Birthday parties...enough to make all parents insane! We have so much family that, until recently, we had to rent someplace just to invite the immediates. I know it sounds silly, but we started having a kid only party on inservice days so the kids can invite more than one friend. To answer your question, never punish the child for the parents actions. If your daughter wants to go, let her.

I'm always on the lookout for new ideas for fundraisers, especially ones that I can attend and watch work. Tonight we went to a Monte Carlo Night for our church. Granted it's an adult only event, which I could see causing huge problems at our school (visions of parents leaving their kids in the car or home alone), but it was a lot of fun. Your winnings are converted into raffle tickets at the end of night and you put them in a cup for the basket you want to win. There are also door prizes given away every 15 minutes. I think it was the only fundrasier my husband enjoyed that I will probably never try to duplicate for our school. I also won a gift certificate to a local garden center that I gave to my mother in law for watching the kids. I can't see buying plants knowing they don't stand a chance!

I agree-we shouldn't burden children with the issues of adults and really all your child see is her friend having a party and her being invited. I try all the time to work on the boys about not boasting or letting things slip even with each other so the "don't discuss" policy is in keeping with respecting others feelings on invitations etc....
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thanks alatte CC!

Well, Beignets! As I live and breathe.... Nice to see you!!!

Wow, this is a loaded situation, isn't it? Feelings are bound to be hurt no matter what. It's too easy to read into it what this means and what that means. When my son has a birthday party, I have to limit the number of guests. We mail the invitations to the homes and he's given strict instructions to not discuss it at school. It isn't to keep it secret from anyone, it's just that we can't invite 30 kids and there's no reason to hurt the feelings of the 23 that we can't include.

My son has been invited to two birthday parties by a parent calling me on the phone at the last minute. It's more to do with the parent's disorganization than whether or not they really wanted him to come. They threw it together at the last minute, forgot to send the invitations, etc. There are to many reasons to guess.

I'd simply say to my child, "You've been invited to X's birthday party. Would you like to attend?" Whether she says yes or no, state that you don't know the guest list so it would be inappropriate to discuss it at school.

Kids always find ways to hurt each other's feelings. One primary way is to make a big show of who is and isn't on a birthday party guest list. That's one reason many schools don't allow invitations to be passed out at school.

Hiya ladies (and gents), not to change the subject, but id be interested to know how you would respond to this situation:

Suppose another classroom parent whose girl is having a party, invites only your girl from the class (even tho ALL the girls in her class are good friends with the birthday girl), but for space reasons, the invitations were limited and your girl got the honor of being chosen from among the classroom friends(all other invitees are from outside the school).

The invite came by phone to the parent, ie there was no card, the girl did not invite your child directly, etc. And suppose the mom nicely suggested, that your girl 'keep it to herself' so as not to make the other girlfriends in the class feel slighted. The birthday girl herself got instructions from the mom to keep it to herself, in the classroom/school arena.

What would you say to this parent, and would you let your child go, and risk being slighted herself, as having been the 'chosen one' from the class gang of girlfriends (becuase OF COURSE they will learn of it!)?

It might be different if all the classroom girls werent such good freinds and since several years, but they are really a team of nice kids and get along very well. and of course, the whole secrecy angle is not something which i would subscribe to anyway. So, in order not to rock the apple cart here, and risk offending the parent or the birthday girl, any ideas on how to respond are welcome!!!

Huh.... I'm so confused. It's the weekend and there's nothing we have to do. We didn't even get out of bed until 9:15 because we didn't need to set the alarm for anything. Now it's 11:30 and all we've done so far is shower and have breakfast. This is such an odd feeling. I guess we'll enjoy it while it lasts!