My son has just started kindy and already the invites for parties are rolling in. This is exciting and a great way for us to meet all the other children and parents.

BUT

... there seems to be a tradition of inviting all the children in the class. Parents seem to think they have exercised restraint if they only invite by gender (eg. 12 boys to a boys party or 8 girls to a girls party).

Have we all gone mad? If I do not do this will my son be singled out and never invited to another party again? Is the only answer to have an outing where a small selection of friends come along eg. The zoo, the aquarium? Or is that unacceptable?  What if I decide upon a party but only invite a few kids?

I found that happened in the first year, when the friends network hasn't really been established, and then slowly dropped off each year after that.

Oh gosh. So I just have to last the year. Went and bought bulk Lego kits this morning in preparation!

Buying bulk is a great idea!

Don't let other parents change the way you want to do parties, better yet how H wants his parties. I agree with Marty - all are invited becasue they don't know who to invite.  Your kid will get invited if they are their friend, whether or not you invited them.  If  your son isn't stressed about the whole friend thing don't let yourself, its just our horrible memories of primary and high school flooding back to haunt us!

I think it depends when you childs birthday is during the year.  I have one that was born during our summer breaks - I have had parties for her from 6 - 34 children depending on what was being done.  My second is at the beginning of the school year and we invite the girls only - and only the ones she is friends with.  There are parties and time to get to know the others during the year.  Parties do trickal down though as the years pass - I say no worries and just do as you please.  You don't have to accept all the party invites as well - only what your child can handle.

Phew. It's a jungle out there!

Henry's 5th birthday party was the smallest we had ever had and he got to invite who he wanted. He picked his best friends and a few who we had seen a bit more of and who will most likely become good friends. It was relaxed and lots of fun.

Henry's was in the summer break so I avoided all the hoop-la

Our winter baby always gets a bad party.

We have several friends whose children were born right before Christmas - so their parents have a half birthday for them - they celebrate in June instead of December.

We've been particularly adept at avoiding the party soap opera...our kids are still too young at school, so I guess that helps, and the preschool has not created too many invites.  At home we just have ourselves and a cake, sometiimes with immediate family, but our reluctance to invite a wider group is informed by our general reluctance to go to children's birthday parties..we assume that everybody else, like us, finds the party situation a pain in the arse and they would rather not be invited.

 however, we do organise a babysitter and go out to dinner to mark the occasion of a child's birthday

I'll never understand why my friends invite me to their kids birthdays....

What the?!??! 

So you can drink all the free booze.

If they had booze, I might actually go.....

Honestly, if you don't have a family, there's just no point going to 'family' functions...

There is only so much orange cordial the body can tolerate.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that I asked Mick to my son's birthday. He's a 'godparent' (not in a religious sense) to Oliver and I see him as family. Phil and I have no family here so people like Mick are important to us. Maybe that's why you get asked Dek....

Just a thought.

I enjoy going to kids parties. I like seeing my kids enjoy themselves (plus they won't let me leave! Still getting their confidence) and it's a good way for me to meet other parents. I'm off to one today in fact.

Foodwise: well, our kids have never actually had cordial and we don't buy biscuits/cookies/cakes and none of us consume Coke/Pepsi/anything fizzy-crappy and never go to the Big Yellow M, so it annoys me when I do get dragged along and am tacitly expected to condone junk grazing while the wee snappers gaze in wonder and gorge themselves on absolute rubbish.  ...and don't get me started on 'chicken nuggets'.  The socialisation is good, admittedly, but it is only logical that they get that already - otherwise how did they get invited in the first place?

 Friday Moany Hole. 

Nah Kasta.... that's not why I get asked.... I ain't god-anything to anyone

A single person just does not have a place at such functions.... it's a pain, a pain... but remember that I say the same about weddings etc too

And yeah, I agree with you Rira... lolly bags anyone? 

Rira - it's just a one-off! I think it's fine if they don't have that stuff all the time.

It reminds me of my son's party a few years ago. I tried to make it a bit healthy and one of the kids said (in front of a table full of food), "where's the party food?"!

I served nuggets (real ones I made) to some kids recently and they said to their mum, "mum, this isn't chicken." She said, "No, that IS real chicken. We never have real chicken." !!!!

For parties now I just have a fruit platter and party food. No lollies - they are for the bags and a birthday cake. I notice this happens a lot now. By the way, don't you like party meat pies just a little bit?! 

Hey, I'm not Australian - I don't get the meat pie thing.  Nor am I impressed with fairy bread, lamingtons, vegemite sandwiches or aeroplane jelly.  Bah humbug.

What's fairy bread?

White bread - buttered - and then they sprinkle it with lots of tiny coloured sugary pebbles..known as "hundreds and thousands"

Oh! Why would they do that??

That's odd 

And kids like it?

Unfortunately they love it. I wonder if it has roots in hagel slag, a Dutch tradition? My eldest was going to a Ducth day care when we lived there and I asked him what he had for lunch. He kept saying, "Chocolate mum". I kept saying, "No, it wouldn't have been chocolate." Turns out that was what they served on sandwiches. Chocolate sprinkles with butter. It tastes like cake icing. Terrible. And theirs is not saved for the odd birthday party!

It's in the bread spreads section. The Dutch Store