Joint party invite ettiquette

[Bumperlicious]

It's DD's 3rd birthday next month and we are having a joint party with 2 of her friends who were born within days of her (well, one of the mum's mentioned that she was planning a village hall party and the other friend and I swiftly jumped on her organised bandwagon ).

A few of the friends are mutual friends, some are individual friends, but we are also inviting a couple of nursery people (different nurseries) who I at least, don't personally know (may be different for the other mums). Anyway I have nominated myself in chart of making the invite and I am wondering how to word it to make it clear that people don't need to worry about getting presents for the other children as they won't know them. DH suggested 'Bumper's DD invites you to her party, which she is sharing with XXX and XXX...'? Does that sound ok? Would anyone feel like that they had to buy presents for the other children?

Also, how do I make it clear to the parents of the nursery children that this isn't a drop off party? They are only 3 but I want to be clear (most of the other guests will be family friends with kids so not an issue), is it ok to say 'To XXXX and mummy or Daddy'?

This is our first proper party and I am feeling the etiquette pressure already!

We did a shared party with three four year olds last year and after much discussion, we went for one invitation with "you are invited to xx, xx and xx's party". People bought pressies for the person / persons they knew and not for the others. I'd say it would be highly unlikely for anyone to assume that a 3 year olds party would be a drop off one so I wouldn't worry about the Mummy / Daddy bit.

I also don't think you need to make the presents thing explicit, tbh. Or the drop-off bit.

Best thing to do is to be responsible for handing out your own invites directly to the parents of the invitees. Then you can say it at the time.

Although there was a child at dd's nursery who was dropped off at 3yo parties. There was a lot of from the other parents.

We just went with "You are invited to Child1 and Child2's birthday party..." IME it seems to be generally accepted that you bring present for the child or children that you know but not for those you don't.

I'd be surprised if anyone assumed that a third birthday party was drop off.

My DTDs went to a 4th birthday party last year which was shared with 2 other DCs. The DC we knew is the DS of a university friend of mine, and we knew no other DCs, let alone the other birthday boys. The invitation came from one of the other mums (via my friend) and was to my DTDs from all three of the birthday DCs. I never once thought that I would have to take a present for any DC other than the one we knew, so I would say don't worry - joint parties are common enough that most people either already know the etiquette, or can ask a friend.

Thanks for the replies, I'll not worry too much about the invites then.