This is a problem that has been bothering me for days so I will share in hopes that someone will advise/sympathize.
We live in a very nice cul-de-sac with a homeschooling family right across the way and lots of kids the same age as my kids. There is one family (we’ll call them the J family since their names all begin with J) who my kids really like. There is J1 who is 71/2, J2 who is 5 1/2, J3 is 3, and J4 who is 1. We see them a lot when we play outside and since the weather has been warm we have been playing with them fairly regularly. We even started going over there to play about once a week.
Now, when we went over there I went with them – to walk them across the street and supervise the outside play. Mrs. J didn’t seem to mind a bit and even commented that she liked having friends for her kids and someone outside watching them in case of cars coming into the cul-de-sac.
Before too long it was our turn. The little J’s came over to our house to play. Great I thought and happily invited them in. I even declared a homeschool day off (if we do five days a week or four in the summer it really doesn’t matter to me a bit which days they are) so they could all play together. I made popcorn for a snack, set up a painting craft, let them watch my kids favorite show and then I invited them over for dinner making a vegetarian dinner to suit their eating lifestyle. It was a great day.
Then the next day they came over again. Again we played and they wanted popcorn so I made it again. And again they asked to stay for dinner so I agreed.
Then the next day they came over again. This time at 10:00 in the morning. When we returned from swim lessons they were at the door and again they stayed all day eating lunch, snack, and dinner with us. They practically demanded popcorn again but were refused. This day I had to do homeschool with my kids so they just played in the playroom.
Then the next day they came over again. This time interrupting quite time (my little guys 3 1/2 and 2 1/2 still need to rest in the middle of the day especially after swim class) by coming into the room and making noise. The attitudes of expectedness had been getting worse and worse. Isn’t there a point where if you come over every single day that you stop being special guests and start being a part of the group. The J boys even went with my boys to see their fathers 5-ton – their mother let them. In fact, she was asleep when we called over there and sent the three year old back across the street alone with a note saying that she had been asleep.
After about two weeks of seeing them all day every day we were really used to them coming over. My kids wanted to play with their things and not ours anymore (you can’t really play with any of your other friends if you already have people over). I was getting a little tired of the free babysitting I was doing because that is what I was starting to feel like at this point. But she is pregnant with J number 5 so I was more than willing to cut her a little slack.
But J1’s attitude was getting on my nerves – his mother may be his servant but I am not especially with seven kids under 8 in the house all day.
The last day they came over we had an incident. J1 and J2 were throwing sand. And as my usual M.O. since I wasn’t there and I had my daughter B telling me something that I didn’t see while they denied it I made everyone leave the activity, the sandbox in this case. They would not leave. They just stood there staring at me. I told them that in my house they have to do what I tell them to do. They still stood there. I told them I was going to have to call their mother. That had no effect either so I did. I got their father on the phone (that’s right readers, both parents were home and three out of four J’s were still sent to my house at 10 am). I said to them that their father was coming to get them. This statement alone would have gotten my kids to change their attitudes and fast but not them they just continued playing.
Fifteen minutes later when their mother arrived I told her that with this many kids in the house they have to do what I ask them to or chaos will break out. She agree. She rounded up her kids and took them home giving them a very mild lecture on the way.
They haven’t been back since. I have been thinking about this for the two days since it happened. I wonder if I was justified in sending them home. I wonder if I have severed the relationship with a family that my kids like playing with. I wonder if I should go over there and make some kind of peace. I wonder if they will come over again. I wonder if they understood that they are welcome as long as they follow the same rules as the kids live here.
Any thoughts out there?
