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Parties/celebrations

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Original poster

Just held dd2's party and no-one turned up - I am seething & have 1 disappointed child.

76 replies

Radley · 29/03/2008 18:11

Just had dd2's party and out of the 6 that were invited, only 1 of the them turned up, I am so

The invites were given out in plenty of time and my address and telephone no were there for them to ring etc.

Hence, party bags sat on the side, loads of food going to waste, games ruined because not enough people to play and one very very disappointed 6 year old.

I am seething and should have calmed down before Monday, do you think I should say something on Monday as to how they spoiled things for her?

OP posts:
QuintessentialShadows · 30/03/2008 12:12

Oh so sorry for your dd.

But a bit naive to think everybody will come if you have not had any rsvp, have not sought people out in the playground, before/after school, or made an effort to mention it as often as you can, or even check that the children concerned got the invites.

Last year when I invited 20 children to my sons 5th birthday, around half rsvp'd. So I rallied around, asked the class rep for phone numbers, and emailed some parents, and eventually all turned up.

This year I invited 40 (as it was also a sort of leaving party) and even after confirming on email, and talking to the parents, some had not received it, some were confused about the date, some had not checked their email, so you must ALWAYS check.

SlartyBartFast · 30/03/2008 12:24

perhaps they were all ill?

just had to let someone down for an event, my ds is ill.
parent was extremely annoyed. that's 4 cancelled already!
i bore the brunt of this, but unfortunately my ds is ill but i couldnt know about the other cancellations.

nappiesgalore · 30/03/2008 13:18

i missed one party both ds1&2 were supposed to be at as was running late, and then couldnt find the sodding place! apologised on the monday...

Psychomum5 · 30/03/2008 13:36

as much as I sympathise here, adn I too would be ranting if this were me, I too have been on the other end of this whereby my kiddies have either forgotten to hand me the invite (and assume that I just know by some wierd osmosis type thing), or they didn;t realise that they had been given an invite as the teacher puts things in bookbags for them in with a bundle of school letters and homework and for this very reason I miss it for a few days and sometimes find it aftere the party.......or they are put into the school trays and my DD/DS finds it months later!!

I find teachers are sometimes as much to blame...........in some cases the invites come froma very popular person and if only a few kiddies invited, rather than upset the entire class they try to sneak the invites into bags in some way.....don;t tell the selected invitees that there is an invite, nor the parents to look for an invite.

when you have 5 kiddies all with bags to check, you sometimes miss one or two of them for a time......you grab obvious letter and homeowrk but the little scraps of there drawing can hide an envelope unless very brightly coloured!!

I often gete a mum ask me tho if I have recieved said invite only for me to look blank......so for that reason, I always follow up invites that I send out so as not to go thro this.

awfully rude tho had they RSVP'd and then not turned up!

Vinegar · 30/03/2008 15:34

Your poor dd, how horrible for her(and you).
I find many parents are very rude about children's parties. Half of them can't be bothered to rsvp - I usually have to chase up loads of parents. Some will say they are coming and then not turn up. For dd's party, many said they would come and then didn't. There was another party on the same day-another child in dd's class, but these invitations were handed out alot after dd's. The ones that had accepted dd's had then decided to go to this other party, without bothering to let us know. Many parents also can't be bothered to make an effort to take thier children to parties. It's a real dilemma for me. If I call dd's closes 6 friends for example, just one or two may turn up. I'm finding around here anyway, that only half to one third will actually turn up on the day, so it is best to invite alot of children.

WestCountryLass · 30/03/2008 22:10

Deffo kill them with kindness and deliver the party bags because they couldn't make it, bastards!

Flubdub · 31/03/2008 09:03

So did you speak to any of the mums at the school gates?

Clary · 03/04/2008 01:13

how awful for yr DD radley. So sorry.

The best thing is to chase people up I find, esp if the numbers are small like that.

If no phone no, catch them in the playground, ask the child themselves, get numbers off someone else etc.

Quite at those who say most people don't reply or only half invitees turn up.

I have always find that virtually everyone replies and most turn up. 2 people can't come to DS2's party this w/end (in hols time too) which about as many refusals as we ever have tbh.

hana · 03/04/2008 01:15

pshchomumof5 - blaming teachers? what an odd way to think

Psychomum5 · 03/04/2008 08:40

hana....it does happen tho, and I know this cos it has happened to me, with three different teachers and three different children!!!

maybe it is school policy (or was in fact as it was at the kiddies old school), as I have had it happen and was told by these teachers that they would just pop the invites into the bookbags and they expected me to ensure that the parents got the invites after......

soo.....for me, not a strange way to think (and never thought it was either TBH, so maybe I have had a raw deal with this).....altho I appreciate that for others it may be.

I have to say, I now hand the invites to the parents when I see them, or the kiddies only invite people they have tel.no's for.

in fact tho....I have just added up the amount of parties I have most likely done for my children over the years needing invites.......eldest is 14, started doing parties with nursery/school friends from the age of 3, also done xmas and halloween parties.........added up to 36 at least.
on that ratio......3 odd teachers not a huge amount but it happens.

Rude parents are a lot more common tho!

Hulababy · 03/04/2008 08:47

We never get told by teachers if there is an invite in DD's message folder. I just check every night to see what is in there, at the same time as taking out her reading book. I figure it is my responsibility to check the message folder nightly, not a teacher's job to tell me what is in there.

Hulababy · 03/04/2008 08:49

DD's party is next weekend. We invited about 20 people, maybe a bit more. I already know that at least 6 can't come because of it still being school holidays, and couple due to other arrangements. I still need to chase up about 5 invites.

nervousal · 03/04/2008 08:53

Very sorry for your DD - but as some folk have said, if folk didn't get back to me to say they were coming then I would assume they weren't. You can't assume that just because folk are invited they can drop everything to attend - and its a fact of life that folk don't always rsvp.

myermay · 03/04/2008 10:29

Message withdrawn

Blu · 03/04/2008 10:35

Any news on what happened, Radley? Did the parents of the other kids say anything at school?

It's possible that the near-neighbours were peering in because they were thinking 'uh huh, why wasn't XX invited?', while the invite sat languishi8ng in the tray?

Very odd for none of the parents to have apologiesed, as presumably the children are her closest circle of friends?

Really sorry...your poor dd. And poor you.

wheresthehamster · 03/04/2008 10:43

These mums who think it's the school's job to hand out invites . AND make sure the mums notice!

It's YOUR party - stand at the gate or deliver them by hand. If you don't know the mums or kids then maybe you should take this opportunity to introduce yourself!

Fennel · 03/04/2008 10:46

It does sound horrible, but I know that at least one of my dds regularly loses party invitations, they disappear into the ether. I have no idea how many parties she's missed as I only occasionally find out we've missed one, unless I happen to already know the family. dd1 is 8 and still utterly scatty and unreliable on such things.

batters · 03/04/2008 10:55

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

noma · 03/04/2008 21:14

I think next time you should just do something as a family for her birthday its much easier saves disappointments and stress for you and is a lot cheaper.

hana · 03/04/2008 23:19

well, don't think it's a teacher's responsibility or indeed anyone working at a school to sort things like party invites out into trays or bookbags.

callmewhatyoulike · 03/04/2008 23:32

I really feel for your dd. A similar thing happened to one of my children (odd enough at their 6th I think) where only 6 out of 20 arrived (think big hall etc). At least there were 6 I guess though. I only got 2 apologies (they forgot).

I think it's so rude to not go without telling you. Can you plan an extra treat for your dd to make up for it?

SoMuchToBits · 03/04/2008 23:35

If you were inviting the whole class, then maybe I would think you could enlist the teacher's help, as you would not necessarily know everyone. But for 6 people, these would presumably be very good friends of your child, so you would know the children, and give out the invitiations personally to the children/parents concerned??

I think it is very rude for parents not to reply at all. Also, if they can't come on the day (e.g. illness) then surely they could phone you (we always put contact no on invitiation) to let you know.

I really don't understand the concept of not replying to an invitiation, or to replying with a yes, and then just not turning up with no explanation.

Fennel · 04/04/2008 12:29

They're not being rude they haven't received the invitation. In many cases. Really. I would stake my money on it. As parent of an unbelievably scatty child.

Novicecamper · 04/04/2008 12:34

I agree with others - this is awful for your dd but it's essential to chase up with parents. Plenty of times I've asked people and they've no idea what I'm talking about as they haven't received the invitation. Similarly, just the other week a parent asked me if ds3 could make the party on Sunday (this was Friday) and I hadn't had an invitation and wasn't even aware the child was having a party. I felt terrible to think that all week she'd probably been thinking 'when is she going to acknowledge our invitation'!!

Novicecamper · 04/04/2008 12:35

OTOH, there are people that just don't respond. We had 2 non-responders for ds1's party over Easter but since there were already 14 people confirmed and it wasn't a party where I was paying 'per head' it didn't matter too much.