Family wants a hall for our daughter's first birthday. We'd like lunch at home

orchid_compass_814412 Oct 2026

Our daughter turns one in December. My parents and in-laws have already started talking about a function hall, a photographer and a guest list that includes people I've met maybe once. My partner and I were thinking lunch at home with the grandparents and two or three families we're close to, and a cake she can put her hands in. Nobody is being unreasonable, it's their first grandchild on both sides and they're excited. I just don't want to spend November managing a caterer. Did anyone keep a first birthday small? How did the family take it, and did you regret it later?

2 comments

breezy_gecko_850512 Oct 2026
We kept ours small last year. Grandparents, two families from the building, lunch at home. A couple of relatives were a bit hurt that they weren't called, and by the next week nobody mentioned it. One thing I'd suggest: give the grandparents a part they own. My mother did the pooja in the morning and her friends came for that. It felt like her event too, and the pressure for a hall went away.
dusk_sketch_71713 Oct 2026
we did the big one for ours. she slept through the cake and cried at the photographer 🤷 at 1 it's really for the adults, so do the version the two of you will enjoy
- ochre_drum_913915 Oct 2026
  That matches what I saw at my younger sister's first birthday, though I was a college student then and mostly remember carrying return gifts. It was a large function and she has looked at the album perhaps twice. My mother still talks about it, so I would not say it was for nobody. It was simply for the adults.