No playdates because other siblings won't have a friend

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You don't get to decide the culture/atmosphere of my home. If the kids are fighting or annoying each other, I'd intervene, but a kid insisting to just play with her friend and not interact with the family doesn't belong in my home.

Wow. You’re all ridiculous. Your poor kids.

What's ridiculous about my comment?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter’s former best friend was an only and it was a nightmare to host her. We had an open yard policy where all the neighborhood kids were welcome to play in our yard and vice versa. My daughter’s friend would come over and demand that my younger son not be allowed to play on ours or our neighbors’ swingset equipment while she and my daughter were outside playing. The mom would also constantly invite my daughter, husband and me to do stuff with their family (go to pool, come over for dinner, etc.) and forget that we had a four year old son at home. The mom was not pleased when our families weren’t as close and she would send nasty texts accusing us of liking our neighbors and other friends better. Well, yeah, of course we were closer with other families that had multiple, same aged kids and were inclusive of all my children.

It’s not rocket science.

The bossiest kid I know is the youngest of 3 kids. Should I now assume all youngest children are this way? Or all families of 3 kids? You have experience with one bossy kid who happened to be an only child. But go ahead and generalize and teach your kids to do the same .

Children with siblings can also be annoying. They often don’t get invited back either.

It’s not as though any mom is thinking, “Who should we have over this weekend? Not Larla, she’s an only child.” It’s more one child begging, “Can Larla come over this weekend?” If the other child begs for Larla too, Mom will invite Larla. If the other child is indifferent or occupied, Mom may still invite Larla. But if the younger child says, “No! Larla’s mean to me!” Larla won’t get the invite, especially if Mom spent the last play date breaking up dealing with high maintenance kid. Mom will probably say, “What about Larlo instead?” And if both kids get excited about Larlo, Larlo gets the invite.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I haven’t read through the second half of this thread, but from the first several pages and your response here’s my hot take:

1. You have a 7 year old. That is drop off play date age. If you expect me to sit at your house while my child plays, and then expect me to host, I’m going to assume that you intend to lurk at my house. Our kids are friends. I don’t necessarily want to spend an afternoon on company behavior entertaining you.
2. If your child comes to my home and has an issue that there are siblings around, spare me the drama. My kids have enough other friends who can handle being around other kids.
3. One of my kids is best friends with a very lovely only child. But the biggest pain in the a$$ is dealing with her insanely neurotic parents. It’s a huge turn off. Don’t be that parent. I would invite the little girl over more often if I didn’t feel that mom expects the red carpet rolled out for her kid. I don’t have that kind of energy.

I had a 8 year old spend the night at our house (which, if the kid isn't doing drop offs yet, is probably not the OP's case) and the mother was irritated I hadn't given the kid a sleep mask to cover her eyes. The kid complained to the mother as soon as the mother arrived, and the mother looked at me like I had given her child heroin.

[Anonymous]

My DD’s closest friends are two girls with no siblings. DD has 2 younger siblings. We have never had issues related to the family size. We reciprocate sleepovers and play dates equally and when the girls are at our house, they hang out with my younger kids (not always, but often with the middle sister). When my DD is at their houses, she hangs out with her friend alone. Girls are always happy to come to our house and my DD is always happy to go to her friends’ house.
Family size has never been an issue in my DD’s friendships…

[Anonymous]

I have 5 kids. I would never bring a sibling along for a play date in someone’s house, but we don’t tend to do those anyway. (logistics and driving issues). If one of my kids wants to have a friend over, usually they sort of get absorbed into the pack, lol. I wouldn’t invite back a kid who was being weird about siblings or exclusionary. My kids are kinda known for being a big family so it’s not like it’s a surprise to a guest that there are 4 other kids running around.

Frankly I don’t have the time for a play date kid trying to exclude siblings at my house.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can’t get you invited places but if you don’t want the other siblings - just start offering to take the kids alone to the zoo etc and giving the other parents off.

+1

Some parents are resistant to this though. Some aren't.

My son has a friend with 2 younger brothers. Finally, this year in 5th grade, the mom started allowing the boy to do get togethers without her, the two other boys and the dad.

I LOVE when other parents invites my child over or to an activity. But I decided a long time ago that I am willing to be the inviter and the chauffeur if that's the only way my kid can have playdates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t get you invited places but if you don’t want the other siblings - just start offering to take the kids alone to the zoo etc and giving the other parents off.

+1

Some parents are resistant to this though. Some aren't.

My son has a friend with 2 younger brothers. Finally, this year in 5th grade, the mom started allowing the boy to do get togethers without her, the two other boys and the dad.

I LOVE when other parents invites my child over or to an activity. But I decided a long time ago that I am willing to be the inviter and the chauffeur if that's the only way my kid can have playdates.

That's pretty gross you will not help out at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is why I almost never initiate playdates. I have 3 and it's impossible to line up 3 simultaneous playdates so no one is left out. If one child has a friend over I will never hear the end of it about how bored one of the other kids is. Usually this is between my 2 youngest who play very well together on their own. It's not worth the hassle so we just don't initiate play dates very often or at all. They aren't bored since they have each other.

Do you think they'll grow out of this? Or do you have a plan for how to ease them out of the codependency? This dynamic isn't very good for their development.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can’t get you invited places but if you don’t want the other siblings - just start offering to take the kids alone to the zoo etc and giving the other parents off.

+1

Some parents are resistant to this though. Some aren't.

My son has a friend with 2 younger brothers. Finally, this year in 5th grade, the mom started allowing the boy to do get togethers without her, the two other boys and the dad.

I LOVE when other parents invites my child over or to an activity. But I decided a long time ago that I am willing to be the inviter and the chauffeur if that's the only way my kid can have playdates.

That's pretty gross you will not help out at all.

What are you talking about? What am not helping with?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is why I almost never initiate playdates. I have 3 and it's impossible to line up 3 simultaneous playdates so no one is left out. If one child has a friend over I will never hear the end of it about how bored one of the other kids is. Usually this is between my 2 youngest who play very well together on their own. It's not worth the hassle so we just don't initiate play dates very often or at all. They aren't bored since they have each other.

Do you think they'll grow out of this? Or do you have a plan for how to ease them out of the codependency? This dynamic isn't very good for their development.

This is about as sound as saying that only children aren't able to socialize, which is to say, it isn't.
Also, it sounds like OTHER people do initiate playdates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is why I almost never initiate playdates. I have 3 and it's impossible to line up 3 simultaneous playdates so no one is left out. If one child has a friend over I will never hear the end of it about how bored one of the other kids is. Usually this is between my 2 youngest who play very well together on their own. It's not worth the hassle so we just don't initiate play dates very often or at all. They aren't bored since they have each other.

Do you think they'll grow out of this? Or do you have a plan for how to ease them out of the codependency? This dynamic isn't very good for their development.

This is about as sound as saying that only children aren't able to socialize, which is to say, it isn't.
Also, it sounds like OTHER people do initiate playdates.

This person will tell her child "no you can't play with your friends ever, because your younger siblings will annoy me." She's isolating her kids because she's too put out to parent any of them individually. How is that ok for her kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter’s former best friend was an only and it was a nightmare to host her. We had an open yard policy where all the neighborhood kids were welcome to play in our yard and vice versa. My daughter’s friend would come over and demand that my younger son not be allowed to play on ours or our neighbors’ swingset equipment while she and my daughter were outside playing. The mom would also constantly invite my daughter, husband and me to do stuff with their family (go to pool, come over for dinner, etc.) and forget that we had a four year old son at home. The mom was not pleased when our families weren’t as close and she would send nasty texts accusing us of liking our neighbors and other friends better. Well, yeah, of course we were closer with other families that had multiple, same aged kids and were inclusive of all my children.

It’s not rocket science.

The bossiest kid I know is the youngest of 3 kids. Should I now assume all youngest children are this way? Or all families of 3 kids? You have experience with one bossy kid who happened to be an only child. But go ahead and generalize and teach your kids to do the same .

Children with siblings can also be annoying. They often don’t get invited back either.

It’s not as though any mom is thinking, “Who should we have over this weekend? Not Larla, she’s an only child.” It’s more one child begging, “Can Larla come over this weekend?” If the other child begs for Larla too, Mom will invite Larla. If the other child is indifferent or occupied, Mom may still invite Larla. But if the younger child says, “No! Larla’s mean to me!” Larla won’t get the invite, especially if Mom spent the last play date breaking up dealing with high maintenance kid. Mom will probably say, “What about Larlo instead?” And if both kids get excited about Larlo, Larlo gets the invite.

Yes, of course - this is reasonable and applies no matter the kid. I am the poster you quoted, but the posters *I* was responding to overtly said they don’t want only children over for playdates because they are too [self centered, exclusionary, high maintenance, insert rude adjective].

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is why I almost never initiate playdates. I have 3 and it's impossible to line up 3 simultaneous playdates so no one is left out. If one child has a friend over I will never hear the end of it about how bored one of the other kids is. Usually this is between my 2 youngest who play very well together on their own. It's not worth the hassle so we just don't initiate play dates very often or at all. They aren't bored since they have each other.

Do you think they'll grow out of this? Or do you have a plan for how to ease them out of the codependency? This dynamic isn't very good for their development.

This is about as sound as saying that only children aren't able to socialize, which is to say, it isn't.
Also, it sounds like OTHER people do initiate playdates.

This person will tell her child "no you can't play with your friends ever, because your younger siblings will annoy me." She's isolating her kids because she's too put out to parent any of them individually. How is that ok for her kids?

I am the bolded PP. I don't get that from the above necessarily although I see your point.

[Anonymous]

I have three kids and playdates with onlies are pretty rare, because if only one child is invited I have to find childcare for the others. One of my kids has an only friend whose mom always invites the other two and they play as a group so we hang out all the time (or she picks up our child to hang out singularly with hers and I stay with the other two). I don’t think it’s so much that siblings need same-age friends, but parents of multiples tend to do activities that are more group-friendly and not as age-limited. IME the parents of onlies who welcome siblings at play dates tend to have more of them.

[Anonymous]

I only host kids who don’t cause drama in my house. I have 3 kids. My middle child is the most social. He has a friend who is an only and whenever he comes over, my youngest is left and always ends up crying. We haven’t had that kid over for years even though that family has had my child over multiple times. Same social middle child has another good friend who is the youngest in his family. Since he is the youngest and is used to tagging along with his older siblings, he is nice to my youngest and genuinely doesn’t seem to mind her being around. My oldest has 2 good friends and they both probably don’t like a little girl hanging around but they also don’t make her cry and not mean to her.

The point is that families like kids who make it easier for them, not harder. My older kids are 2 years apart and boys. There would be some boys who would come over and all kids would be happy and get along. Then there would be kids who would cause my kids to fight. Guess who I would invite back?

Just from your post, it is obvious you don’t like the siblings around. The siblings are not having a good time and that is exactly why you are not invited.

I try to juggle my three kids’ friends. I make priority for my kids’ favorites. I will leave youbgest with DH and do something for older kids or vice versa.