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Original poster

Can we start a mnet movement to ban party bags?

412 replies

bubble99 · 29/08/2006 20:18

Back in the dark ages, when I was a girl, we sometimes got an extra piece of birthday cake in a paper napkin to take home.

When did this 'party bag' nonsense start? From what I can see most of it is (expensive) junk and, what offends me more, is that the guests look for it.

Am I an old skinflint/curmudgeon? No honest answers required.

FGS, most parents have already forked-out for the food and the makeover/clown/entertainer/ unicycling jugglers, as it is. Isn't that enough?

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Orlando · 30/08/2006 11:29

just thought of another Party Bag Plus.

When you say to your hot, overexcited, emotionally overwrought child at the end of the party 'go and say thank you to x's mummy' they do it without a murmur because she's the one dishing out the party bags....

(Feel I won't be winning over anyone in the conscientious objectors camp with that one)

katierocket · 30/08/2006 12:26

"Do not understand the idea of a party bag. If you go a child's birthday party then it should be all about the birthday boy/girl shouldn't it?
It gives me the impression that we are trying to compensate the children that are invited because they don't get any present by giving them something else.....
SAD, SAD, SAD"

Just listen to yourself - it's a bit of harmless fun, it's not "sad" it's sweet and my DS loves them. So bloody what if they're full of tat and sugar - they're children, it's a party, let them enjoy themselves FGS. Why does everything have to be so worthy?

jembob · 30/08/2006 12:26

I've recently had the same conversation with a bunch of mums at a 3 year olds birthday! I'm expecting my first in January and just can't get my head around party bags (and on another topic, 'Thank you teacher' cards!)
Everyone agreed that they were a waste of time, but wouldnt dare not do them in case it had a negative affect on their children in nursery/school etc!!

My parents were childrens entertainers and I went to 100's of parties as a child - do you think this has caused an unnatural hatred of childrens birthday parties!

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prettybird · 30/08/2006 12:35

The reason I don't do them is not because I think they are sad but becasue I can't be bothered with the faff - purely selfish motives!

But I am a "Domestic Goddess" in all other respects : home made fancy "shaped"birthday cake (Thomas type trains in the past, a Dalek this year - still to work out how to do it), home made biscuits, fairy cakes, traffic light jellies..... and even home made nibbles for the adults and an extra "grown-up" birthday cake for my SIL, whose birthday is the following day (the party last year was a day late, so was actaully on her birthday)

It's nice for the kids when they get them - but ds would get such a rollocking if he ever complained after a party that he didn't get one.

So I'm going to sit firmly on the fence: I half give them out (in that Silly Billy gives out wee bags with a couple of balloons/toys - plus a flyer with his own details - he's not that Silly!), and I don't mind if ds gets them at other parties. But I most definitely would get annoyed at any kid (escpecially my own) who expected a party bag.

laundrylover · 30/08/2006 13:23

Not read this HUGE thread but just to add my vote as a party bag hater!! Cake is good enough. The stuff that dd1 comes home from nursery with is amazing - massive chewy lollies for a 2 year old????
On her b'day she took buns in for kids and staff and a couple of candles. Will do the same this year too...

Tallie11 · 30/08/2006 14:32

I am 12 weeks pregnant and love the thought of party bags already - sad, but true

Please keep party bags

JoshandJamie · 30/08/2006 14:44

I'm so squarely on the fence on this issue that it's beginning to hurt my butt.

Don't like cheap, plastic tat.
Don't like loads of sweets that will make them wired
Don't like ungrateful children who expect them.

But
Do love being creative in making a bag up
Do like the expectation and excitement that goes with them
Do like it as a way to round off a theme of a party.

Just want to say that all these dos and don't are unqualified as my two boys are too small really for any of this yet.

pointydog · 30/08/2006 14:44

Jembob - your parents were children's entertainers? Wow. Doing what?

I've always suspected that in real life children's entertainers are miserable, grumpy people who lack a sense of humour. Any truth to this? (No disrespect to ma&pajembob)

suzywong · 30/08/2006 15:22

entertaining children, surely

laudaud · 30/08/2006 15:24

well put joshandjamie

monkey · 30/08/2006 15:27

My party bags are as follows - each child gets empty bag as they arrive. (not expensive themed bag either, just a 2L freezer bag with thier name & a picture of sponge bob stuch on it & some string so they can wear it across thier shoulders). Then each game most kids receive a prize (eg a couple of jelly sweets inside each layer of pass the parcel, the biggest prize is a fun size choccy bar) they basically spend the party collecting little sweets, at the end we have a treasure hunt (more little sweets), they decorate a cup cake to put in bag and take home, then the finally is the fishing game - 1 cheap plastic toy, beautifully wrapped. They have to fish out a prize with a little fishing rod & they are all dead chuffed. Birthday kid gets exactly same. ANd only costs a few quid altogether. And as they spend the party snaffling sweets, the don't each much either.. And as they all have the bag from the word go there are no annoying grasping child moments either. It's an integral part of the party. Works really well for us.

I never got a party bag as a kid, but I they like it & it's only little. I wouldn't spend a lot. Who doesn't like to get a little pressie?

JackieNo · 30/08/2006 15:31

I enjoy doing them (although have some reservations about the fact that DD expects them), and it's also a good way of signalling the end of the party (perhaps that's why I like them so much).

monkey · 30/08/2006 16:26

that should read the finalé. oops. ANd the fishing game is a great way to end party, fish yourself out pressie. Kids are also usually very sweet & encouraging to the others too. nice end.

AmandaP · 30/08/2006 16:37

I hate party bags with a vengeance. There seems to a big element of competition between parents locally as to who can put the most in the bag. It's ridiculous! The best party 'bag' idea we ever did was to give every child a torch so they could run round the garden in the dark (ds' birthday is November hence it gets dark quite early), they got to keep the torch (it was only a 1.99 one) plus a slice of cake. They all loved it, and I felt better for not just chucking sweets and bits of plastic at them.

So I'm voting against bags!

prettybird · 30/08/2006 16:51

Am I just unaturally lucky (or blind) but I never seem to have encountered any competition or pressure to have/not have pary bags/invite all the kids in the class/have a biiger/better party?

Or maybe ds is just still too young.

lulabelle · 30/08/2006 16:53

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Medulla · 30/08/2006 16:53

I'm not against party bags but I do not feel I need to provide them if that makes sense. If others want to do them then go ahead but I've decided to send my childrens friends home with a piece of birthday cake and maybe a balloon!

TooTicky · 30/08/2006 17:22

Perhaps somebody should research how much plastic tat from party bags ends up in landfill - probably a shocking amount, like the UK's yearly disposable nappy contribution to landfill which would fill Trafalgar Square from the ground up to the top of Nelson's column more than ten times. Perhaps they'll bury it near you.
Also, who made said plastic tat? Most likely it was made abroad in grotty working conditions by underpaid workers. Hardly happy jolly party stuff

Blondilocks · 30/08/2006 17:41

When I was a child every party had party bags. In my opinion they are a given part of the party & taking them away would be like not serving food! It is possible to do a party on a budget & include party bags ... we did it for LO when OH & I were both students.

Spidermama · 30/08/2006 17:46

TooTicky I find myself in total agreement with you once more.
Also, it's bad to teach our kids that cheap thrills which break within minutes and go straight into the bin are an acceptable part of life.

TinyGang · 30/08/2006 17:54

Nearly 350 posts on this thread?! I can't believe how passionatly some of you feel about the humble party bag.

Also how would you 'ban' them anyway? I have this vision of Tony Blair discussing this at PMQ's.

Roobie · 30/08/2006 17:58

Those who say there is a competitive element amongst local mums as to who puts the most/the best stuff in their party bags - how do you know? How does this manifest itself? Are you actually aware of whispering campaigns about the latest party bag efforts? - I tend to think it is merely an assumption that must actually come from your own attitudes.

Agree too that there's nothing sinister about children looking out for their bag at the end of a party - it's becoming the norm so only natural they should expect it, nothing to do with being a selfish brat in the making.

Jimjams2 · 30/08/2006 18:21

SufferinginSilence your points about consumerism and other children having nothing.

Hmm some sympathy, although I think that living with ds1 (and more to the point visiting his school) will teach ds2 and ds3 way more about what 's important in life than banning party bags.

As for children in other countries- we sponspor an african boy- and use that to teach ds2 andds3 about other children having very little.

mousiemousie · 30/08/2006 18:41

these are a party highlight in my book - why ban them and spoil the fun

housemum · 30/08/2006 19:39

I am not against party bags as such (it's pretty hard to get rid of them now) but then again mine aren't much removed from the bit-of-cake-and-a-balloon that we got as kids. I tend to put in mine:

Birthday cake (so the kid can eat it at home off a plate hopefully rather than smear it in my carpet)
Balloon or 2 - to be blown up at home
Bubble mix - always liked, disposable, non-offensive, unisex

Only possible extra might be home-made biscuits, or a couple of gingerbread/chocolate biscuit men (the sort you get a tub of for £2 in Sainsburys)

Then again, I am one of a growing group of mean mothers in my circle who have pass-the-parcel with ONE PRESENT IN THE MIDDLE!!