I was soooo relieved to see that thread! I thought there was something wrong with my child! We moved to another state and things are different here. Since we have no family here, we thought that giving a birthday party for our child would be great. WRONG. For the past 3 birthdays (she's 7), I have spent a considerable amount of money on the parties(around $300), sent invitations 3-4 weeks in advance (having to put them in backpacks at school before it ended & having to celebrate her birthday in May instead of June as we are not "allowed" to have other classmates phone numbers and this year, we can't even have their last names!) I have always requested an RSVP but I figured these people here don't know what it actually means. The hardest part was trying to contact people to see if their child was coming - with no way to contact them, it's difficult. After this last party - I spent so much on the goodie bags alone! - my husband and I told our daughter we would do something else for her birthday this year. This not knowing if someone is coming is maddening as well as distressing. My daughter is an only child and being so far away from family we can't throw a "family party". So this year instead of stressing, planning, wasting money on people who could care less about my child's feelings, we are taking a trip to San Diego. We bought our tickets last week and are in the stages of planning the itinerary of sites. It may sound extravagant, but my DD, DH & my birthdays are all within 6 weeks of each other, so it's our early presents to ourselves. Our daughter is so excited! When her actual birthday happens, we'll take her out to eat, give her a present and have a small cake. Problem solved! Yay!