For my 8 year old daughter’s birthday, she wanted to go to a movie with some friends and then have some time at our house for playing, opening gifts and cake & ice cream. It works out better to do the house part first, and then we and another mother will drive the kids to the theater for the movie. Parents were asked to drop the girls at our house and pick them up from the theater when the movie ends.
My daughter invited about ten of her friends. Today the mother of one of the girls called and said she hadn’t responded to the invitation yet (the party is this weekend) because she wanted to talk to us first. Her daughter is a twin, and she (the mother) always allows both twins to go to the parties that the other is invited to, so she’d like us to include the twin daughter. She offered to pay for that girl’s movie ticket, but she would bring her over with her sister to our house at the start of the party. My daughter does not know the twin, although she thinks she might have seen her on the playground once.
My wife was so flabbergasted that the woman was telling us to include her other daughter that she didn’t put up to much of a fuss, but did say that she could come to the movie if she wanted; the woman said OK, but we’ll bring her to your house. My wife told her the time we’d be leaving our house for the theater, thinking the woman might get the hint that she wasn’t really invited, but the woman said she would bring both girls over at the start of the party. My wife didn’t object too forcefully, but when we talked about it afterward, we both became frustrated at the woman’s forcefulness and my wife wishes she had put her foot down about it.
The family is Indian. Is this a cultural thing? I know that in some cultures, it is not uncommon for people to open up their parties to other friends and relatives, but this sort of surprised us. Also, if we were having an all-day barbeque for lots of people and one of them wanted to bring another person along, we’d have no problem with it. But this seems different.
What do you think- is that a strange request, or do we need to lighten up?
Maybe they are running a sort of social/genetic experiment where they are trying to make sure both twins get EXACTLY the same experiences to see if they will become EXACTLY the same person :-p
The part that seems odd to me is that your daughter knows one half of a set of 8-year-old twins and not the other. Almost all of the twins I’ve known were basically inseparable as children up to the mid-teenage years. There’s not anything wrong with that, it’s just not a situation I’ve ever encountered. I’m 5th or 6th generation Irish-German stock whitebread American, so I don’t think this is an Indian culture thing.
That said, I think your proposed solution is a bad one. You’re totally within your rights to apologize and stick to the invitation as made, or to give in and let the mother invite her other daughter along. But going half-way and letting the other twin in on only part of the fun just emphasizes that she’s unwanted but being reluctantly accepted. That’s not a cool position to put the daughter in, whatever you think of her mother’s etiquette.
It sounds less like an ethnic cultural thing and more like a mom with twins thing. I have a friend that has a set of 9 year old twin girls and they have always been in every class together, do all sports and activities together, share a room, have the same friends, etc.
In the grand scheme of things, it’s really not that big a deal to you, but her daughters will probably push for more independence from each other as they get older.
Unfortunately, I can’t classify it as a strange request, because far, far too many people think it’s acceptable to invite themselves or others to events that are not theirs to invite to. It is, however, a bullshit request, and a shitty thing to do to you and your wife.
As a (non-Indian) parent of twins, I can say that it was a delicate balancing act between encouraging my kids to have separate identities, friendships, etc., and having one of them feel left out when the other got to do something. Even though my twins were in separate classes at school, up until age 10 or so it was pretty much impossible to untangle their lives.
So I can understand a somewhat protective (I won’t say overprotective) mother wanting to make sure one twin doesn’t feel left out when a birthday party comes up.
On the one hand, your daughter has the right to choose her own friends. On the other hand, the mother is paying for the other twin’s ticket, so how much of an inconvenience is it to accommodate her? I don’t recall birthday parties for 8-year olds being rigidly structured social events.
I’d be inclined to cut the mother (and the twins) some slack, although the mother doesn’t get much sympathy for not getting your wife’s point.
When I was in third grade and turning 8, one of my classmates asked if her twin could come too. I think I knew her twin well enough that it wasn’t weird or anything. They were apparently really close. They were Japanese, for what it’s worth. In my case, though, it seemed to be more that the twins themselves wanted it, whereas for you, it seems the mom is afraid of one of them being left out.
I had a couple twins and two sets of non-twin sisters who were very close in age who came as a twofer. It irritated me, because I always seemed to prefer one more than the other, and sometimes a younger sister needed to be protected from some of the older girls’ conversations, but we just rolled with it. It was made clear by the doubles’ moms that they operated as a complementary set. It was also implied that invites to the twins/sisters’ houses were contigent upon accepting the twofer arrangement.
For my son’s 5th birthday we/he had invited a bunch of kids his own age to his party. One of them was another 5 year-old that lived in our neighborhood. I think the parents are originally from Kenya. The Dad called before the party and wanted to know if his other kids (8 and 10) and their cousin (4) could also attend.
Fortunately my wife kindly turned him down.
Another vote for “mom with twins” thing rather than a cultural thing. My (white, southern) best friend in school was an identical twin. They’re 33 now and their mother still hasn’t realized they’re 2 different people.
We have twin girls - 6YO.
It would not surprise me in the least if the twin you invited did not want to go without the other one. Mine are practically inseparable. I’m told they tend to become more independent as they grow older but if they’re young it could be an issue.
Honestly, at that age, it wouldn’t even occur to me to only invite one half of a set of twins.
Also, while I’m not a parent, it seems to me that the difference between having to deal with 10 kids for an afternoon, and having to deal with 11 kids, is not that great. But having to deal with one kid for an afternoon versus having to deal with no kids could be a tremendous relief. Since the mom’s offering to cover additional expenses, why not do the woman a solid and let her get rid of both kids for the day?
Growing up, whenever a kid in my sister’s class threw a birthday party and she was invited, I was invited too.
And vice versa.
(Or it could be that I wasn’t and she wasn’t, but my mother didn’t care and I never learned the truth!)
Granted, we were always in separate classes but we’d play together during recess and usually eat with each other at lunchtime. So in that way, we were always “the twins”, joined at the hip. There was no one in our classes that didn’t know we were twins.
I would not say it’s a cultural thing. It boils down to how the parents raise their twins. If the parents don’t really care to help them develop separate identities through having different experiences, then the kids start to feel like everything has to be “equal”…that if Twin gets to do something, then I must absolutely get to do it too! At least that was how it was for us. We eventually got older and realized we couldn’t always tag-along with each other, but to this day I remember all the times my sister got to go on class field trips that I didn’t get to go on just because the sense of unfairness burned the memories in my brain. Or there was one time when my teacher took me and a couple of other kids out to lunch as a reward for something we’d done, and my sister bawled her eyes out when she learned that she wasn’t invited. And we were ten years old…way too old (IMHO) for that kind of reaction. Seriously, I blame my parents. But I guess they figured things would work out naturally, and ultimately they were right.
I agree that if you’re going to let the twin come, she’s got to be invited to everything.
I don’t think it’s weird to invite only one twin, necessarily, but like kunilou I’m surprised that your child would be friends with one twin but barely know the other. Are the twins in different classes?
Since the OP includes “My daughter does not know the twin, although she thinks she might have seen her on the playground once” I think the answer must be Yes.
I definitely lean toward the notion that it’s rude of the twins’ mother to ask that a kid whom the daughter doesn’t know be invited to her party.