Joint parties - etiquette please.

[littleoldme]

DS is having a joint second birthday with a friend. Do we do invitations with both names on, or have seperate ones for each child. I certainly don;t want people to feel they need to but two presents .( I actually don't themnto feel they have to buy any at all.) Equally well, I don't want then to turn up and feel embarrassed that they know it was shared party if they wanted to.

Write something like:

dear ....

ds would like to invite you to his birthday party, which will be shared with .....

So it's clear the invite is coming from just your ds, but it's also clear that it's a joint party.

We sent invitations from "DS and [other child]". People who were friends with both tended to buy two presents, others just bought for the child they knew well. And when we've been to others' joint parties that seems to be the general approach, too.