Evite

We hosted a new year's eve party. Since we hosted a new year's eve party last year, it seems that we may be starting a precedent. I was not intending to host a party, but at least two of my friends asked if we were going to host a party this year -- so we did.

I'm always happy to entertain. My parties are usually quite nice. But, despite all my experience throwing parties, I always get anxious that no one is going to come.

For this party, I sent out invitations via Evite. Evite is an electronic e-mail invitiation service that sends out invitiations, tracks responses, and even lets you send out photos of the event to all the guests. One of the features of evite is the rsvp page which shows who has rsvp'd to the event and any comments they may leave. We invited over 25 couples, but only a handful rsvp'd through Evite. Of that handful, only three rsvp'd that they were coming. There were at least five people who posted on Evite that they would not be coming. Two were undecided. This really disturbed me. I know that I certainly would think twice about going to a party where only three people said they were coming but more than that said they were not. What good is a party without guests? I knew in reality that more than three people were coming to the party because I spoke to them directly -- but the other guests responding on Evite did not have this information. I became anxious -- what if the guests who had not yet responded saw the rsvp list and thought going to this lame party would be a waste of time?

Of course, if the guests did not respond on Evite they would not see that only three people said they were coming and all of this concern is really for naught.

P.S. The party turned out lovely, with a houseful of friends eating, drinking, visiting, playing music and bringing in the new year together.