We have separate. Usually BM throws SSs birthday parties at her house and it is just the boys and their friends. She'll schedule it on a weekend she has the boys. We have just a family thing where we'll go out to dinner, have cake, and give them presents.

We have separate parties. BM throws a party with her family, DH and I throw a party for family and SS's friends.

We used to have them together until it got to where the BM(she would do all the planning) and girls were wanting to go to waterparks and expensive places, and have DH pay for all of BM's family to go also. So since then we just do it seperately, we can't afford a huge party plus gifts which is usually cell phones or other expensive electronics.

Hi with future SD's 17 and 15 we do blended because they have a big loving family and there is no drama with any of us. With future SD 7 we do everything separate because BM is a nightmare and full of drama, all the time :jawdrop: !

Nope. Never. My wife and I married when SS was 1yo. He just graduated from HS. Never once have we had anything to do with the SpermClan beyond court dates and kid exchange.

And we like it that way.

DH and I attended exactly 1 shared party at BM's for SS17's 8th grade graduation. It wasn't horrible, but it never happened again. Separate parties for separate families.

We do blended parties, but BM never shows up. Her family (who are nice people) does.

I do joint also.

(Like Anon2009 though she doesn't always show up)

Yes and No, I have had my ex-Inlaws over for birthday parties along with several other relatives for larger events at my home like the girls graduation from High school. The parties were held at the house and we invited both sets of grandparents along with my current in-laws (who do not acknowledge me or the kids, even though the BF of my children passed away several years ago and so H mean's a lot to the kids-he is their dad).

Because of domestic abuse my ex was not welcome at my home for obvious reasons. The boys BM has been invited over to our home for bigger events. Even though she was the one having the affairs in the marriage she is very angry about my marriage to my H. Year's ago both couples were friends, we at times watched each other's children. I did not find out about my ex's affair with the Boys BM until AFTER I was married to H, BM "let" it out of the bag in an attempt to hurt me when she found out that H and I were engaged (which was long after both of our divorces!).

I am hopeful that in a few years that she will come to her own son's graduation and party that will be held at the house (ss16 is already planning it! lol) I dont see it happening since she refuses to allow SS13 to see us now and we are in a really bad custody case again.

My allowing my ex relatives to come to celebrate in our home made a huge impression on the GAL in this case for placement going on currently.

I've done a little of both as a BM. It really depends on who it is with.

My general rule is this: If you want to do a combined party then both bio-parents contribute equally and can invite their respective family members. Otherwise....have your own damn party.

My oldest boy we have combined B-days twice in 13 years. Once was a bowling party and once was a swim party. Both went off without a hitch and everyone got along just fine.

My youngest boy has only had 1 b-day since our divorce. We did a combined party. I planned everything and ex paid for 1/2. We didn't have my SKids that weekend but wanted to invite them so my DH's ex ended up coming too!! Talk about Jerry Springer Worthy!! Attendees included: Me, my DH, my Ex, Ex's new wife and her 2 kids(this was my 1st time to meet them), my DH's ex and her new baby plus my Skids, my parents, my new in-laws plus friends from school. It actually went perfectly. His birthday is coming up again in about a month.....not sure what we will do.

DH and his ex have done a couple of combined parties over the past several years. Like I mentioned above, she was at my son's joint party with my ex. She asked DH about doing a joint party for their son a couple of months ago and he told her "I don't think so". The reason - She's a nut and can't get along with us long enough to plan something like that. She got mad at DH and mentioned that I did a combined party for my son....he said that's because my ex and I know how to cooperate.

It really depends on how well everyone can cooperate and get along.

With my kids, no blended parties, ever. On my exBFs side, all parties combined, everything combined...from an art show at school, to parent teacher conferences...it's like SD's entourage...exBF, BM, BM's now fiance, exMIL, Bm's mom, BM's grandmother. Yuck. If only he could have worn my shoes for a day!

Hahahahahahaha! This is my reaction to the idea of shared events with BM: :sick:

Not to use a cliche, but pigs will not only fly, but offer frequent flier miles before we share any events with BM. It's bad enough that we have to see her at parent teacher meetings and school events, let alone willingly subject ourselves to that kind of torture. Even if we wanted to make peace, it wouldn't be possible with her. In the past she responded to civility and a waving white flag with insane stalking behavior and open hostility.

We do completely separate birthdays and holidays and we intend to keep it that way. It's really sad because even minimal efforts on our side seem like gargantuan and lavish compared to what BM does (or doesn't) do for the skids. For SS12's recent birthday, she made him share his party with her sister's step-daughter, who is 7 and he didn't get to invite any of his friends. Basically they added his name to the cake and no one other than his aunt and BM got him any presents. The present thing isn't important in itself, but it's the thought that really does count and he was really hurt that no one seemed to care. We got him on his actual birthday and I went all out and decorated the house with streamers, balloons and a banner. All of my family had presents for him, we had two very nice presents (one was a brand new phone just for him) and saved his presents from his grandparents and aunt and uncle on his dad's side from the mail so he could open them all at once on his b-day. He was so happy that we cared that it made me want to cry. He was even enthusiastic about receiving books from my sister. We then took him on a b-day camping trip that he shared with me (both of us are May b-days). It wasn't that we got him stuff it was that we obviously cared and had thought about him and what he would like.

To make it worse, he asked his mom why she didn't let him have his own party at her house, even with one friend and she said she couldn't afford it. This was one week after she threw a "fondue party" for her creepy druggy friends. We are actually friends with the guy that just moved in to the house next door to her and he said that she unloaded a bunch of hard alcohol and a couple cases of beer as well as food for the party. She was supposed to have the skids, but pawned them off on her sister and apparently got extremely drunk and was yelling and swearing and shrieking in the front yard until she got a noise complaint and had to shut down the party. (she lives in the only decrepit shack in an actually very nice and quiet family neighborhood). So basically she spent all her money on booze and God knows what else and didn't bother to save out enough to throw a dollar store party for her son.

She pulled the same stunt last Christmas too and spent all her money on alcohol for a Christmas party. She literally had no money and didn't buy a single present for the skids. She poured out some sob story to her mother, who bought tacky presents for the skids and mailed them, unwrapped to BMs house. BM didn't bother to wrap them or even get them out of the mail box and and she told the skids to go to the mail box because Santa had visited there. Seriously the lamest thing I can imagine short of a Dickens-esque Christmas story. We had them on Christmas Eve and Day luckily and they had a great Christmas with us. We don't spoil them, but we try really hard to get them presents they will love. On top of all that, BM had the nerve to get bitchy because we took them to church for Christmas Eve services. She acted like we were taking them to a satanic black mass and H just ignored her and we took them to church anyway.

So yeah, her priorities are way out of whack. We just assume now that she is going to be as lame as possible for holidays and birthdays and just throw our own for the skids. The funny thing is that she thinks we are trying to compete with her and make her look bad and she says nasty and bitter things about us when the skids tell her what they did at our house. No one is forcing her to be a crappy mother and she acts like we try to make her look bad, when she does a pretty great job of doing that herself, without our help.

She is completely banned from our home and lives other than pick ups and drop offs and there will never be a day that she is welcome at any event we throw or plan. She has also been completely excluded from H's parents home which is something that really upsets her. Her family is seriously trashy and her childhood was abusive and filled with neglect and so she desperately wanted to be a part of H's family. She thought she had it made because she tried to trap him with having his children and weaseling her way into his family that way, but he refused to marry her and now that he is married to me and his parents love me, she is never invited or welcomed to their house. H's family is really wonderful and they are very classy and kind people and have a beautiful home on their own wooded acreage and it is very lush and luxurious and I know it kills BM to know that she will never be invited there again. My in-laws were over the moon about their only son getting married and they are amazing to me and have been nothing but kind and understanding. BM still tries to be involved with them, but at this point they are so shocked and disillusioned by her that they have cut off contact with her unless it's about logistics of our holiday schedule. The skids spend two weeks with them every summer as a special grandparent/grandchild tradition and for the last two summers she has tried her best to work out a way to go to their house to drop the kids off. Last summer she technically had the skids and was responsible for dropping them off after a two week stint with her and her family, but H's parents live out of state and about six hours away, driving, one way. We assumed that we would be taking them, but she threw a fit and said it was her time and acted like H's parents would side with her and want to see her (???!!!). She called them and told them that she was driving them down and they were really confused and told her they had planned for us to drive them, not her and when she corrected them, they told her that it wouldn't work for her to drive to their house and they insisted on meeting her halfway. They were willing to drive six hours total just to avoid having BM at their house! She is so delusional that she was actually completely shocked by this! Since her plan to go to their house didn't work, she told H that we could take the kids after all and then was even more upset when she found out that H's parents wanted us to come all the way so we could stay the weekend with them and have a visit. Haha! The tradition has always been to stay with H's family overnight for the summer vacation drop offs and so she was trying her best to stay with them. She then, audaciously tried another tactic and said that she was visiting a "friend" in their town, on the same weekend we were there. What a coincidence! She didn't outright ask to stay with them, that would be too direct and she is nothing if not completely passive aggressive (unless she's being openly hostile to us) but she hinted strongly and they completely stood their ground and refused to invite her to stay with them. She finally asked if she could stop by that weekend to give the boys a hug (???!!!) and they told her that they did not feel comfortable with that given that I would be there. They told her that they didn't want me to feel uncomfortable! It was so awesome! Total triumph! They told her they would have the boys call her or if she wanted to meet them downtown they would drop them off for an hour and then pick them back up. She jumped all over that and asked if she could pick them up at their house (she cannot take a hint OR an overt statement) and they said no, that they would be happy to drop them downtown while they ran errands. She tried everything she could think of and nothing worked! Of course, the whole "friend" thing was completely made up and when she realized that she would never be invited to their home again, she completely gave up and didn't bother to be involved at all. We picked up the skids on our way out of town and her face was puffy and tear streaked and I was actually feeling sorry for her until the skids told me that she said that I wanted to "hurt them" and that I hated their grandparents (?????) and that I wanted to take her place and be their mom and get rid of her. Of course, they were upset from hearing stuff like that! I corrected the lies and reassured them and they were totally fine, but it made me realize that BM was grasping for straws and desperately trying to lash out in any way she could.

Since then, she has been more and more excluded and at the moment H's parents are so disgusted with her and angry that she avoids talking to them at all costs because she doesn't want to get called out on all the horrible things she's been doing.

So, yeah, that is my long-winded explanation of us and BM and shared events. She would have to be a completely different person for it to work and if she was like my most recent ex, who is a great friend of both H and me and who stays with us when he is in town visiting, things would be completely different. I broke up with my ex to be with H and he is such an amazing person that he and I were able to talk through it and maintain our friendship. Not only that, but he is friends with H and they genuinely love to hang out! When he's in town, he gets the spare bedroom and we all have a great time cooking for him and drinking beer and laughing and talking and just having a great time. He has a really nice girlfriend that comes with him sometimes and we have no problem hanging out as a foursome. I knew her casually before, but we have gotten to be good friends now too and as weird as it is, it works for us. H and I often wistfully talk about how great things would be if my ex were the "BM" rather than the psycho we are stuck with. If she was a good person, like my ex, I would happily share events, but she's not so we are more than happy to keep things completely separate.

This makes me SO HAPPY to read. I was told I was a lunatic, a worthless piece of shit, I dont care about the kids, blah, blah, blah...

I can't be in the same room with BD or there will be violence. But GF (BM) says that the kids want both of the parents there for parties.

I have told her a million times that MOST people do separate parties. The kids want mommy and daddy there because they harbor fantasies of reconciliation.

She has told at least a million times I'm self-centered and crazy and that nobody does separate parties.

Thank God some completely random, disinterested third-party folks came to the rescue and someone asked what I should have, and proved to me that I'm not completely batty.

Good God I love this website.

So far this has been working awesome:
One year a friends from school party (sleepover,bowling,skating,movies,etc.)the following year is a family only party. We have been alternating like this for 9 years now without a problem.
Probably works better for blended a family with children similar in age and friends ages.

Ahh.. BabyMomma has never thrown ss5 a birthday party, nor has her family as far as i know. We do not invite her to ss's birthday parties but do make an effort (more or less force her) to spend time with him on his birthday. SS does attend his half brother's (7 y/o, BabyMomma had him at 14, lives with her parents) birthday parties, but for the past two years BabyMomma has not been there - last year when we told her ss would be at her parents house, she had no idea why, threw a fit, we told her it was her oldest son's birthday and she said she had forgotten. the girl is on drugs or something.

We will never have a joint party. Our situation is almost identical to StepMadre's.

This has come up recently. BM is about to get her extended visitation for the summer. So friends of DH's family are having a big blowout one of those weekends with a big waterslide for the kids, a bunch of kids and bbq the whole nine and it's the week of SDstb9's birthday. I thought we could have SD's bday party that day. Bring a cake, maybe plan a few games and give her some gifts from the family and yeah, nice little party for her with a bunch of kids in attendance and loads of fun to be had.

DH mentions to BM that he would like for the kids to come out and do this (he doesn't mention the bday party angle). Well, I find out last weekend that BM is assuming that she's and her newest babydaddy are invited.

Needless to say, we're having SD's bday the weekend before and we won't even be at the other party. Skids will along with their mom, but DH and I are making other plans.