I have a question for you mammas, but first the info. My son will be 4 in August, we are having a Cooking Party at a local Chef's Academy. We are only inviting 7 of his friends from school, he has 18 in his class and can't invite them all so we are opting for a small party. My son has picked out 7 friends whom he has known for 1 1/2 years to attend. My MIL said to him the other day,"I hope H(my neice)can come down for your party(live in Tulsa, we are in Dallas) this year." My son said yeah. Here is the problem, she is younger (just turned 3) and doesn't listen or follow directions well. We were planning on meeting family in the evening for our traditional Snow Cone Snack (we started this when he turned 1 and it is our special b-day thing now), and hang out time. Would it be rude to invite H to the Snow Cone Event and not the Cooking Party?
Tell her the class limit is set by the teacher and you can't do anything about it, that it would have been fun but it's out of your hands.
Just tell her there is a limit and your son has reached that limit with his classmates, but your son will be really excited that little cousin will be a "surprise" at the snow cone stand!
Gamma G. had a good 'neutral' suggestion, for MIL.
Next, at a certain age, birthday parties for kids, are generally with their friends. Not all combined with family necessarily like when they were babies. So your son's party is nice... for him. He's a big boy. It is a "classmate" party. And no other relatives are invited... as such.
MIL however, is thinking that his cousin (her niece) is a 'part' of the birthday... but gee, they don't live in your State. Why would they fly down there for it? When this is clearly a classmates/friends party? or is HIS birthday parties ALWAYS including the 3 year old??? There should be no obligation to that "assumption" on MIL's part.
And your Snow Cone thing/tradition, is just between your son and you/Hubby. Oh I"m sorry, you said you will be meeting family for this. Well that is fine. If anything just 'invite' the 3 year old, if you have to, to the Snow Cone part.
But so there is MIL's "feelings." But to me, she just sort of invited things herself... it being the niece. And now, it may be a big ball of a web to clean out.
YOU did nothing wrong. MIL was the one that threw in this extra 'kink' into it all.
But sure, you don't want to offend her.
Thus, I would just tell her the "excuse" that Gamma G. suggested.
All the best,
Susan
oh... My gut says that keeping peace with your MIL is golden.... if you think your MIL would misunderstand your niece not being invited to the cooking party, then I would invite her--or at least make an effort to ask her mother if she thought it would be safe and age appropriate for her. You can always say that you are concerned that she might get hurt and you wanted to check first... However, I would at least make the effort to include her.
If you both decide that its not age appropriate, you will then be able to tell your MIL that you made the effort.
