How much notice for a reception year birthday party?

[mugginsalert]

I've left it late for organising my soon to be 5 year old's birthday (he didn't want one, now he really, really does) and now need to either send out invitations on monday for a party the following weekend (i.e.11 days later) or schedule it a couple of weeks later to give everyone more notice.

Myself, I don't mind last minute invitations, because the more notice I get, the more I tend to lose the details, double book ourselves etc. But other people are more organised, I believe.

What's the etiquette here? How much notice would you consider to be too short for your child to be invited to attend a party?

My son is shy and only wants to ask about 8 people, but I think he would be upset if hardly anyone came.

Schedule it a couple weeks later.
I usually give six weeks notice but the norm here is four.

I think 11 days is fine.

I give 2 weeks. You should be fine.

As long as there is one weekend for parents to organise a gift - 11 days is fine.
6 weeks? I'd have forgotten!!

I think as long as you're not clashing with another party, 11 days is fine. Especially this time of year. My dd's is next weekend. Gave out invites on Monday. Any sooner and invites would have got lost in the end of term / Christmas melee.

We received one on 7th Jan for the 24th which is fine by me. 2-4 weeks is ample.

Wow 6 weeks notice
I think 11 days is fine. If I have plans that I can't cancel my DCs just wouldn't be able to go, it wouldn't really matter how much notice you gave me. 11 days is plenty to organise a present and sort out lifts to the party and about the average for bday party invites here.

Last year , when my son was in Year 1, I did a week. But that was manly because I forgot to organise one and it was all a bit last minute... Disclaimer - 3rd child.

Year 7 DS1- I sent out a text 5pm the day before for a lunchtime thing....

OP - I would say that is fine.

Norm here seems to be 3 weeks. I'd be happy with less. My DC can either make it or not, no matter how much notice!

In our school it's 6 weeks notice. I got one earlier on this week for 31 January and thought "ooh they're late". I gave myself a shake.

DS went to a school where people gave ridiculously long notice for parties.

I never understood why.

Did they think that if something more important came up in the meantime, people wouldn't cancel a school party?

Normally 3-4 weeks is reasonable, particularly if it's an activity that requires an rsvp to confirm with a venue.

I think 11 days is a bit short, but really, the people who wouldn't have been able to come with more notice, still won't be able to come.

2-3 weeks here

DD's birthday is late September, and her school didn't start til the 7th. I wanted to give her a couple of weeks to make friends before deciding who to invite, so I ended up only giving a week's notice for the invitations. I let her invite extra people because I thought some wouldn't be able to make it at such short notice. Everybody came.

I was going to say about 2 weeks. 11 days will be fine.

6 weeks is bonkers!!! 2 weeks is the norm here. 11 days wouldn't make me bat an eyelid OP.

I would try to contact any 'must haves' and see if they can come and then send them out. 11 days should be enough or go for the following weekend.

10 days or so is perfect.

6 weeks is FAR to far in advance - it would not be in my mind at all.

Thanks everyone. I think I'm going to stick with the 11 days or maybe the week after to give myself a chance to pull together a few party bags etc.. i hadn't even thought about clashes - hopefully my leaving it late will mean no risk of clashing with the better planners…Now on to the challenge of extracting an invite list from the mouth of my child who after one term of school has learnt to roll his eyes at any questions from me! Thanks again

4-6 weeks at least is standard where I am. People's weekends get booked up. I have parties in the diary in March.

It is worth asking the teacher / TA. Just say you can have x children, ds has mentioned that they would like a, b, c, is there anyone he has missed who he often plays with. They have always been happy to confirm and make a few suggestions. They don't want the drama of a good friend discovering that they were overlooked.

Thanks for the suggestion shouldwestay. The TA and teacher both said parents were welcome to contact them with queries at any time but I wasn't sure how far that stretched. I hadn't thought about the classroom implications but that makes absolute sense!

Sorry had to come back to this thread as I mentioned 6 weeks being the norm at our school and was met with disbelief. I just got one for a party on 12th March.