:

mcoys · 04/01/2010 21:12

agree with batteryhuman let him keep a few and regift the rest! bound to be more parties!

based on your settling in comment, denying him a party with his entire class could possibly throw a spanner in the works affecting his relationships with new friends and yours with other parents? just a thought but i don't know how things are ....

Baileysismyfriend · 04/01/2010 21:18

Ahhh you can't say that presents arent allowed that seems very mean.

Let him have presents and then go through what he would really like to keep and give the rest to charity - or keep them to give them as gifts to other kid's parties. Sorted.

Original poster

LovelyWalters · 04/01/2010 21:20

that's what i'm thinking, mcoys - don't wamt him to feel like the odd-one-out as it does seem that he's been to a ton of parties already.

DH thinks we should just go for the full monty and store the overflow in the attic, where we can 'use it up' as time goes on. If we can manage to spirit a selection of them away before ds notices, that could be the answer....

OP posts:

frecklyspeckly · 04/01/2010 21:22

We have stopped doing the whole class parties.

Made a decision that it was wrong for us as a family as we also have no space for gifts and the cost on the run up to and just after christmas (this is when the birthday's fall).

Fortunately both dc's accept this. For DS he just had one friend around for tea and they had a great time - plus a family get together on the night.

DD had a family party at my mum's (bigger) house and we had her 3 cousins - all lovely kids AND they all get on fine! Cake was a chocolate Christmas log from the Spar shop - Classy!! we had a right laugh and an excellent time. No pressure, no parental competition and if anyone played up you could feel free to tell off without fear or embarassment. Excellent night had by all.

I think it can be quite easy to fall into feeling pressurised you have to do this 'big' party thing otherwise your child will be having a 'lesser' birthday.

Some parents really seem to go 'all-out' and it can feel depressing if you can't or don't want to do it. And it can be quite hard to make a stand and do your own thing.

I feel I may have gone off at a bit of an odd tangent here but the thing is you should do what feels right for you and the way you live. If you want a party - great - just say on invite - no presents needed - just bring yourselves. and if you just want a family tea - thats fine too.
And it is fine to only invite a few. It is part of life to accept you can't be invited to every party!

StealthPolarBear · 04/01/2010 21:26

I love the £1 idea! How would you word the thank you cards though? Or would you just not mention the gift?
I have the same problem - don't mind books and clothes (although not something friends would usually get I know) but far far too many toys! Grandparents both asked for tips about Christmas and I managed to reduce the toy mountain slightly that way but it's still a mountain.

Original poster

LovelyWalters · 04/01/2010 21:43

it is a mountain, Stealth. with 3 dcs and generous family/friends, Christmas was reasonably well-managed (by me!) and they got a fair amout of clothes, colouring in stuff, books etc but I still had to get another storage unit for their bedroom to try and make it slightly more organised.

didn't really work though. I now have a lovely new toy storage unit which sits unused, while the dc prefer to find more inventive places to 'tidy' their toys away to - like jammed down the back of the radiators, the kitchen bin or a laundry basket...there's no room left in any of these places for even more stuff!

OP posts:

StealthPolarBear · 04/01/2010 21:48

"the dc prefer to find more inventive places to 'tidy' their toys away to - like jammed down the back of the radiators, the kitchen bin or a laundry basket..."
sounds good to me! Two of those aren't problems, when you find the ones in the laundry basket, put them with their friends in the bin

Original poster

LovelyWalters · 04/01/2010 21:51

....and we have the solution!

OP posts:

PlanetEarth · 04/01/2010 21:52

For my daughters 6th(?) birthday we asked for no presents, but a charity donation if they wanted. The party was at a local trampoline centre which is primarily a centre for physically/mentally disabled kids, so we asked for donations to the centre. We also put the money we'd have spent on party bags into a donation for the centre, and just had take-away cake instead of piles of plastic tat.

Daughter was OK with this (we explained that if she wanted a big party she would have to agree to this), and one or two people did give her small presents. The trampoline centre were of course delighted with the donation (don't know what it came to, but I'd guess it was probably around £200 - far too much for a small child's birthday presents!)

My only regret is that, keen as all the other parents seemed to be on the idea, we didn't start a trend .

MadamDeathstare · 04/01/2010 22:02

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

renderedspeechless · 04/01/2010 22:03

Agree PE. its sad that the presents that are received for the children in my dds class are duly noted by some of the parents. its seriously at risk of descending into competitive present-giving. my dd recently went to a party and i planned to give a lovely gift that i picked up in currys for £5. the following week one of the other mums mentioned to me that they were surprised that the birthday child had been given a better present than we'd given her child. i'd hate to think such a thing might even cross my mind, much less approach the 'offending parent'. so no presents remains the way to go for me!

am sold on the £1 idea, will select gift and will email thank you card with picture of my dd with said gift. simples.

Oblomov · 04/01/2010 22:05

We are having a party in a few weeks, for ds1 who will be 6. I dred all the tat we will get.
Is it wrong to sell it on e-bay and then say buy him a star wars lego set that he really does want ?
Is that bad ?

renderedspeechless · 04/01/2010 22:09

obl, you post made me smile...a lot.

id just say, its not bad, per se.....it's just....not good!

Oblomov · 04/01/2010 22:14

render, unfortunately, i think i knew that.

piscesmoon · 04/01/2010 22:30

I wouldn't be blackmailed into having a whole class party-just have a few friends.
If you really want to have a huge party then just ask them not to bring presents.

cat64 · 05/01/2010 14:51

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

PrettyCandlesAndTinselToo · 05/01/2010 14:59

Party-share, so still have a big party, but only get half the number of presents.
Small party, eg perhaps a Pizza Express party, which is fun with even small numbers of children.
Say on invites that ds had his heart set on a particular toy, so vouchers for XYZ shop would be greatly appreciated.
Say on invites that ds loves a certain toy which has fairly expensive parts, so that they can all get one small part of a kit.

But definitely YABU not to have a party becuase you don't like the presents!

Hando · 05/01/2010 16:11

I have received loads of plastic tat for dd's birthday.

i think it's lovely they chose to get a pressie, but the "plastic tat" they give is awful. i would much rather a homemade card with some nice birthday words in or nothing at all. People seem to feel they HAVE to bring a pressie. As others have a said a nice small pressie can be bought for a few pounds, if I couldn't affird this then I'd not bring one at all.

I do not think it's rude to ask for gift cards at all. It makes sense, so that the child can buy something they'd really like for £100 rather than 30 £4 bits of plastic tat. I'd have no problem with a request like this and neither do i see a problem with a child having £200 of birthday money to choose toys they would like with.

We invite the whole class because i like to hire a hall and it doesn't make a huge difference if it's 10 or 30. We have entertainer or I will do the games and dancing. The food never gets eaten anyway, so a few sandwiches, drinks, fruit and crisps will suffice and party bags are the only real cost. I love searching for stuff and making up party bags though.

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