My daughter has just now reached the age (she is 5) when people start asking her on play-dates that don't include me. So far, they've only been with other parents who I know very well and for a long time, but I know there is a time in the not-so-distant future when my daughter will want to play at someone's home and I won't know them. Scary!
This is why stories like this one where a dad accidentally put on his own porn instead of the Smurfs movie he had intended to show at a child's birthday party scare me to death.
If I were the parent of one of the kids at the birthday party, I would be livid, and this is a classic example of how hard it is to trust other people with your kids. This is why I have a plan.
My plan is multifaceted. First, I plan to BE the cool hangout pad. Oh yes, I will have all the Tang and cookies my kids could want. I will provide red paper for Valentine's and plenty of candy and fun. My house will be the place to be for kids after school.
My mom was the queen of this herself and I almost never went over to anyone else's house after school because she was so cool and all my friends wanted to be around MY mom. It's a genius plan, really.
My other plan is to really get to know parents of my kid's friends. This past January first, we invited one of my daughter's friends and her whole family up to my family lake house. We did skiing and snowshoeing and ice skating. At night, we put the kids to bed and we got to know the parents.
Now I consider them somewhat good friends of ours and it was really a very simple thing. The fact is, I want my daughter and son to make many, many good friends. But I also want to know the parents. I am never going to be comfortable sending my child over to a stranger's house. That would just not be me.
So I have to bake a lot of cookies, make my house super appealing, and be prepared to make a lot of new friends.
Do you trust other kids' parents?
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Comments 43
i was at my cousin in law's daughter's sleep over for a while last saturday and realized that her mother was cussing out the kid for being to loud... needless to say, the only slumber parties my daughters will be going to are the ones at my house.. the only 2 people on this planet i trust with my daughters are my own parents.. yes that means not even my mother in laws home... not because of her but because of my sister in laws who live there have no respect for my request to not smoke in the house while my daughter is there.. not to mention that one of their 14 yr old daughters smoke cigarettes and weed at the house.. if it was my MIL alone then i would definitely let my daughters stay there over night....
I really had no intention of commenting until I read your comment, Woodsman. I have to say that I respectfully disagree with your opinion that once you are a parent, you have to give up porn. I happen to enjoy watching porn with my husband from time to time. If it's not your thing, then that's quite alright. But that doesn't give you the right to tell me that I need to "grow up" because I enjoy a little adult entertainment once in awhile.
Um. Yeah. This wasted my time.
I'm sorry, but if I was at a kids' birthday party where porn got mixed up and put on for a few seconds instead of The Smurfs, I would be rolling in the floor laughing! So what? That is not what I'm scared of at all concerning my kids at other people's houses. I do trust most other parents. I DO believe in speaking to the parents of your child's friends and getting to know them as well as possible, but it's not possible to be good buddies with all of them.
My biggest concern is firearms. I am NOT anti-gun, but I am very anti -irresponsible gun owner. My boys are already schooled in the fact that if they're EVER at someone's house, and a gun is brought out -either by the friend or they just find it, they are NEVER to touch it and to run to the nearest adult as fast as possible. I tell them this is the one time they have permission to leave the house to go find another adult anywhere! Main objective -get away from the gun. Other than that, I refuse to be Susie -paranoid.
OOPS....It does kind of sound like an honest mistake. Now, if the dad left the video playing for any length of time, that would be an entirely different situation (and not in a good way). I say, give the guy a break, he was probably mortified too.