I have either a strong case of denial, or a strong case of disorganization, or a strong case of avoidance, or perhaps some sort of unholy trifecta situation, because William’s big birthday party is a week from today and I haven’t even sent out the invitations.
I’m appalled, and yet “being appalled” did not have its usual mobilizing effect: even though I started being appalled a week ago today (when I thought, “OMG, the party is in two weeks and I haven’t even sent out the invitations!”), it was only yesterday that we printed out the invitations, and only today that we put them in envelopes and bought the stuff for the favor bags. “Panic” was apparently required for this.
One of the major immobilizing issues for me has been this: The school has in previous years (though not this year, I don’t think) reminded parents that invitations can’t be handed out at school unless everyone in the class is invited—but I don’t have the addresses of William’s classmates, so….? I could have William get each address, and I guess that would be the only option, but doesn’t that draw EVEN MORE attention to the party? I see what the school is trying to do here, but I’m not sure they’ve thought this out.
What I did was lecture William for an entire 20-minute car ride on the importance of kindness and discretion. We discussed that he should hand over each invitation as inconspicuously as possible, with a quiet “Not everyone is being invited, so…” And if any classmates confronted him about not being invited, he could blame us, saying “My parents would only let me invite a certain number of people,” which should be said in kind and regretful tones, not defensive and angry ones.
But this has brought to my attention another problem: I can’t call parents to nag them about RSVPing, because I DON’T HAVE ANYONE’S PHONE NUMBER EITHER. Which I guess is just as well, since William won’t be handing out the invitations until tomorrow, and that doesn’t really give enough time for a decent RSVP window followed by another batch of invitations and a second decent RSVP window. Anyone who gets invited on, say, Friday, is going to think either, “Oh, I see: second string” or else “Who issues invitations two days before a party??”
But then, what about the thank-you notes? I suppose those too will have to be brought discreetly to school. ACK.
I don’t know if this works for older kids, but among my baby-to-preschool playgroup, Evite or Ping are almost a standard. It lets you send by e-mail only, and the site reminds the invitees for you. I personally forget to RSVP or forget paper invites altogether until the last minute. Plus, if the list isn’t private, you can see who else is invited. Maybe for the next time you have a party it’ll be more convenient / less anxiety inducing.
I stumble when it comes to this kind of thing, too. As social as I am, I’m not really all that into my kids having friends that are not children of MY friends… it’s so awkward, and I don’t know if I feel ok letting them go and play at someone’s house, and BLAH. So I avoid it, as much as possible, which is getting less and less as they get older.
I just read about this exact problem on someone else’s blog and I am starting to think maybe school directories are not as common as I thought they were. Both elementary schools my son has attended have them and my daughter’s preschool does, too.
Considering how many years you have left at this elementary school, you might try suggesting it to the PTA. Ours are distributed for free, but they could be sold as a fundraiser. Not that this solves your short-term problem…
Lynnette- I definitely would! If I had their email addresses.
Maybe at the party, you can have the parents leave their contact information. Say you would like to be able to mail a Thank you to their home. Most parents would be willing to do that and then you have names/phone numbers if he ever wants to have a playdate with them.
I’m confused about birthdays too, especially as regards presents and whether or not the party is drop-off or parents stay. Most of the invitations we get these days say no presents (sometimes a food donation or book swap is mentioned) but then I never know if it’s ok (or expected?) to bring a present if it’s NOT mentioned. And what is there’s no paper invitation, just a parent-to-parent verbal thing? Just today I dropped my kid off at a party where he was not supposed to bring a present, but we DID, because there was nothing telling me not to. If it were up to me kids would exchange presents–it’s part of what makes birthdays fun–and skip the huge Chuck E Cheese/gymnastics space/pool rental extravaganzas.
I have a very independent kid and neither of us have any problems with me departing at the beginning of a party, but I’m never clear if the parents are expecting help and want me to stay? It’s getting more clear as he gets older (he turned 6 last week) but when so many parents stayed at the 4th & 5th birthday parties he was going to, I felt like I had to apologize for going to run errands and leaving him there.
These are just another in a series of complaints I have about raising kids in this country today–we have no set of rules or expectations to follow, so EVERYTHING is up for grabs. It is nice sometimes, certainly, but also seems to cause much confusion and irritation.
I was going to make the same suggestion as Hallie. You could also see if they prefered to give you their email addresses as well as or instead of snail mail addresses.
Sahara- I always wonder if I’m supposed to stay, too! So on William’s invitations, I specified: parents MAY stay if they’d like to, or they may drop off and come back later. Presents in our area are easier: it’s assumed YES unless otherwise specified.
Add me to the list of folks surprised that your school doesn’t have a directory. Ours has a directory that includes e-mails. I’d have asked the school in advance for the kids’ addresses, explaining that you want to mail invitations, yadda yadda.
But also? The waiting till the last minute and only being motivated by panic? Yeah, I’m that way too. Hugs.
collect addresses when the kids arrive. Just tell the parents it’s for TY notes/future reference and get email/phone while you’re at it. Then you’ll be all set.
have fun next weekend!
Even if you DID get the invitations out at 2 weeks I bet nobody would RSVP anyways. Just saying..
It’s funny how diff. it is w/ a boy. If this was me as a little girl I’d have all of my friends’ addresses and phone numbers printed alpabetically in my Lisa Frank hot pink address book.
Along the lines of getting addresses- if you get your thank you notes before the party, you could have a basket with the envelopes and some pens and ask parents (or the child) to put their name/address on the envelope. I’ve seen this done at showers all the time–so why not a bday party? I am also making a mental note about the lack of a school directory. Both preschools we used have had one so I would probably assume it was true for elementary and middle school at least. At our preschool, you can opt NOT to be listed but everybody in my sons’ classes are listed. Not that this information helps you right now. Hope everything works out smoothly!
I think someone else suggested this already, so I second the idea of just asking the parents for their addresses when they drop off/pick up the kids. A simple, “Can you just leave me your contact info so William can send thank you notes?” would be fine and perfectly acceptable. And, in fact, I would be among those parents who would applaud your dedication to raising a polite child.
urgh.
d’s school won’t let kids bring invitations to school at all AND won’t send out a class list so… I guess none of his friends from school are coming to his birthday party. (which is fine with me because I don’t know them anyway)
Luckily, we have a fairly big social circle from my mom’s group and many of his friends are from there. This is will start to become a problem when he gets older, I guess…
Anyway, i like the idea of having the parents leave their address so you can send thank you notes. Maybe a little notebook they can “sign in”
I have no solutions, but lots of sympathy.
— Mairzy
I’ll be the next in line to be baffled at the lack of a school/class directory! Yeesh! I use ours all the time. Names of kids and parents and addresses – even addresses of both parents if they aren’t together, and phone numbers and emails. The school is even polite enough to not list info parents prefer not be listed, but still there’s some kind of contact info on there.
But me being Yeesh! about it, doesn’t really help you in this situation does it?
Dang.
1. Apparently, there is a class list in Bud’s class, but I never saw it. It seems to have my cell phone number on it, as all of Bud’s friends call me ALL THE DAMN TIME.
2. Bud only invited a few kids from his class to his last party and we stressed the being discrete thing too (it didn’t work). Hub actually suggested, since I didn’t get around to invites until the week before, that I just call parents and ask them. Ha! Ahahahahaa! No.
I have a good mind to be a classroom mom next year, just so I can put out a class list that includes email addresses.
Wait, there is seriously not some sort of classroom contact list? That is a thing now? (Per Devan’s comment that the school “won’t” do it.) Really? None? Mystifying. How does one call one’s child’s new friends for playdates? Is there no emergency phone tree? I am fascinated. (Um, and have nothing useful to offer on the invite-passing quandary, except to say it seems you’ve done the best you could under these VERY STRANGE no class list circumstances.)
Pseudostoops- Seriously. Some teachers do it, but it’s inconsistent, and this year’s teacher didn’t. I don’t think they need an emergency phone tree for anything, so it must just be if a particular teacher thinks it’s a good idea for social stuff (WHICH IT IS).
I seem to remember, as a child, poring over our slim white pages phone book and copying down addresses. But I suppose a) that’s not quite as easy in a town with more than 7,000 people (if your town is, indeed, that big) and b) phone books just aren’t that common anymore (I sure don’t possess one).
Which is a totally unhelpful comment. I suppose I am simply shaking my head and thinking, “What a crazy messed-up world we live in these days.”
our preschool has an email distrobution list for snow closings, reminders of special days, classroom celebrations, etc. i figured that was pretty standard. we do the evite, too, but just invite everyone in the class. her class is pretty small, plus there’ always a bunch of kids who can’t make it. evite sends out the reminder, too, which is nice.
I am flabbergasted at the lack of even an email directory as well, although I don’t have any kids in school so I don’t know if that’s standard around here or not. I also used the phone book to get addresses when I was little, but it would probably not work these days. I know we aren’t listed, because we don’t even have a home phone. And even if we were there are a TON of people with our last name.
Anyway. Unhelpful. Sorry.
I am commiserating about the late invitations, though, because I finally made invitations for James’s 1st birthday the week of it, and handed them out to our family/friends that were there while they were at the party. I had spent good time making them, and didn’t want them to go to waste, you see. And yes, everyone laughed at me. Luckily it was just a couple people, and I had told them all verbally about the “party” for a few weeks.
To clarify my earlier comment, our whole school policy is that there are no class contact lists and no birthday invitations sent to school.
Very annoying.
I don’t know how you are supposed to have playdates. I guess you could stand around after school and try to follow the kid to their car. LOL
That wouldn’t be creepy, huh?!
I’m kinda surprised at all the surprise over no directory. “In this day and age” (boy do I feel like an old fart) all it takes is one kid to get their hands on a copy and do something stupid like take a picture and post it on the interwebs somewhere. Obviously not as big a problem for email addresses but still, a major risk for the school/teacher who disseminates the information. Even an email address could lead to harassment.
I’m a teacher and I’m telling you, in no way in hell am I giving anyone but another staff member contact information (even an email address) for a child or parent.
If parents and/or kids exchange info, fine, but leave me out of it.
A sad reflection on our times? You bet.
I’m sure this is too late to help, but at my child’s school we can contact the teacher (by email thankfully) and they will give us a list of all the student’s names with their information.
I have also noticed some parents have not done this. Once a week at my child’s school they are also sent home with papers. Invitations have been included with these papers, which means the parents would have given them to the teacher and then the teacher distributed them this way, which means it would be discreet.
Sorry for spelling and any incorrect apostrophes. Also, less than a week notice is totally normal in my area.
I haven’t read all the comments on this. but I’m so feelin’ ya on this. I had a similar discussion with Cliff in Kindergarten about handing things out and being kind/discreet etc. LOL!
I love that you told William to hand them out discreetly. That’s what actually happens in adult situations when you want to include some people and not others. School is a tiny microcosm for society. Teaching kids how to navigate the world like it is, rather than some alien, unfamiliar place, just confuses them. Let us know how it turns out.
Doesn’t your school pass out address books for all the students?
Ours does and it’s really handy.
Livinia Redlips- Sadly, no! If they did, I’d be all set!
Dude, I totally experienced this with Sophie’s bday party this year in kindergarten. Because I didn’t want to invite all 25 kids but I had no addresses. So I sent a note to school with Sophie for the teachers to hand out to the appropriate students that said “Sophie’s mom would like your address for a party invite. Do I have permission to give it to her?” That was the best I could do/think of at that time.
I also suggested that the teacher make an email list next time she wanted to plan a class party as I coordinated one and HATED calling parent’s phone numbers… I mean, I don’t know them; I don’t know if they work or not work; if it’s their cell phone or home phone; they don’t know my number…gah. Meanwhile, 99% of us are checking email once a day so…
I’m not a teacher but Karen L is and she makes a good point from the other side. Still, it is hard for parents to plan play dates, etc.
This year I’ve gotten to know several of my daughter’s classmates because I come in to help with “centers” and parties and what-not but in first grade, all of that stops and it’s really disconnecting, at least according to my friend whose daughter is in 1st grade this year.
Our preschool won’t even allow me to have a list of the names, nor will they confirm or deny if a particular child is in my daughter’s class. So I sent in 16 blank invites. Of course, I’ve got exactly 7 RSVPs back if I count my own daugter, and I have no way to follow up to make sure. My husband wants me to order enough cupcakes and favors to cover all possibilities, butI think that’s stupid. Why should we spend extra $$$ because people can’t get their stuff together?
That is so weird. When I was in elementary school (early 90’s) there was a contact book sent home with “oldest & onlies” on the first day of school that had every kid’s address and phone number in it. No idea what they do around here now since none of my friends’ kids are old enough to go to school yet.