January Birthday Sleepover? To Have or Not to Have …

Poor Joe. No sooner do we get through with Christmas and New Year’s and he’s talking about his 10th birthday at the end of January. Another gift list, more parties, meals to plan, cakes to make … who’s idea was it to have a January baby, anyway?

Kidding, of course! We wouldn’t trade Joe’s January birthday for anything. But let’s get real for one mom moment, at times it’s a lot to think about so soon after the Christmas credit card bill just came in the mail. Downright exhausting, sometimes.

This year, Joe has five good friends he wants to have over for his birthday party. He’s been hinting at a sleepover, but Teacher Man and I aren’t so inclined. The problem – and it’s truly a good problem for Joe to have – is that he has friends from three different areas of his life: 1) school (also known as M, J and Joe – the Terrific Trio, apparently), 2) his before and after school care program, and 3) his best bud down the street. Joe knows all of these boys well, but not everyone else knows each other.

In other words, there is no guarantee that everyone is going to get a long – and in fact, we ran into issues at last year’s birthday party because one of his friends clearly did not want to “share” Joe with the rest of the boys at the party. It ended with Teacher Man having to play, well, the teacher and take this boy into another room and have a bit of a stern talking to him. Not that fun, really.

Now Joe can get along with pretty much anyone – he’s very easy going and is a people pleaser, which is why, of course, he has friends from all these different walks of life. But not every kid is like that, and Teacher Man and I shudder to think of throwing six boys down in our basement for a sleepover, wondering who might make it out alive the next morning.

Does that make me a bad mom?

My solution, instead, will be to offer a slightly different option: we’ll bring all these boys together for a birthday party at our house on a Saturday afternoon, and then at a later date, Joe can invite his school friends (aka the other 2/3 of the Terrific Trio) for a sleepover. We know the three of them get along really well, they are nice boys and there won’t be much, if any, drama. (Except for when they are start yelling during the Skylanders video game …)

That’s not all bad, right? I mean, it’s almost like getting two birthday celebrations. Or so I’m going to point out to Joe when he and I discuss this particular scenario this week. We’ll see if he agrees.

Have you ever had issues with your kids’ friends like this? If so, how do you handle birthday parties and/or sleepovers with groups of kids who don’t all know each other?

This is Joe at his birthday party last year – anything Pokemon was a big hit. This year, as he is nearing the age of 10, he’s moved on mainly to Yu-Gi-Oh cards. Whatever that means.

Earl the pug was fairly unimpressed with the whole birthday experience last year. Too much activity meant not nearly enough nap time for him. He’s got his priorities.