Birthday Party Question - Tempe,AZ

We've always done opening presents afterward.
I've seen too many parties where the gifts get played with by everyone and get broken before the party is over.

So here's my take. I believe gifts should be opened at the party. My child took the time to choose it and I spent the money to buy it. My child wants to see the birthday kid open their present. Irks me to no end when they don't. If you won't have time or patience to open them at the party, don't invite that many people.

That said, 30 guests at a 4 yo party is crazy. Unless the majority of the guests are adults prepare for melt downs. In that case I can see where you might not open gifts at the party. But for crying out loud SEND A THANK YOU NOTE for every gift received. It's terribly rude to not open the gift, not acknowledge a gift was given and not thank those that brought gifts.

We just had a party for my 3yo granddaughter and she opened presents at the end and wasn't able to open more than 3. There were 15 or so guests Including 5 children. All the children were older than 6 or 7. I've learned on this site that many don't open presents at the party at all. That isn't the way we do it in my family but I understand it now.

We had a wonderful clown with a lot of partipating activity. I think if she'd opened presents first she wouldn't have enjoyed the party as much as she did. So reluctantly I would choose to open presents later or perhaps have an adult open presents with her to get it done quickly.

The adults also participated with the clown and continued chatting when my granddaughter opened presents. It looked like no one except me and her Dad were watching. The rest if the adults didn't seem to notice she didn't open them all.

i'm always so interested in how deeply divided we are on this issue!
some people feel that if they don't see their gift opened and sufficient delight expressed, it's a disappointment.
i myself want to gouge out my own eyeballs if i have to sit there and watch a child (or pregnant woman or bride-to-be) open present after present from an enormous pile, and ooo and ahhh each time.
if your 4 year old is going to open 30 presents, i'd say put it off until later. it'll be less stress on her, you can record each one easily, and deal with the mess without your guests there. if it's just a few gifts from her friends, let her open them at the party.
khairete
S.

We open the presents after the party. I hated going to birthday parties and having to sit and watch kids open presents, especially if there are lots of presents. It is very boring, and the kids get bored very quickly. When we have parties we are often paying for our time at a venue, and I would rather the kids be doing whatever it is we have paid to do rather than sit around watching gifts be opened. I also find that by opening gifts in private people aren't comparing who brought what, nobody feels bad for bringing a less spectacular gift, and the kids don't have to fake excitement over gifts they really aren't excited about. We just make sure we thank everyone for bringing gifts at the party, and again after the party.

At that age, I definitely remember doing it after -- at least after the preschool friends leave. When my son turned 4, my mom got him started opening presents before all the kids had left. BAD idea. My son got a very cool remote-control car, his preschool friend had to be told that there was only one said remote-control car, and the friend couldn't take it home, and pretty much all hell broke loose. At that age, they can't handle seeing another child get presents if they don't get the same presents themselves. My son is now going on 8, and we've NEVER been to a part ywhere the birthday kid opened gifts in front of friends, though I remember doing this back in ancient history, when I was growing up.

I usually wait until after. It is easier for my to write down and if it is a duplicate or something I don't want for my child, then I can either return it before the kids open the packaging or wait until i think my child is ready for the item.

I've been to both and either it fine. Some 4 year olds just start opening without the parents around. That would bug me, because I would not know who gave what to my child.

edit: I do recall a friend saying she wanted my child to open the gift in front of her. Now I ask people. Most say "It doesn't matter to me, what ever is easier for you."

edit: many places give you 2 hours for a party and this is also a reason we do not open presents when it is at a party place with a strict time limit. If the kids rock climb and then sing happy b-day and eat there is just not time.

.... I have been to b-day parties, where they open the presents during the party. And let me tell you, it takes TIME. LOTS of time, to do that... each present being opened, then the Mom has to jot it down and who gave what so that thank-you notes can be sent out later, then a photo is taken of the B-Day kid with the present given, then the kid/parent has to make like OH MY THANK YOU ITS SO CUTE to the crowd and the gift giver so that EACH gift giver is graciously thanked right there and can see the 'reaction' to their gift by the b-day child/parent.
I went to one party, for a 4 year old, and it took... OVER 1 HOUR, for the opening-presents part of the party, to take place. THEN it was cake/ice cream. ALL the kids, were getting antsy. And the parents too.
It was.... tedious.

Now, you will have about 30 guests at your daughter's party.
So, figure about HOW long... opening presents will, take. That whole process.... and how long the timeline is of the entire party from start to finish.
That is a LOT of people, at the party.

If the party were just like 5 kids from your daughter's school that's fine and you 'could' open presents then, AT the party. But not when there is 30 people including relatives.

IME, kids that little REALLY, REALLY, REALLY like to see the birthday child open THEIR special gift.
Good luck!

(I'm sure that "30 people" probably means family members, spouses & a couple of friends--I know it doesn't take much to get to 30--I don't think it's too many, just keep it to the time of day best for 4 year olds!)

We always open after. There just isn't enough time and it takes too long. Most of our parties are at places where we have only 2-3 hours, so the kids want to play and eat cake, they are happy to open gifts later.

Before I had a party at a place where I had a time limit I thought it was rude, but when you're in the situation, it's different.

So if the party is at home and you have time, go ahead and do it there, if not, do it later and don't feel bad about it.

With that many people, you really should wait. It's too many presents and it will take too long. Plus, a four year old isn't very good at masking her emotions if she doesn't like the gift, or keeping quiet if she already has something, so it might hurt people's feelings if she isn't (or at least doesn't act) thrilled. It doesn't matter how much you coach them about it, kids don't fully grasp it. Spare your guests the boredom and possible frustration/embarrassment/disappointment.

Miss Manners says that opening presents during the party so that the recipient can express their thanks in person is proper birthday party ettiquette.

That said, I think that 30 people at a 4 year old's birthday party is entirely too many. I think that's entirely too much stimulation and upset and would expect an emotional meltdown from the most calm and stoic child.

Perhaps you could consider doing a party with playmates and classmates during the day, and then have family over for a dinner that evening. No balloons or party supplies needed for the latter event.

My 3yo recently had his firt birthday party. I pre-printed thank-you notes for each invited guest. As the gifts came in, I sat in back (during the party) and peeked into each package and wrote out the thank-yous (specifying each gift) on the pre-printed notes. Then, I handed them out at the end of the party. He opened his gifts once we were settled at home.

This was a venue party, and timing was critical, so opening them there wasn't much of an option. I think that this way worked out very well, though, and I'll be doing this in the future, no matter where we host. I don't like for kids to feel obligated to share their brand-new toys. Also, for this one, I found that I preferred to put certain ones away for later development and just because he didn't need to have so much in his active pile at once.

I think that the "right" decision would be based on the child's age and development stage, type and duration of party, number of guests, "type" of guests (temperaments, relationships with guest of honor), temperament/personality of the child's parent(s)....

For us, it depends on the venue.
My daughter's 5th birthday party will be I. A few weeks at at trampoline place where we are limited to two hours. We will save the time for jumping and cake and bring presents back home to open.
My son's 3rd birthday party is next week at the train park. We've set a 4 hour party window, but actually have the ramada the whole day. We might open presents there if the kids want a break from playing.
My youngest's 1st birthday will be in 2 months at my mom's condo pool and clubhouse. We have no time limit, but will save presents for afterwards since we are asking for no gifts from guests.
If there's a time limit, then let the kids play and save the presents for home. If it's a home party or one with no time limit, open them!

We always do guest presents during, and parent presents before or after.

If I buy a present for someone, I want to watch them open it. I would be pretty upset if I brought a gift, then missed the reaction.

That's a huge number of people! If more than 10 gifts, save until later.

We do it during the party. I try to make sure that presents from friends are opened before presents from family, as presents from family tend to be more expensive. Also, if someone needs to leave early, I have their present opened before they leave.

When my daughter turned five we had a backyard party. It tired out fo be the hottest day of the summer so us adults were melting, but the kids were splashing and having fun. I have her open presents at the party. One of the older kids read the cards while she opened (if they were old enough they could jot down what the present was on the card/envelope) we had about thirty ppl-maybe more and it was manageable. Some of the kids wandered off-and we let em, but many of the kids were excited to have her open 'their' present/see what she got. It went pretty fast due to the ecitement-then we had cake.
I didn't know exactly what came from whom-but, she thanked them as she opened them and I sent a nice collage card to everyone with pics of the party (one was a group pick of all the kids) that said thank you as well.

I've never been to a party where the presents weren't opened. I would probably think it was rude/weird.

I almost always had my kids open their gifts at the party, except when it was at Chuck E Cheese and there just wasn't time built into the party for that.

I preferred to have the birthday kid open their gifts at the party. Everyone likes to watch, and it made the gift givers happy to see their friend open their gift. I managed the chaos by setting up two chairs - one for the birthday kid, and for each gift, the giver got to sit next to birthday kid while their gift was opened. I would take a photo of the two of them, and enclose it in the thank you card. This always went well.

I felt that opening the gifts in front of the guests was a good way to practice good manners, saying thank you and remembering not to announce, "I already have that Barbie!"

Although I will admit that in the end, I was glad that my daughter's four year old party was at CEC and no time to open the gifts there. It was her first friend party, and she was used to going to birthday parties and seeing other kids open gifts and get all these toys. Every guest gave her clothes. I could see her disappointment at home when she opened the presents and there wasn't a single toy. I was glad the guests didn't see that, since I hadn't prepared her for this possibility.

I would open the gifts from her friends at the party and the others later. Gifts from 30 people will simply be overwhelming to her.

If there are a ton of presents skip it. If there are less than 20 let her open them but please, let the kids go play. They really really really do not care to sit still and watch kiddo open them. They could not care any less.

It's the adults who want to see her like their stuff.

In the future you might want to do it differently. Family party's are just not fur for visiting kids. They'll do a LOT better if you have a small kid birthday. The family will like having freedom to be themselves and not share their time with strangers.

We always open presents at the party, but we never had more than 12 to 15 guests/gifts, max.
If you expect 30 presents that's literally going to take half an hour! Let your child open the presents from her preschool friends and save the rest for later.

To me, the whole point of presents is for the child to enjoy opening them and the givers to experience the look of joy on the child's face. The parents help the birthday child say thank you to the giver, and over time the child learns to express gratitude without prompting. Afterwards, the child still writes a thank you note - at age 4, of course that's with help. We've done it with one of us eliciting a comment from our son about the gift and writing it down verbatim (which is usually hilarious but heart-felt), and we've had him make a picture and then we write "thank you for the ____" across the top, and mail it. Our son always helped put the stamps on the envelopes and take the thank you notes to the mailbox. Later, when he started to write a little, we made a "fill in the blank" thank you note and he wrote in the few words (with some help, but we left the misspellings as long as it was clear what he was trying to say), then he signed his name. Later on, he wrote the thank you on his own, and he wasn't allowed to play with the toy until the note was written. When he was old enough that he started to receive checks, he couldn't cash them until the thank you was written. If he said he didn't want to write a thank you, we told him he then had to send the gift or check back with a note about why he wasn't grateful and didn't want it. (Of course, he learned that he was writing a note one way or the other, so of course a thank you was the way to go!)

I think parties should be of manageable size so that the child can open the gifts, everyone can ooh and aaah, but not have so many people that the entire day's activity is watching the birthday child open the gifts. It's no fun for the guests, and it's so hard for children to see a child open 30 gifts and they can't have any of them. But your 30 people sound like they are part of families, so there will be a group gift, so maybe only 6-7 gifts total? That's terrific!

By all means, let the gift-givers see the look of joy on your child's face and hear the appreciation from you as you help your child learn to navigate these social situations. You will be happy when your child is older that you started early with the social graces and good manners.

We do them during the party. Since it's mostly family, they want to see her reaction to their presents.

I always have my kids open at the party because I think people of all ages want to see the birthday child open their present. Kids want to see it because they want to see their friend get excited about what they bought…adults want to see if so they know the kid got the present and sometimes adults are more excited about what they bought than the kids are.

I would say announce you are doing it and let people choose if they want to sit and watch or not. Most kids will lose interest fairly quickly and continue to go and play, which is fine. Some kids will be right in the action trying to help the birthday child open. I don't have a problem with that so much, but others might. I would just suggest making the other kids get out of the way sometimes to family members can get some pics of just the b-day child.

I think it shows appreciation and grace to open presents at the party, just my opinion, but I think it's important.

We opened presents during the party, and if the honoree got overwhelmed, we stopped, played for a while, then went back to it.

After the food, cake and activity--open the gifts !
I despise when the gifts are not open at the party.

At age four, I would wait and see.

Watch your daughter and see how she's handling the party. If she seems wound up and excited about all of the attention (30 people is alot!), then I would wait and open them after the party is over. It may be too many presents for her to open in one sitting.

If she's doing okay, maybe have her open a just few presents. There are always going to be people who want to see their presents open, so have her do those first. If she needs a break, then take one and move on to something else. Then, should she be ready to start in again, go for it.

We started early in coaching our kids how to handle a duplicate gift or one they didn't like. You may want to 'practice' opening presents with your daughter if you choose to have her open presents at the party.

I didn't give a definitive answer (sorry), but I think you have to follow your daughter's lead on this one. Happy birthday to your girl! Hope the party goes well!