Kids Birthday Parties

So if you have kids you know that they get lots of invitations to birthday parties for kids you don't know.  Here is my beef.  I usually try to make sure that either my kids know we can't make it and tell the birthday kid or I call and let them know.  This is not only teaching them a little bit of respect for others, but it is the right thing to do.  There were a few families that could not make the party and they did call to let us know.  That is not the problem.

I had a birthday party for my twin girls this weekend.  It is the first time they were able to invite their friends instead of it just being several families getting together.  We had a great time.  However one daughter invited two friends and the both were there.  The other daughter invited two friends, and they told her they were going to be there and none of them showed up.  This was heartbreaking for her.  She not only was hurt by the fact that they weren't there, but was embarrassed in front of her grandmother, big sister (from Big Brothers Big Sisters), and her god parents.  That is a lot for a child who is celebrating her 13th birthday to have to deal with.  Then come the feelings of why am I not as good as my twin sister?  How come my friends don't like me as much? And the list can go on. 

I can speak about all these questions before I talk to her about this because when I was growing up I was that kid who would invite 5 to 8 kids to my birthday party (the few times I was allowed to have one) and then no one would show up.  That would be followed by my mom yelling at me for having to go through everything to try to have a party for nothing.  Now as the mom I held her and told her it was all right, that we would talk about it later.  Let her Big Sister hug her and then we walked back into the party room  with everyone else and changed the subject.  I gave her her new book she had just bought (birthday tradition for our family; they get to pick out any book they want at the book store) and she shared it with her Big, soon on the outside everything was ok again, but I don't know how long it will be before she is ok again.