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Early is 4:58. Then you can say, "Oh, I'm sorry, am I early?" It would be better to show up shortly after 5. If you thought you might want to go early, you should have worked it out ahead of time.
I keep a book in my car just for this purpose- especially because I strongly believe early is on time and on time is late. But just because I'm early arriving doesn't mean I have to knock on the door! It's not like a doctor's appointment where there's a waiting room and no expectation for entertainment. You don't want to put extra pressure on your host!
Coming early is not bad, make them feel at home and have them watch TV or something until dinner is ready. Better than being late. It would be unusual if say party was to begin at 5 pm and they arrived at 7 am.
Huh? "Make them feel at home?" It is THEIR home....Watch TV? Not at a dinner party when THEY are trying to get things ready...
OP, I hope you picked up a nice hostess gift and arrived at 5:05. Next, I hope you had a wonderful evening. Finally, I hope you offered to help with clean up.
5-5:15 is ideal. I am usually running around half naked those last couple minutes (because I dont want to get dressed until the last minute if I am cooking)
I keep a book in my car just for this purpose- especially because I strongly believe early is on time and on time is late. But just because I'm early arriving doesn't mean I have to knock on the door! It's not like a doctor's appointment where there's a waiting room and no expectation for entertainment. You don't want to put extra pressure on your host!
Coming from up North, I'm used to arriving at 5:10-15 for a 5 PM invitation. However, the first time I did that at my retirement community in FL, they all looked at me like I was late! I got there at 5:10 and everyone was there, seated, had their drinks, etc. So now I get to these things on the dot of the invited time. Of course, everything is early down here, and everything wraps up early too. At least among the retirees.
Yes, I know I asked this same question about going to a friends house a few weeks ago, and you were all very helpful. However, my cousin is having a dinner tonight for his grandmother's birthday, and he told me 5pm. 5pm is an odd time because you don't really have time to do anything before. I've been home all day today, so I've been bored out of my mind and can't wait until it's time to go. So since my cousin said 5pm, what is the earliest possible time I can arrive without it being rude or intrusive? Like 4:45? 4:50? I know you'll all have different opinions, but I would like to hear what you think. If it helps, there will be about 10 people at this party.
Just arrive on time. You are complicating the **** out of this. And have fun!
Here's how it is in our house when we have holiday dinners:
We give them a time to be here, which is usually 2:30. If someone shows up early then we want them to relax in the livingroom because we want to concentrate on what we're doing. Our kitchen is too tiny for 2 people, let alone guests who want to be helpful. We don't want to visit before the dinner. All that is done during and after.
Sometimes we ask an early arrival to make a trip to the corner store if we need something, and they're always eager to help that way.
But one thing we do not tolerate is lateness. We'll wait an extra half-hour if someone's running late, but after that we start digging in.
So, OP, I'd say that 15 minutes early should be the max without annoying the hosts.
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