{"id":58285,"date":"2012-10-03T10:36:43","date_gmt":"2012-10-03T14:36:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/?p=58285"},"modified":"2012-10-03T10:37:33","modified_gmt":"2012-10-03T14:37:33","slug":"hate-my-kids-friends-204","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/hate-my-kids-friends-204\/","title":{"rendered":"I Hate My Kid’s Friends Because Their Parents Forgot To Teach Them Manners"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Yeah, yeah, before you get all mom-judgey on me, I love kids. I am nice to all kids. But secretly other people’s kids annoy the hell out of me and even worse, I blame you, dear parent, for failing to raise a kid I can find tolerable. When they are at your house, do you let your kids walk all over the house in muddy shoes after kicking a ball around the garden? Do you tolerate them crying because you said “no” to a second helping of ice cream? Do you really allow them to talk to you in that tone of voice? Because my house is not some magical playground of bad behavior. They didn’t suddenly walk through my door and learn how to be rude little punkasses incapable of saying “please” or picking up 900 toys after playing with them. They had to have learned that sort of behavior is okay somewhere, and I bet it was at your<\/em> house, the place they live in.<\/p>\n

I’m not trying to be controversial. You know you feel the same way. With the weekend approaching some of you are planing on hosting play dates or sleepovers with a kid you cannot stand and you are all ready dreading it. The kid isn’t evil or harmful to your kid. They just aren’t fun to be around. And they have bad manners. And they probably don’t smell that great. And they baby talk. Don’t even get me started on the baby talk. But the biggest telling factor of these kids is that when the mom or dad drops them off they look almost gleeful about it, because you are the one who has to deal with their precious little monster for a certain amount of time and they don’t.<\/p>\n

My kids aren’t perfect. Well, they are, truly, amazingly great. Why? Because this is how I have raised them. When I schedule a play date at your house I remind my kids of how they are expected to behave as a guest in someone’s home. I remind them to say “please” and “thank you” and to ask how the parent of their friend is doing. A simple “How are you?” is easy for even a small child to remember if you teach them how to ask this question.I remind them that they have to help clean up toys and carry dishes to the sink, just like they are expected to do at home. I tell them to offer to help grownups if they see an adult straightening up. When I drop them for a play date I expect them to greet the grownup who answers the door in a polite manner and say thank you for having them over. I kiss them goodbye and say “Remember your manners.” I text or call the parent and ask if my child is behaving. And then when I pick them up I make them say goodbye politely and thank the adult for having them over.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I assume I go about this the right way because the parents of the kids my kids play with always compliment me on my kid’s behavior and manners. I’m told my children are a joy to have around and “no trouble.” Sure, these parents could be lying to me and my kids could be acting like total jerks when out of my sight but I assume that if there were issues I’d be made aware of them. I make a strong effort to raise kids who are fun to be with, who won’t grow up to be insufferable assholes who don’t know to offer a seat to a pregnant woman or who drink all the good wine when they are guests at a dinner party.<\/p>\n

I’m always amazed at the parents who don’t instill a sense of manners in their children. Who excuse their kid’s atrocious behavior when they witness it by saying “Oh, they are just tired” or ” I don’t know what’s gotten into them.” No, you know what has gotten into them, because the same kid who is chasing my dog around the yard with a stick while you have a coffee with me and try to engage in adult conversation pulls this same shit at home. Don’t feign shock at your kid telling my kid to “shut up” when they told their dad that same thing over dinner last night.<\/p>\n

We, as parents, owe it to the world to raise these humans so they don’t grow up to be total assholes. Manners aren’t some weird, archaic tradition that shouldn’t be taught the same as teeth brushing and looking both ways before crossing the street. Being polite and kind and helpful is a dying art. I make my kids learn these things with as much diligence as I approach them learning math and English. Every parent knows a kid or twelve who they hate having come over because the kid has zero social skills and acts like a monster. But we let them come over anyway, because we hope our own kids don’t emulate their behavior and start acting like creeps too.<\/p>\n

I’m not going to lecture or discipline your kid while they are at my house unless they are doing something dangerous or truly unacceptable. I will call you and have you come over and deal with them. And if the worse they are doing is forgetting to say “please” and wiping their hands on my $200 tablecloth and tracking mud all over my floors, well, that won’t get them on the ban list from visiting my house. I will just quietly seethe inside and judge you for raising a future Kim Kardashian<\/a>.<\/p>\n

(Photo:\u00a0JPagetRFphotos<\/a>\/Shutterstock<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I hate my kid’s friends. Clarification, I hate all of my kid’s friends except for two of them. The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21280,"featured_media":58296,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_kadence_starter_templates_imported_post":false,"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,77,526],"tags":[7353],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":3,"label":"Childrearing"},{"value":77,"label":"mom fun"},{"value":526,"label":"mommy wars"}],"post_tag":[{"value":7353,"label":"gallery"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/shutterstock_35866462-640x427.jpg",640,427,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Eve Vawter","author_link":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/author\/evevawter\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":3,"name":"Childrearing","slug":"childrearing","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Get childrearing advice and read blog articles about how to raise your kids. Get advice for moms on how to be a good parent.\r\n","parent":0,"count":5343,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":3,"category_count":5343,"category_description":"Get childrearing advice and read blog articles about how to raise your kids. Get advice for moms on how to be a good parent.\r\n","cat_name":"Childrearing","category_nicename":"childrearing","category_parent":0},{"term_id":77,"name":"mom fun","slug":"mom-fun","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":977,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":3,"count":448,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":77,"category_count":448,"category_description":"","cat_name":"mom fun","category_nicename":"mom-fun","category_parent":3},{"term_id":526,"name":"mommy wars","slug":"mommy-wars","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":979,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Mommy wars can occur when two moms are caring for a child. Learn the best way to deal with other mothers raising a child\r\n","parent":6,"count":24,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":526,"category_count":24,"category_description":"Mommy wars can occur when two moms are caring for a child. Learn the best way to deal with other mothers raising a child\r\n","cat_name":"mommy wars","category_nicename":"mommy-wars","category_parent":6}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":7353,"name":"gallery","slug":"gallery-2","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":7444,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":2500,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58285"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21280"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mommyish.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}