It seems Kindergarten is the year children’s social calendars get put on steroids. Every week we are being invited to someone else’s birthday party.
Who are these kids?
I do understand the “Invite The Whole Class” policy and respect it for the feelings and tears it spares, but if I am being very honest, it’s annoying. I miss Pre-school where you could request a list of class address’ and send individually. Feelings weren’t hurt and you got to have small parties with close friends.
Because here is the thing, in a class of 28 kids- if “Party Penelope” doesn’t play with my son, does she REALLY care if he is at her birthday? I’m sorry. I just cannot do 28 birthday parties a year. So my rule is if I don’t know the name from his school stories, I politely decline and don’t even mention it to my son who truly has no idea he’s invited anyway. I must admit I do this half hoping that when I have to invite Penelope to our birthday party- her Mom does the same. I know it sounds like an episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” but it‘s courteous really, isn’t it? …I mean we are all in this crappy “Must invite a kazillion kids” battle together – right?
When it is someone my son talks about and considers a friend, we always go. But then I am faced with another bothersome situation- The uninvited sibling. I am not sure at what age you get the green light for the the “drop off” at birthday parties and I don’t have sitters at my disposal, so when a party is during the week (which many of them are) I have the choice of either being *that* Mom who ditches her 5 yr old at a party or *that* Mom who totes along the uninvited sibling. And since I am not yet comfortable with “the drop off”, I always choose the latter and it stresses me out.
Don’t get me wrong- the Mom never says “No you can’t bring her” but I still feel bad because I know she’s not technically invited. So in an effort to “blend” in and not have her draw attention to our party crashing ways, I find myself sweating bullets to keep her occupied, killing the battery on my iPhone, fumbling for a juicebox in a handbag full of empty fruit snack packs and sitting with a little Dorito-faced girl hugging my my legs with her little cheese covered fingers… after 45 minutes.
… uh.. not that that *exact* scenario has EVER played out before… um… It ‘sounds’ Exhausting!
Sleep- Fiction. Cheese fingers- Fact
Anyway, I’m just saying when do kids get to secretly hand out invites during lunch or on the bus? When does it become uncool for parents to stay at classmates birthday parties?
When exactly do the birthday parties get to be small and simple?
PS- I may or may not have found my purse flooded with an open juicebox this morning.
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