Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When I was 13 I was at a neighbor friend's house one weekday after school. No parents. A classmate of hers stopped by with a few kids we didn't know well, asking to pick up something for a school project. Long story short one of those kids swiped a bottle of vodka out of the liquor cabinet, which we found out when the police showed up that night. The kid who swiped the vodka had proceeded to drink almost the entire bottle and was hauled off to the hospital that evening. It was a horrible, frightening situation and my friend and I were interrogated at length and got in a lot of trouble, as did her parents. No one was arrested but there was a lot of blame coming from multiple directions.

A hell of a lot can go wrong when adolescents have access to drugs and/or alcohol. Some people may think their kids are above temptation, and maybe they are, but you still need to consider all those other teenagers who may ever set foot in your house.

I totally agree.

I'm a prosecutor and every deadly vehicle crash or other unfortunate situation involving teenagers and trouble starts with the parent telling the judge, "Larlo is such a wonderful kid. This was so out of character for him. We didn't raise him this way."

Why would anyone say anything other than that? Do you expect something like " I've seen him leaving the house with a bottle of vodka many time, but it's was just one bottle".

Anonymous wrote:It has nothing to do with trusting or not trusting my kid. Trusting or not trusting their friends. I do not trust adolescent brains.

I give them more credit. They know which house is a fair game for alcohol and which house is off-limits. They know who to ask to buy.

Anonymous wrote:When I was 13 I was at a neighbor friend's house one weekday after school. No parents. A classmate of hers stopped by with a few kids we didn't know well, asking to pick up something for a school project. Long story short one of those kids swiped a bottle of vodka out of the liquor cabinet, which we found out when the police showed up that night. The kid who swiped the vodka had proceeded to drink almost the entire bottle and was hauled off to the hospital that evening. It was a horrible, frightening situation and my friend and I were interrogated at length and got in a lot of trouble, as did her parents. No one was arrested but there was a lot of blame coming from multiple directions.

A hell of a lot can go wrong when adolescents have access to drugs and/or alcohol. Some people may think their kids are above temptation, and maybe they are, but you still need to consider all those other teenagers who may ever set foot in your house.

I totally agree.

I'm a prosecutor and every deadly vehicle crash or other unfortunate situation involving teenagers and trouble starts with the parent telling the judge, "Larlo is such a wonderful kid. This was so out of character for him. We didn't raise him this way."

It has nothing to do with trusting or not trusting my kid. Trusting or not trusting their friends. I do not trust adolescent brains.

"I lock up my wine and my liquor but not my beer because that is in a fridge in the garage. This is not because I don't trust my kids but because my kids don't trust their friends.

When I have kids over my house I am under some sort of obligation that I am not supplying liquor to them and leaving easily accessible bottles of liquor in my basement where I do not monitor them, is irresponsible.

My wine closet has a lock and is big enough to put the bottles of liquor. I stocked the downstairs fridge with gatorades, water and a little bit of soda (not a big fan of soda). We have a basketball court in our backyard and ping-pong table. We have a big TV for football, XBox, PS4. The kids hang out a lot and are welcome to the drinks in that fridge and the snack closet.

If your kids have friends....Freshman year they will be faced with friends trying to steal your liquor.

in HS, your kids are going to drink, period. They will also smoke pot. You will hope it stops there.

I don't care if your kids take 10 AP classes and is 1st chair orchestra and is a nationally ranked chess player and won nationals in fencing and you go to church every Sunday. They are going to drink and try pot.

It's not that I don't trust my kids it's that I want them to have fun and to not deal with the pressure they already feel every single time there is a party. I made my basement a safe zone. I don't think that is unreasonable.

BTW, my friend had a homecoming dinner hosted at her home and she said no alcohol and locked up the alcohol. She checked bags at the front door. Kids came to her house the weekend before and hid alcohol in the drop ceiling of her basement. Kids are going to drink, but they are not drinking my alcohol, I am not a supplier."

I really appreciate this perspective, thank you.

I was a "good" kid in H.S. Not a partier. Most parties I attended didn't have alcohol. My parents let me taste their alcohol, and drank only in moderation, so it was mostly no big deal to me. However, there were a handful of times in H.S. when my otherwise high-achieving, rule-following, non-partying friends and I would drink alcohol. It was the experience of drinking with peers that was new to me, and the effect, but not the taste. We either had a neighbor buy it for us, or took it from a friend's parents who didn't monitor it. (I knew my parents did, so that was never an option.) Nothing crazy happened; we were pretty responsible and mellow. But I agree that I don't want my DC to be in a position of policing whether his friends are stealing booze from my house. And I like the idea of an alcohol-free "safe zone," where fun can be had and there is no temptation. No, it won't stop them from drinking. But I think it will reduce the opportunities.

Anonymous wrote:Not until you are given reason to.

Granted, me and DH are not heavy drinkers, so we rarely have more then a few beers and maybe a bottle of liquor or two in the house at the time.

But seriously, can you guys not tell when liquor has been watered down? Its pretty obvious.

We have tons of bottles of different liquors and we don't go sample each one daily so it would actually be very hard for us to notice some missing or watered down.

I lock up my wine and my liquor but not my beer because that is in a fridge in the garage. This is not because I don't trust my kids but because my kids don't trust their friends.

When I have kids over my house I am under some sort of obligation that I am not supplying liquor to them and leaving easily accessible bottles of liquor in my basement where I do not monitor them, is irresponsible.

My wine closet has a lock and is big enough to put the bottles of liquor. I stocked the downstairs fridge with gatorades, water and a little bit of soda (not a big fan of soda). We have a basketball court in our backyard and ping-pong table. We have a big TV for football, XBox, PS4. The kids hang out a lot and are welcome to the drinks in that fridge and the snack closet.

If your kids have friends....Freshman year they will be faced with friends trying to steal your liquor.

in HS, your kids are going to drink, period. They will also smoke pot. You will hope it stops there.

I don't care if your kids take 10 AP classes and is 1st chair orchestra and is a nationally ranked chess player and won nationals in fencing and you go to church every Sunday. They are going to drink and try pot.

It's not that I don't trust my kids it's that I want them to have fun and to not deal with the pressure they already feel every single time there is a party. I made my basement a safe zone. I don't think that is unreasonable.

BTW, my friend had a homecoming dinner hosted at her home and she said no alcohol and locked up the alcohol. She checked bags at the front door. Kids came to her house the weekend before and hid alcohol in the drop ceiling of her basement. Kids are going to drink, but they are not drinking my alcohol, I am not a supplier.

Anonymous wrote:

Unless a family member has a mental health issue, that would be a serious violation of trust and a confession of parental failure.

Yep

We haven't. Not sure what's right. Oldest (in college) never drank. Next kid started drinking on occasion at age 14. Drank old beer and, apparently. Oh surprisingly, vodka. Then he had a binge event and projectile vomited and had to deal with loss of friends who were disgusted. Learned a lesson but we do t trust him. We don't lock but we monitor. Too soon to tell about younger kids.

As to why we don't lock, I sort of feel like we need to try to instill our values and let them deal with consequences when we are here to protect and guide. We are good at boundaries so I am pretty confident that other kids are not drinking here and that our kid is t drinking anywhere else.

I appreciate hearing everyone's views.

Unless a family member has a mental health issue, that would be a serious violation of trust and a confession of parental failure.

Holiday Inn Express. Opened a bottle of chardonnay with a shoe and a pen. Cork ended up inside the bottle, but we weren't planning on leftovers, so no biggie....

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Been wondering the same. We have the liquor cart like everyone else that we rarely touch. It's for entertaining others. We likely wouldn't notice minor missing amounts or replacements--at least not immediately. An occasional beer in the fridge but that's rare. What we DO have is wine. A LOT of wine. Expensive wine. In built-in wine shelves in the lower level of the house where we just couldn't "lock" it away and/or where there isn't a door that could be locked etc. DD is only 12 but we've definitely had convos where we have explained house rules about expectations that none of it is to be touched. She's a great kid. Very responsible/trustworthy. But hey, every kid has lapses of judgement. And also I realize that she's young and maybe my assessment of her will change as she ages. DH and I keep talking about what to do. He doesn't want to do anything. I worry about the consequences of not doing it. Although honestly the only thing we could reasonably do at this point with our wine collection is to pay to rent a 3rd party wine storage facility. We probably have a couple hundred bottles. They're pretty well organized but to suggest that we'd notice if ONE went missing is far-fetched. What do folks do about their wine shelves???

Wine is easy.

You hide all the wine openers in your tampon or underwear drawer.

Unless you are buying Boones Strawberry Hill screw top, wine is difficult for people, even adults, to open.

No corkscrew, no wine.

You need to get around more.

Seriously. Where there's a will, there's a way. Ask me how I know.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Been wondering the same. We have the liquor cart like everyone else that we rarely touch. It's for entertaining others. We likely wouldn't notice minor missing amounts or replacements--at least not immediately. An occasional beer in the fridge but that's rare. What we DO have is wine. A LOT of wine. Expensive wine. In built-in wine shelves in the lower level of the house where we just couldn't "lock" it away and/or where there isn't a door that could be locked etc. DD is only 12 but we've definitely had convos where we have explained house rules about expectations that none of it is to be touched. She's a great kid. Very responsible/trustworthy. But hey, every kid has lapses of judgement. And also I realize that she's young and maybe my assessment of her will change as she ages. DH and I keep talking about what to do. He doesn't want to do anything. I worry about the consequences of not doing it. Although honestly the only thing we could reasonably do at this point with our wine collection is to pay to rent a 3rd party wine storage facility. We probably have a couple hundred bottles. They're pretty well organized but to suggest that we'd notice if ONE went missing is far-fetched. What do folks do about their wine shelves???

Wine is easy.

You hide all the wine openers in your tampon or underwear drawer.

Unless you are buying Boones Strawberry Hill screw top, wine is difficult for people, even adults, to open.

No corkscrew, no wine.

You need to get around more.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Been wondering the same. We have the liquor cart like everyone else that we rarely touch. It's for entertaining others. We likely wouldn't notice minor missing amounts or replacements--at least not immediately. An occasional beer in the fridge but that's rare. What we DO have is wine. A LOT of wine. Expensive wine. In built-in wine shelves in the lower level of the house where we just couldn't "lock" it away and/or where there isn't a door that could be locked etc. DD is only 12 but we've definitely had convos where we have explained house rules about expectations that none of it is to be touched. She's a great kid. Very responsible/trustworthy. But hey, every kid has lapses of judgement. And also I realize that she's young and maybe my assessment of her will change as she ages. DH and I keep talking about what to do. He doesn't want to do anything. I worry about the consequences of not doing it. Although honestly the only thing we could reasonably do at this point with our wine collection is to pay to rent a 3rd party wine storage facility. We probably have a couple hundred bottles. They're pretty well organized but to suggest that we'd notice if ONE went missing is far-fetched. What do folks do about their wine shelves???

Wine is easy.

You hide all the wine openers in your tampon or underwear drawer.

Unless you are buying Boones Strawberry Hill screw top, wine is difficult for people, even adults, to open.

No corkscrew, no wine.

Wine is not usually what teenager steal. Vodka or anything else that looks like water.

We didn't and both my high achieving seemingly straight arrow kids admitted they took vodka. One replaced it with water. The other apparently had watered down vodka.