Playdate : how is that working?

[Pitchounette]

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sounds great!

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I would present as "small birthday tea" to your DS's friends and their parents to avoid misunderstanding. Also if on a school night straight from school I would say finish time at 5.30-6 or whenever teatime playdates normally end for your DS and friends.

I'd also make it clear to the other children that it's because it's a birthday there are extra treats.

Otherwise they'll be very disappointed next time they come to a playdate.

I would ask the parents of the children if their DSs want to come over for a birthday tea with your DS on xxxday.

And you need to clarify the following with the parents:

• are you collecting them from school or are you expecting parents to collect them from school and drop them off?
• if latter, at what time do you want them to arrive and are parents staying?
• what time will they be collecting (round here that is between 6-6:30pm pm on a normal playdate) their children?
• are you feeding them?
• if so, any allergies?

We often have friends round to play and DD goes to friends for tea after school. Normally the host's parent collects from school and takes them home. They then play (normally left to own devices) and have tea, then parents collect between 6-6:30pm. Soemtimes parents come in on collecting children for a wuick coffee and chat, sometimes they leave straight away.

DD is going to a friend's house in a couple of week's for a birthday tea. Her mum asked me yesterday. All quite informal. Her actual party is the weekend before, so will take present then, not to the house.

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I am watching this with interest as DD has just started school, has been on her first playdate and I also need to learn the rules...

Thanks all, very useful info. I was getting tangled up the other day wondering if the mum would feed them and not wanting to ask in case she thought I was hinting

Remove anything easlily breakable/precious from his bedroom. If he's built some amazing lego tower/car/rocket hide it before his friends come.

If he's not used to having friends round, don't be upset yourself he he becomes overwhelmed (cries) - and it's not the end of the world if you end up putting a DVD on for them. Although only do that as a last resort, as you'll lose fab mummy points with the other mums.

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How many 6 year old boys will you have?
The best behaved children can turn into monsters with the excitement of such an occasion.
I would plan games to keep them occupied or you risk anarchy in my experience.

The way I have run this for 7/8yos is:

gaggle of boys arrive (doesn't matter if it's on the day, usually on the nearest weekend to birthday)

greeted by dh who does the honours (I am skiving busy in the kitchen)

handed first clue in a treasure hunt which they are told they must do as a team so noone gets left behind (or the treasure will mysteriously vanish)

treasure hunt is linked to theme of party (last year we did pirate's with a map of the house as Treasure Island)

they are sent up and down the stairs and into the garden until they find the treasure which on the last two occasions has been water pistols (bearing in mind that ds's birthday is in May)

wild water pistol fight all over garden, with dh refereeing (and getting soaked to the skin)

food (a few sandwiches, but mainly crisps and biscuits- they never eat much at parties)

cake

party bag (we let them fish for theirs with a fishing rod, blue cloth stretched over living room door frame represents the sea)

when they were younger we did more sedate games instead of the water pistols: things like Musical Bumps or Sleeping Lions

2 years ago I had a party from home for 6 6-year olds, mainly because DS wanted his party table laid out with some power ranger themed stuff he saw in one of my catologues. We actually took the children to the park for the first part of the afternoon (and would have taken to soft play had it rained), then after tea I did a pass the parcel and DH did the water pistol fight thing, and they played football.

This year I said he wasn't having a 'party' as such because we had just been to Eurodisney but invited 2 of his closest friends round the Friday after his birthday - I texted his friends' parents and made it clear that I needed the date that the two boys could make as it was a tea for his birthday, but didn't do invitations. (although I did do party bags for them all to take home) The boys had planned their afternoon well in advance at school. One of the boys had bought him some new water guns as presents, which he knew as they had all discussed this, I suggested the two boys bought changes of clothing as they were in their uniforms (and also I knew they would get soaked) and I just left the to it. However, after a while they did seem to find it difficult to find games that all 3 of them wanted to play and I think another time I will invite one child at a time (as I normally do).

cory , team games in the trick. Takes advantage of their competitive spirit and usually means nobody is left out.
Here is a tried and tested one.
Get two balls of brightly coloured wool.
Cut off a piece from each one as long as you like and cut it into smaller lenghths about 10cm long.
Drape them around house and garden.
Set the two teams off to collect as many as they can find and they have to tie them together to make one long piece. The team with the longest after 20 minutes or so wins.

This is a good opener as they can run off a little steam and it doesn't reqire any skill apart from a few knots.