I must preface the rest of my story with an explanation of our families. Derek and I are blessed to be surrounded by parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts & uncles, and cousins, all wishing us well and all wanting to shower love—and many, many gifts— upon our children. We are gracious. Well, mostly we've been told we're not allowed to say no. It's a grandparent's (or aunt's or cousin's) right to spoil a child.
Keeping that in mind, I decided to kindly, but firmly, ask parents of our birthday party guests not to bring gifts. This, I knew, might be a little strange to some. I never realised how foreign it would be to a few. Here are some of the reactions I've gotten so far:
I'm hoping that no one will show up with a gift bag in hand. I just want to have a fun time with the kids and then send them on their merry way so that I can clean up and get ready for the next party.
I'll keep you posted on how this experiment turns out.
3 comments:
Good luck with your experiment. I know we didn't have much luck with a similar experiment.
(rant on)
It's amazing how many extended family members assume that they can do whatever they want and forget the fact that you are trying to create your own family traditions... and then get offended and make you feel guilty for even suggesting such absurd ideas... leaving you on what should be a special day, thinking about how you've ruined it for them?! ARGGG!
And in the case of asking people not to bring gifts... if they do bring gifts anyway... not only are they disrespecting you, but they end up making others feel uncomfortable for trying to accommodate your wishes.
(rant off)
I'll remain anonymous... although I'm sure Cristina can guess who I am ;)
well are we allowed to send gifts? don't worry - it's books!
we do miss you guys
One of my clients here in Vancouver has a 7-year old daughter with a large circle of friends, most of whom come from quite wealthy families, and the conspicious consumption (conspicuous gift-giving?) at her school birthday parties started getting WAY out of hand. So for the past couple of birthdays she has asked parents/kids to bring a card with a cash donation to a charity of Michelle (the 7-year-old)'s choice in lieu of a gift (cash so that Michelle gets the fun of actually handing money over to the people at UNICEF, which is the charity she chose). She got a lot of resistance at first - not from her daughter, who loved the idea of collecting money to help other kids who didn't have enough food/medecine/etc., but from other parents who couldn't conceive of a birthday party without dozens of presents! But then they sent round thank you cards with a note about how much Michelle and her friends had raised, and what that money could do via UNICEF...and the idea caught on and now lots of other kids in her circle are doing the same, with different charities. It's a neat trend!
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