Entertaining Ideas
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
How do I get guests to leave after a party?
My husband and I love to entertain, but too often we find our friends staying over when that was not part of the invitation. I don't want to sent them home if they've been drinking, and our last party we had just a few beers, but friends still overdid it as almost an excuse to not go home so they could stay together last night (one lives w/ a roommate and the other with her parents.) I love my friends, and can't seem to tell them no? I left lots of not subtle hints that we were not in the mood for extended company. How can I put an end to the party so I don't have to kick them out before we have to leave for work?
KW
Re: How do I get guests to leave after a party?
Welcome to the nest
Some ideas:
- Stop throwing nighttime parties and switch to Saturday afternoon BBQs and Sunday brunches.
- Arrange in advance for a responsible friend to be DD for the worst offenders.
- Stop being subtle. Turn the lights on, turn the music off, wash the dishes noisily, grab their coat and purse and stand by the door and/or any combo thereof.
- Offer to help friends entertain / suggest a potluck at their house. They can learn what a PITA it is and have a light bulb moment. I've found my most inconsiderate guests are, without exception, the youngest ones who haven't had a place of their own and don't understand what effort goes into entertaining. Once you host, you learn how much simple niceties mean.
- Be completely honest with them before the party. (The tack I'd take since no one's ever accused me of mincing words.) "Hey yall, we'd love for you to come over tomorrow, but I can't have you drinking and getting sh!tty, so one of you needs to make plans to be the DD."
Here are a couple paragraphs on point.
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It sounds to me like you friends are having trouble crossing the bridge into adulthood where not every party is a all-nighter. Do they show up with overnight bags? A toothbrush in a purse? Or do they just put themselves to sleep on your couch and stumble out dirty in the morning?
I think you should be honest with them if they seem to be planning on staying over. Tar Heels & Rebels made several good suggestions.
Thank you everyone! That does help. They didn't pack anything for overnight this last time, but I usually let them know when they're welcome to stay over and hadn't extended the invitation for our last shindig. Next time we host a party we'll keep these ideas in mind! I did some good dish clanking and cleaning this morning, and that did seem to do the trick pretty quick.
Our family usually doesn't have much alcohol around at parties, especially when my aunt and uncle host (my uncle was nearly killed by a drunk driver). So, this might not work when worrying about people driving drunk. Anyway, when it's just family or close friends at the party, and my uncle (who gets up very early to go to work) gets tired and wants to go to bed, he turns to my aunt and says:
"Come on M, let's go to bed so these people can go home," instead of a guest saying, "Let's go home so they can go to bed."
I would go to my room, put my hair up, wash my face and put on my pajamas. Then come down, and while brushing my teeth, I'd say "well, guys, its bedtime at the Smith residence, nice having you over".
that sounds something like my family would say!
Wow. I can't imagine any of my friends doing that.
Where do these people sleep? Do you have a guest bedroom, or are they just crashing on your couch? If they're sleeping in a guest room, just don't have the room/bed ready for people to sleep on, and keep the door to that room shut. If they ask to use the room, say it's not ready for guests because you weren't expecting anyone to stay overnight.
If they're just crashing on a couch ... I would say something to those people in advance next time so they know staying overnight is not an option. Tell them you have plans the next morning so you can't have overnight guests, it doesn't matter if your only plans are to sleep in and enjoy a quiet guest-free house. Hopefully they'll be responsible and not drink too much to get themselves home after the party.
Mr. Sammy Dog
We usually let people stay over if we entertain later in the evening, there's just no point in having people drink even a little bit and drive, and taxi's in our area are really expensive so we don't want them to bother with that, it's expected that if you have people over at night they're most likely going to stay over, and they'll leave by morning (we would not make them breakfast). If we didn't want people to stay over we wouldn't have people over late at night. We'd keep it to early afternoon bbq's so they have time to sober up, or we'd have a early supper or brunch and we'd let them know that they should arrange a way home if they plan on drinking because we cannot host overnight guests that night, you can't really go from letting them stay over though to surprising them the night of a party to let them know "okay go home now, figure something out at this drunken moment of yours" make sure you let them know before they come over so they don't make a stupid decision.
Don't invite the problem guests next time.
Hold the party earlier.
Have a "last call," and stop serving alcohol. Bring out the coffee (and dessert!).
Tell them beforehand that you're planning an early night / have morning plans and they can't stay, so figure out driving plans beforehand.
"Wow, let me call a cab for you. It's getting late and you're obviously not ok to drive." Pick up phone, call cab.
This is a great idea!!