NWMR: Superbowl Party Conflict

ss265 · January 2014

So I'm trying to get a feel for whether I should be annoyed at this situation.

Last week one friend in my group of friends (there are 4 of us in total) emailed us and asked us if we were up for getting together at her place on Superbowl Sunday. DH's birthday happens to fall on Superbowl this year and I was planning on inviting everyone to our house so that we can invite his friends and have a birthday party as well. I hadn't sent out the evite yet because I was waiting for DH to send me his list of friends to invite. I responded back as such. Well the friend responded back that she had called it first and was still planning to host people. So now there are two parties and our mutual friends are torn over which party to attend. I should also add that the original friend just wants to have people over and could probably do it any weekend, she just chose to do it on Superbowl Sunday.

Now, it is not my place to tell her to move her party and I am not planning to do so at all. What annoys me is that I found out that she called the friends in question the night that the emails were sent out and asked them which party they planned to attend. On the other hand, I deliberately did not call or text our mutual friends because I felt that we were all adults and I did not want them caught in the middle. Am I being unreasonable for being annoyed? Should I just let this go?

Iblamethebeer · January 2014

real talk?

I would drop this friend. If you are on this board you are an adult with a full plate. Who has time for this kind of pettiness? Recruiting friends for competing super bowl parties?!

jlaOK · January 2014

Wow. She doesn't sound like a very good friend. I'd move forward with having your party and make sure that the other 3 friends know that you are doing yours as a birthday party for DH. No one can be upset with you for celebrating your DH's birthday in the way that he wants.

LoCarb · January 2014

She's calling ppl and asking them to choose sides? Wow, very childish. Continue to throw your party was planned and brush her off.

ss265 · January 2014

jlaOK said:

Wow. She doesn't sound like a very good friend. I'd move forward with having your party and make sure that the other 3 friends know that you are doing yours as a birthday party for DH. No one can be upset with you for celebrating your DH's birthday in the way that he wants.

Thanks. I am doing exactly this and I have let the mutual friends know that I will not be offended at all if they chose not to attend my party. I don't want to drop her as a friend because it will just make things awkward for our mutual friends - will probably just keep her more at a distance. It helps that she usually doesn't attend events with all of us anyway.

I was fine with everything until I found out about the phone calls and the more I think about it, the more annoyed I am getting.

mommymegan831 · January 2014

At 1st I thought "what a jerk" but was it going to be just the 4 of you or was she inviting other people as well? If it's a bigger group then I can understand why she wouldn't cancel because it affects alot more people, and her DH may be inviting people as well.

If I were you I may have called the 2 mutual friend and let them know you understand she invited them over 1st and that you don't expect them to attend your party. I think that may have helped to not make them feel as though they were stuck in the middle.

EastCoastBride · January 2014

I'd be annoyed. She's being petty now.

ss265 · January 2014

mommymegan831 said:

At 1st I thought "what a jerk" but was it going to be just the 4 of you or was she inviting other people as well? If it's a bigger group then I can understand why she wouldn't cancel because it affects alot more people, and her DH may be inviting people as well.

If I were you I may have called the 2 mutual friend and let them know you understand she invited them over 1st and that you don't expect them to attend your party. I think that may have helped to not make them feel as though they were stuck in the middle.

She was planning to invite us + 2 more couples but she reached out to us first to see if we could make it before extending the invite to the other 2 couples.

And on hindsight, maybe I should have excluded everyone from my evite since I am inviting other people as well. I just thought that since they knew I was having a party that I should invite everyone to be polite.

ss265 · January 2014

K3am said:

I don't think she's out of line by not cancelling her party. She did schedule it first and plans have been made. You're also not out of line by politely declining and continuing with YH's party, and extending your invites.

I would let any people invited to both parties know that you understand there's a scheduling conflict, and no hurt feelings if they're unable to make it.

I also agree with PP's, she needs to put her big girl panties on and acknowledge that the world doesn't revolve around her.

Is it possible she interpreted you as requesting she merge her party with yours? If so, I can somewhat relate to where she's coming from. She doesn't have to change her plans to accommodate you and yours, but there's no reason for her to go out of her way to make the situation so awkward.

Before actually getting rash, I would probably get off the emails and actually have a conversation with her, if you haven't yet.

Completely agree with all of this. I had no issue with her scheduling a party at the same time, just that she had called people to ask them which party they were going to.

And yes, I did call her over the weekend to chat in person but she never picked up and she never called back. I think I am just going to let it go.

Thank you for all your responses!

Iblamethebeer · January 2014

K3am said:

I don't think she's out of line by not cancelling her party. She did schedule it first and plans have been made. You're also not out of line by politely declining and continuing with YH's party, and extending your invites.

I would let any people invited to both parties know that you understand there's a scheduling conflict, and no hurt feelings if they're unable to make it.

I also agree with PP's, she needs to put her big girl panties on and acknowledge that the world doesn't revolve around her.

Is it possible she interpreted you as requesting she merge her party with yours? If so, I can somewhat relate to where she's coming from. She doesn't have to change her plans to accommodate you and yours, but there's no reason for her to go out of her way to make the situation so awkward.

Before actually getting rash, I would probably get off the emails and actually have a conversation with her, if you haven't yet.

Did she "schedule a party" or did she email 3 friends to ask if they were "up for getting together at her place on Superbowl Sunday" and then, when OP immediately responded to say there was a conflict, double down on the fact that she WAS having a party and then call the other friends to lock down their attendance at her event? It sounded to me like, except for an exploratory email, she rushed to make party plans *after* finding out about the conflict.

That's the part that makes her seem really childish to me.

SparkySharky · January 2014

Her response of "called it first" is totally childish, but then you went ahead and planned yours anyway. It's your DH who is getting screwed if your closest friends don't show, so I guess I wild have said to friend, "don't you think it's kind of childish to play 'who called it first'? That said, I'd like to have everyone there and avoid putting them in the middle so we're going to do something [after/before]. I hope you can make it." Don't get me wrong, I'd be super annoyed at her lack of maturity, but I would still want to meet my goals of a great bday for my husband.

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