DD4 party - nobody coming!

[lamby12]

Ok so slight exaggeration but sent invites to 15 nursery children via nursery, had 3 rsvps from those that can't come due to existing plans.

Nobody's coming yet other than one friend and a family friend! Gave 5 weeks notice at the time of invites. DD according to nursery is friends with everyone, gets involved. Has a core group of friends but plays with everyone. No replies yet from the girls she talks about lots. I have the number of one other mum who we have play dates with. They are coming but at the moment that's it.

DD has never had a party before due to various covid/family things going on and is obsessed with having one so we booked a soft play, the full works and invited the whole nursery group.

I had a feeling it might be a bad idea due to them being so young still, all very fickle, and as not at school yet you don't really see parents on drop off as it's all different times.

I don't know what to do if we don't hear any more! It's 3 weeks away but people have had the invites for 2 weeks. Just had my number to rsvp, I am worried we may have to cancel and DD will be heartbroken. Why can't people even reply?!

Did you give out the invitations? I remember frantically ringing parents on the day as the teacher had put them in a drawer and forgotten about them!

5 weeks notice is (far) too much for a nursery age party. I wouldn't arrange life around a 3/4 yo going to a party of someone I hadn't maybe even heard her mention. Therefore I would wait until ~ 2 weeks before to give a firm answer unless there was an rsvp date.

Did you give an RSVP date?
I would normally only send out invites about 2 weeks before.

My suggestion is 2 weeks before send out prompts with a 4 day rsvp date.

I've just had a similar issue. One of the nursery Mums contacted me to check the invitation was put in my sons bag as she hadn't received any RSVPs - this was the first I'd heard about the party, nursery staff had forgot to put them in the kids bags.

Honestly they are too young at nursery age for parties with those sort of numbers. It’s too much, and toddlers are too unpredictable, they might refuse to go in the day/ be teething/ had a bad night. Parents won’t want to commit.

3 or 4 kids plus yours is a great number for a fun party imo. It'll be great!

Is 15 children everyone in his room? I usually invited everyone and about half came ( now school age it's nearer 3/4). I also find some reply immediately but lots wait until a week or two before.

Do you have a WhatsApp group? If so, I would nudge.

In my experience people usually reply 1-2 weeks before. I usually contact on Facebook or WhatsApp also to make sure they have received invite.

My sons birthday is 15th next month. I probably won't book anything for next week or so.

I think this is totally normal. Any party I have done for my kids including nursery/school friends whose parents I don’t know, only a proportion rsvp. Several still turn up who didn’t let me know.

In my experience alot off parents don't reply and just turn up.

Must admit I'm going through this now. Given out invites to the whole of DD's class and had approx 20% reply. But on speaking to other mums, they've also said people won't reply until a week or so before. Doesn't help I'm EXTREMELY anxious and a "planner", praying I get more rsvps before the actual party. Because I always reply the day I get the invite in case I forget, I expected everyone else does the same. They don't
Chill. They will come and you'll have a wonderful party regardless x

People won’t reply that far in advance.
do you have any back up kids- family friends kids or family if needed? If still no responses in the week before send another invite.

Do you have contact details for the other parents? I find invitations being put in bags very unreliable for getting responses and use this as a last resort.

Do you know the names of the invited children and has your DD been to any parties last year? If so, ask the organising mum if she'd mind sending you any contact numbers she has for the parents of attendees.

I find WhatsApping the invite and contacting parents directly a couple of weeks before the party is a lot more reliable for getting responses. I usually just say "Hi, not sure you've received this invite, but we'd love to see you if you can make it". I've had a lot of paper invitations go astray and my message is often the first the parents have heard about it!

I wouldn't panic yet. When we received invites that early I didn't respond to them until much closer to the date as I don't even know what we are doing next week never mind next month! I would give it a bit more time X

No response doesn't mean they're not coming. It's tedious, but most people have no concept of rsvp'ing these days so you'll probably have to chase if you need actual numbers.

I think it just slips people's minds. They'll probably RSVP soon.
I find it strange to not RSVP because it's weeks in advance though, surely you can just put the party in your calendar and then that's your plan, rather than waiting to see what else might come up? Equally to the poster who said they are too young for parties. 3/4 seems to be a key age for parties round here. Soft play is pretty normal I think.

To those saying you'd only send invitations 2 weeks before, how do you plan for party bags etc? Do you order for everyone that you invite?

Surprised people say 5 weeks is too soon to reply - not how it works round here, so I'd have been worried too. But since so many others say they'd not bother to reply until much later, it might well be it's normal where you are. (I can't get over how rude that is, though? You'd really not bother to fire off a one-liner text when someone might need to know numbers for catering/booking?).

I sent out invites around 5 weeks prior to the party to the whole class so around 28 kids. I sent out a reminder around 10 days later as I had very few replies and then Had to start messaging individually after that. We have around 23-24 show up but I would say a good 90% of those I really had to chase. Do you have a nursery what's app group? This would be your best bet, if not ask the nursery if they would mind sending a reminder email out. You put a lot of effort and money into party's I don't know why people can't take a second to reply. Xx

had 3 rsvps from those that can't come

Experience tells me that anyone who does not rsvp may intend to come. This is confirmed by the three responses actually being 'can't comes'. Expect everyone else to turn up.

Brutal, isn't it.

Thanks for all the replies!

To those who said 5 weeks is way too early, that seems to be how it works around here as some others have said. Other party invites have always come 1-2 months in advance! (I must admit I found two months in advance super organised) but as someone else said, I just put in on the calendar if it's blank, and rsvp straight away and then plan around it. Within reason obviously, unless something else comes up but unless it's a wedding, holiday or family birthday (which we'd usually know about that far ahead!) then we wouldn't just not go to the party. It's 1.5hrs on a Saturday morning so the rest of the days can be free if there's stuff to do or family to visit.

I think maybe toddlers at age 2 would be fickle on the day/refuse to go, but I think age 4 seems to be the standard age for a first 'proper' party. We've spent the last year going to giant parities for 3 year olds round here. DD didn't have one last year as I was due DC2 any second...!

I'm a planner so I'm finding this all very unnerving. The nursery have a system of putting things in the kids drawers and then on collection the staff member empties their drawer. It could be missed I suppose, but the 3 'no' rsvps tell me that they have found their way into drawers. They're usually very good at emptying drawers every day.

I just find it really annoying that people don't reply. Seems to be the done thing these days including not really replying to messages for lots of people.

We don't have a WhatsApp group, I only have the number of 1 mum who is coming. I could ask her if she has any other numbers but she works full time so I think she doesn't have much time for nursery get togethers and doesn't know lots of other mums either.

Is it a bit pushy to send another invite/prompt when the party is 2 weeks out? Or is that acceptable do you think?! The soft play is booked for approx 15 so I have to confirm numbers 2 weeks ahead for the per head food box thing...!

Also thanks for some agreement on the 'why can't people rsvp' annoyance! It literally takes 10 seconds to send a text.

For one party DD had last year it was very close to my due date for DC2 and got the invite 2 months in advance. I still rsvp'd straight away to say we hoped to be there but explained the situation. I also explained DD wasn't having a party for this reason. I wouldn't just not rsvp! There's always going to be a need to know numbers for catering.

can buy stuff a couple of days in advance on Amazon/ in pound shops etc- I had to keep reordering stuff for my daughters 5th as people rsvpd up until the day of- I ended up with more stuff knowing that people would turn up who hadn’t said yes/ siblings coming etc

Maybe people don't want to buy off Amazon or in pound shops, or don't have the free time to dash around a few days before a party?