Do a 3rd birthday party or wait until 4th?

[GSmith86]

We weren't going to do a 3rd birthday party for our son but now his nursery friends have all started to have them and it's got me thinking. Will we regret not taking the opportunity of making the memory? I guess they only really have a couple of little kid parties before doing more activity type parties with a small group. When did you do a first proper party?

4

I think 5 is the sweet spot, they have school friends and are able to enjoy the excitement. The ones I’ve been to with younger kids, they can get quite overwhelmed or over excited and it’s been pretty fraught for parents.

My daughter’s first proper party was her 4th. 3 just seems too little to do anything too big or expensive. Also she used to get overwhelmed a lot at that age & I couldn’t be dealing with that along with entertaining a load of other kids & their parents. Personal preference though, If you want to do something & think your son will enjoy it, go for it.

Thank for the responses. Reassuring. Sounds like we should stick with our original plan and not cave into the peer pressure! 😂

We started having parties for DS at 3. I had DD when he was 2 and 3/4 and I wanted to make a bit of a fuss of him that year. He really did enjoy rampaging around a soft play with his friends from my NCT and nursery.

I tend to think I’ve got very few years of kids parties, so I want to make the most of them. But they are expensive so if it’s a choice between three and four I’d choose four. A three year old will still love the party though.

DD had a first birthday party and is having a second.

I would wait until they start school!

Sixty odd years ago, I had a third birthday party. It was me with two other little girls. That’s all. We probably had a lovely little time. All three of us in our jumpers that our Grandmas had knitted for us.

Bigger parties came later (such as they were fifty five years ago in rural Australia).