Help me figure out birthday party invites

[daneuse27]

My daughter is turning 5 this year. I don't usually have parties, but this year I am going to go all out - have a cake made, hire a Disney princess to come, lots of decorations, etc.

We're planning to have the party at home. I live in a townhouse, so it's not a huge amount of space. Ideally 10-15 kids max would be our ideal guest number range.

She has 25 classmates at school, and then there are 2-3 additional friends we're going to invite.

I know not everyone will come, but I feel funny inviting almost 28 kids expecting/hoping that only half will show up.

My mom thinks I should limit the invites to only the girls in the class. Or leave out the kids who are behavioural or rowdy. I feel bad doing that though. I've put up a poll to get opinions since Im a bit new to the world of birthday party planning. Thanks!

 

[lau86]

I would ask your daughter. I've had invitations from people who have very kindly invited everyone. My son wasn't friends with some of them and didn't play with them at the party so it was pointless. Most parents can understand that sometimes numbers are limited and if you do it the right way the children who are left out don't know

 

[becsboo]

I would let her choose no need to invite them all that would be a lot of kids

 

[.Mrs.B.]

Invite the class mates with only a week or twos notice. Not many will be free, lol.

 

[loeylo]

I think only inviting girls is a really bad idea. What kind of message does that send? That boys and girls are "different" or that they can't play together. Don't do that.
Similarly, excluding kids because they misbehave isn't a great idea. I mean, they are what, 4 or 5? Nobody is going to turn up with a gun, just have a way of contacting their parents (all kids that is) and if they misbehave then have them collected.

I'd let your daughter choose.

 

[Bevziibubble]

When Holly had her party I let her choose who to invite. We paid for 15 but could add more on so we invited 20 people from her class who she chose as she got on well with them, a mixture of both boys and girls. In the end we only got around 13 responses anyway but she had a good time.

 

[Springflower]

I would ask your daughter who she wants to invite.

We invited the whole class and pretty much everyone came, so I wouldn't do that unless you could accommodate everyone, just in case!

I don't understand the just inviting girls thing?

 

[CRWx]

I would let her choose who she wants to invite seeing as it's her birthday party!

 

[Eleanor ace]

I would ask your daughter who she'd like to invite. Here birthday parties tend to be either a party in a hall where the whole class (plus friends from outside school) are invited, or parties of 15-20 children and the kids just invite the children they are closest to.
I definitely wouldn't invite girls only; one of my DS's closest little friends had a party just for her girl friends, it really created a bad atmosphere between the kids in their class (and a lot of the parents were miffed too), massive 5 year old drama!

 

[MindUtopia]

I would ask her who she wants to have there. Mine turned four this year and that's what we did. We ended up with about 11 out of maybe 20 or so that we could have invited. No one's feelings will be hurt as there are lots of parties and no on gets invited to them all.

That said, I would caution about inviting 15 kids to your house unless you plan to have it outside. In the past, we've invited about 5 plus adults to parties at home and that was just about the limit (we have a fairly large 4 bed detached house). There is absolutely no way I could have done the 12 including her plus adults at home this year. It was absolute chaos. We hired the village hall for 25 quid which was so worth it not to have the house destroyed!

 

[BabyGirl999]

Ask her who she wants to invite and give her a limit, ie 5 kids or 10 kids, and only send invites to those kids. Ask the teacher to slip the invites discreetly into school bags to save hurt feelings to those not invited.

 

[Wobbles]

My eledest had a party at home but with a sleepover ... only 1 friend was able to stay (1 ended up poorly) but the other friends came for the party/cake. There was 7 friends. It was a beeping nightmare but if I am honest you only need 1 child to make it that way and I ended up with one of those. Anyway to point further I have a fairly big house and it was more than enough .... her sister is having the same party/sleepover and both were able to invite their closest group of girl friends.

Oh and I'm dreading the youngests one after her big sisters. This time it's MOVIE night in one room. ha!

On the flip side i have done what someone else mentioned when it's been obvious the whole class has been invited and weighed up how much of a friend the child is (also because it's my time with my daughters too).

I'd be scared all turn up so I agree with your Mum!

 

[Natasha2605]

I say let your LO choose. That's what we done recently for Maci's party. Why have kids there who she doesn't like or play with

 

[jd83]

I'd just let your lo choose who she wants to invite. I wouldn't do girls only invites, as there are likely boys she plays with, too, and boys who would have just as much fun at the party as the girls. If you can only accomodate about half the class, don't invite the whole class. You never know how that'll turn out, and you could end up with everyone showing up which would be a chaotic disaster.